Mark Twain, A Biography 1907-1910 | Page 7

no break in the line of callers.
Clemens's resolutions for secluding himself were swept away. On the
very next morning following his arrival he breakfasted with J. Henniker
Heaton, father of International Penny Postage, at the Bath Club, just
across Dover Street from Brown's. He lunched at the Ritz with Marjorie
Bowen and Miss Bisland. In the afternoon he sat for photographs at
Barnett's, and made one or two calls. He could no more resist these
things than a debutante in her first season.
He was breakfasting again with Heaton next morning; lunching with
"Toby, M.P.," and Mrs. Lucy; and having tea with Lady Stanley in the
afternoon, and being elaborately dined next day at Dorchester House by
Ambassador and Mrs. Reid. These were all old and tried friends. He
was not a stranger among them, he said; he was at home. Alfred Austin,
Conan Doyle, Anthony Hope, Alma Tadema, E. A. Abbey, Edmund
Goss, George Smalley, Sir Norman Lockyer, Henry W. Lucy, Sidney

Brooks, and Bram Stoker were among those at Dorchester House--all
old comrades, as were many of the other guests.
"I knew fully half of those present," he said afterward.
Mark Twain's bursting upon London society naturally was made the
most of by the London papers, and all his movements were tabulated
and elaborated, and when there was any opportunity for humor in the
situation it was not left unimproved. The celebrated Ascot racing-cup
was stolen just at the time of his arrival, and the papers suggestively
mingled their head-lines, "Mark Twain Arrives: Ascot Cup Stolen," and
kept the joke going in one form or another. Certain state jewels and
other regalia also disappeared during his stay, and the news of these
burglaries was reported in suspicious juxtaposition with the news of
Mark Twain's doings.
English reporters adopted American habits for the occasion, and
invented or embellished when the demand for a new sensation was
urgent. Once, when following the custom of the place, he descended
the hotel elevator in a perfectly proper and heavy brown bath robe, and
stepped across narrow Dover Street to the Bath Club, the papers flamed
next day with the story that Mark Twain had wandered about the lobby
of Brown's and promenaded Dover Street in a sky-blue bath robe
attracting wide attention.
Clara Clemens, across the ocean, was naturally a trifle disturbed by
such reports, and cabled this delicate "dusting off":
"Much worried. Remember proprieties."
To which he answered:
"They all pattern after me," a reply to the last degree characteristic.
It was on the fourth day after his arrival, June 22d, that he attended the
King's garden-party at Windsor Castle. There were eighty-five hundred
guests at the King's party, and if we may judge from the London
newspapers, Mark Twain was quite as much a figure in that great
throng as any member of the royal family. His presentation to the King
and the Queen is set down as an especially notable incident, and their
conversation is quite fully given. Clemens himself reported:
His Majesty was very courteous. In the course of the conversation I
reminded him of an episode of fifteen years ago, when I had the honor
to walk a mile with him when he was taking the waters at Homburg, in
Germany. I said that I had often told about that episode, and that

whenever I was the historian I made good history of it and it was worth
listening to, but that it had found its way into print once or twice in
unauthentic ways and was badly damaged thereby. I said I should like
to go on repeating this history, but that I should be quite fair and
reasonably honest, and while I should probably never tell it twice in the
same way I should at least never allow it to deteriorate in my hands.
His Majesty intimated his willingness that I should continue to
disseminate that piece of history; and he added a compliment, saying
that he knew good and sound history would not suffer at my hands, and
that if this good and sound history needed any improvement beyond the
facts he would trust me to furnish that improvement.
I think it is not an exaggeration to say that the Queen looked as young
and beautiful as she did thirty-five years ago when I saw her first. I did
not say this to her, because I learned long ago never to say the obvious
thing, but leave the obvious thing to commonplace and inexperienced
people to say. That she still looked to me as young and beautiful as she
did thirty-five years ago is good evidence that ten thousand people have
already noticed this and have mentioned it to her. I could have said it
and spoken the truth, but I was too wise for