were written for publication, and are rather a poor attempt at

burlesque humor--their chief feature being a pretended illiteracy

--they would seem to bear no relation to this collection. He roomed

that winter with a rugged, self-educated Scotchman--a mechanic, but

a man of books and philosophies, who left an impress on Mark Twain's

mental life.

In April he took up once more the journey toward South America, but

presently forgot the Amazon altogether in the new career that opened

to him. All through his boyhood and youth Samuel Clemens had wanted

to be a pilot. Now came the long-deferred opportunity. On the

little Cincinnati steamer, the Paul Jones, there was a pilot named

Horace Bixby. Young Clemens idling in the pilot-house was one

morning seized with the old ambition, and laid siege to Bixby to

teach him the river. The terms finally agreed upon specified a fee

to Bixby of five hundred dollars, one hundred down, the balance when

the pupil had completed the course and was earning money. But all

this has been told in full elsewhere, and is only summarized here

because the letters fail to complete the story.

Bixby soon made some trips up the Missouri River, and in his absence

turned his apprentice, or "cub," over to other pilots, such being

the river custom. Young Clemens, in love with the life, and a

favorite with his superiors, had a happy time until he came under a

pilot named Brown. Brown was illiterate and tyrannical, and from

the beginning of their association pilot and apprentice disliked

The Letters Of Mark Twain, Complete