Transcribed from the 1909 Harper & Brothers edition byDavid Price, . Proofing by Alan Ross,Ana Charlton and David.
FROM MY AUTOBIOGRAPHY
MarkTwain
harper &brothers publishers
new york and london
M C M I X
Scattered here and there through the stacks of unpublishedmanuscript which constitute this formidable Autobiography andDiary of mine, certain chapters will in some distant future befound which deal with “Claimants”—claimantshistorically notorious: Satan, Claimant; the Golden Calf,Claimant; the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, Claimant; Louis XVII.,Claimant; William Shakespeare, Claimant; Arthur Orton, Claimant;Mary Baker G. Eddy, Claimant—and the rest of them. Eminent Claimants, successful Claimants, defeated Claimants,royal Claimants, pleb Claimants, showy Claimants, shabbyClaimants, revered Claimants, despised Claimants, twinklestarlike here and there and yonder through the mists of historyand legend and tradition—and oh, all the darling tribe areclothed in mystery and romance, and we read about them with deepinterest and discuss them with loving sympathy or with rancorousresentment, according to which side we hitch ourselves to. It has always been so with the human race. There was nevera Claimant that couldn’t get a hearing, nor one thatcouldn’t accumulate a rapturous following, no matter howflimsy and apparently unauthentic his claim might be. Arthur Orton’s claim that he was the lost Tichborne baronetcome to life again was as flimsy as Mrs. Eddy’s that shewrote Science and Health from the direct dictation of theDeity; yet in England near forty years ago Orton had a huge armyof devotees and incorrigible adherents, many of whom remainedstubbornly unconvinced after their fat god had been proven animpostor and jailed as a perjurer, and to-day Mrs. Eddy’sfollowing is not only immense, but is daily augmenting in numbersand enthusiasm. Orton had many fine and educated mindsamong his adherents, Mrs. Eddy has had the like among hers fromthe beginning. Her church is as well equipped in thoseparticulars as is any other church. Claimants can alwayscount upon a following, it doesn’t matter who they are, norwhat they claim, nor whether they come with documents orwithout. It was always so. Down out of thelong-vanished past, across the abyss of the ages, if you listenyou can still hear the believing multitudes shouting for PerkinWarbeck and Lambert Simnel.
A friend has sent me a new book, from England—TheShakespeare Problem Restated—well restated and closelyreasoned; and my fifty years’ interest in thatmatter—asleep for the last three years—is excitedonce more. It is an interest which was born of DeliaBacon’s book—away back in that ancientday—1857, or maybe 1856. About a year later mypilot-master, Bixby, transferred me from his own steamboat to thePennsylvania, and placed me under the orders andinstructions of George Ealer—dead now, these many, manyyears. I steered for him a good many months—as wasthe humble duty of the pilot-apprentice: stood a daylight watchand spun the wheel under the severe superintendence andcorrection of the master. He was a prime chess player andan idolater of Shakespeare. He would play chess withanybody; even with me, and it cost his official dignity somethingto do that. Also—quite uninvited—he would readShakespeare to me; not just casually, but by the hour, when itwas his watch, and I was steering. He read well, but notprofitably for me, because he constantly injected commands intothe text. That broke it all up, mixed i