Recollections of a Varied Life

Then she told me the history of the room, explaining that she objected to any talk about it because she dreaded the suspicion of superstition. Briefly the story was that several...

My school district lay not many miles from the little town in which my family lived, and as I had a good pair of legs, well used to walking, I went home every Friday night, retu...

I believe that every human being born into this world has a right to do as he pleases, so long as in doing as he pleases he does not interfere with the equal right of any other...

The rest, as I was convinced, were guilty, every man of them. But equally I was convinced that a court-martial, if left to deal with them in its own way, would condemn them whet...

It was about that time that my work as literary editor of the _Evening Post_ brought to my attention two cases of what I may call more distinguished plagiarism. Mrs. Wister, a g...

A roar of applause welcomed the suggestion, and Mr. Clemens proceeded to make the speech. In the course of it he spoke of the multitude of young authors who beset every publishe...

"Good-afternoon," was absolutely his only word of parting, and after he had gone I wondered if I had presumed too much in the fearless expression of my opinions or in combating...

"'He was--but he is a pacha, now,' answered the dragoman with that air of mysterious reserve which is a part of his stock in trade. Then the rascal went on to tell the tourist t...

So great were the jealousies and ambitions to which I have referred that early in the meeting Mr. Gilder--I think it was he--called three or four of us into a corner and suggest...

The restful leisureliness of the life in Virginia was borne in upon me on every hand, I suppose my nerves had really been upon a strain during all the seventeen years that I had...

This left me "out of a job," but altogether happy. I was very tired. I had had but one week's vacation during my arduous service on _Hearth and Home_. I had removed to an old Du...

As a bit of destructive criticism, this was complete and perfect. But the writer spoiled it by going on to write a column of less trenchant matter, trampling, as it were, and qu...

Authors are supposed to be an unbusinesslike set, who do not know enough of affairs to manage their personal finances in a way to save themselves from poverty. Perhaps the judgm...

In the case of "A Man of Honor" the end was not yet. Mrs. Stannard's novel with that title and the footnote was still in its early months of American circulation when one day I...

About a year later, or a little less, my editorial connection with the _Union_ ceased, and with it my official association with Mr. Tilton. But he and I lived not far apart in B...

In one case of the kind that fell to my share there was a rather dramatic outcome. I was acting as a literary adviser for Harper & Brothers, when there came to me for judgment t...

There was at one time a good deal of speculation as to whose brain had made the phenomenal success of the all-daring _World_ experiment in journalism. I think I know all about t...

The prevalence of the dialect among the uneducated classes was indeed, though indirectly, a ministry to the cause of good English. The educated few, fearing contamination of the...

Newspaper employments of the better sort were not easy to get in those days, and my immediate superiors in the office interpreted Mr. Bowen's utterance to mean that he contempla...

While Mr. Bryant shrank from the delivery of opinions concerning the moderns, his judgments of the older writers of English literature were fully formed and very positive. He kn...

"Now listen," said Edward. "You call that American piracy, and you overlook the piracy on the other side. Your father's book has sold so many thousand copies in America"--giving...

Often Mr. Briggs's brusquerie and pugnacity were exaggerated, or even altogether assumed by way of hiding a sentiment too tender to be exhibited. Still more frequently the harsh...

The first railroad in Indiana was opened in 1847. A year or two later, my brother Edward and I, made our first journey over it, from Madison to Dupont, a distance of thirteen mi...

"I want you to go into the Maynard case," said Mr. Pulitzer to me, "with an absolutely unprejudiced mind. We hold no brief for or against him, as you know. I want you to get tog...

"I remember very well," he said, "that I often thought I ought to write out my recollections of Kossuth, but I can't remember that I ever did so. I remember taking myself to tas...

I have recorded Mr. Schurz's words here, as nearly as a trained memory allows me to do, not with the smallest concern for the political issues of nine years ago, but solely beca...

New York _Evening Post_, 68, 129, 131, 137, 140, 142, 143; character under Bryant and Godwin, 187-189; G. C. Eggleston literary editor, 192-194; use of English, 209-213; book re...

XLII. The "Hoosier Schoolmaster's" Influence--Hearth and Home Friendships and Literary Acquaintance--My First Book--Mr. Howells and "A Rebel's Recollections"--My First After-Din...

"The House of the Heart" (Morality Play)--"The Gooseherd and the Goblin" (Comedy, suitable for June exercises)--"The Enchanted Garden" (Flower Play, suitable for June exercises)...