February 27 Thursday – Sam’s MARK TWAIN’S LETTERS FROM WASHINGTON, NUMBER VII dated Jan. 30 ran in the Enterprise. Sections included: “More Westonism,” “Impeachment,” “Harry Worthington,” “Mormonism,” and:
Judge McCorkle.
They report that this homely old friend of mine—this ancient denizen of California and Nevada—the wrinkled, aged, knock-kneed, ringboned and spavined old war-horse of the Plains is to be married shortly to a handsome young Ohio widow worth Three Hundred Thousand Dollars. Well. What is the world coming to, anyhow? If any man had told me a week ago that any woman in her right mind and under 70 would be willing to marry that old fossil!—that old tunnel—that old dilapidated quartz mill—I would never, never have believed it. He is a splendid man, you know, but then he must be as much as 92 or 93 years old. He is one of my nearest personal friends, but what of that? I would remain a bachelor a century before I would marry such a rusty, used up old arastra as he is. I have always considered that I ought to fairly expect to marry about seventeen thousand dollars, but I think differently now. If McCorkle ranges at three hundred thousand in the market, I will raise my margin to about a million and a half [MTP].
Sam’s undated letter, “Concerning Gideon’s Band,” which ran in the Washington Morning Chronicle on this date, focused on Gideon Welles (1802-1878), Secretary of the Navy from 1861-9. His buildup of the Navy was instrumental in the defeat of the South [Camfield, bibliog.]. Note: Reprinted in the Hartford Courant Mar. 2 as “Mark Twain on the Crisis,” and in other newspapers, including The Oregonian on Apr. 24. From Sam’s letter:
Mr. Editor: — I see it stated that that staunch old salt, Mr. Gideon Welles, is going to rally to the protection of the President with his 400 marines. Do you know if that party is entirely made up? I would like very much to belong to Gideon’s Band. Here’s my heart and here’s my hand. I want to rally to the rescue a little. I am competent. I have been to sea a good deal, and have seen some service as a boarder on shore; besides, I have some entertaining stories to relate, which I have never got anybody to believe yet, and I wish to tell them to these marines.
We can gain the victory in this enterprise. In the old times there were only 300 noble Democrats in Gideon’s Band and they triumphed. Every Democrat took a horn. Every Democrat carried his own jug. Just arm us 400 modern Democrats as we have been armed for three thousand years; give us a jug apiece and sound the tocsin of war! Avast! Ahoy! Way for Gideon’s Band!
MARK TWAIN