Chapters from My Autobiography

Оглавление

Mark Twain. Chapters from My Autobiography

Introduction

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

Chapters From My Autobiography. – V. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – VI. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – VII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – VIII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – IX. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – X. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XI. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XIII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XIV. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XV. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XVI. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XVII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XVIII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XIX. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XX. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XXI. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XXII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XXIII. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XXIV. By Mark Twain

Chapters From My Autobiography. – XXV. By Mark Twain

Отрывок из книги

Back of the Virginia Clemenses is a dim procession of ancestors stretching back to Noah’s time. According to tradition, some of them were pirates and slavers in Elizabeth’s time. But this is no discredit to them, for so were Drake and Hawkins and the others. It was a respectable trade, then, and monarchs were partners in it. In my time I have had desires to be a pirate myself. The reader – if he will look deep down in his secret heart, will find – but never mind what he will find there; I am not writing his Autobiography, but mine. Later, according to tradition, one of the procession was Ambassador to Spain in the time of James I, or of Charles I, and married there and sent down a strain of Spanish blood to warm us up. Also, according to tradition, this one or another – Geoffrey Clement, by name – helped to sentence Charles to death.

I have not examined into these traditions myself, partly because I was indolent, and partly because I was so busy polishing up this end of the line and trying to make it showy; but the other Clemenses claim that they have made the examination and that it stood the test. Therefore I have always taken for granted that I did help Charles out of his troubles, by ancestral proxy. My instincts have persuaded me, too. Whenever we have a strong and persistent and ineradicable instinct, we may be sure that it is not original with us, but inherited – inherited from away back, and hardened and perfected by the petrifying influence of time. Now I have been always and unchangingly bitter against Charles, and I am quite certain that this feeling trickled down to me through the veins of my forebears from the heart of that judge; for it is not my disposition to be bitter against people on my own personal account I am not bitter against Jeffreys. I ought to be, but I am not. It indicates that my ancestors of James II’s time were indifferent to him; I do not know why; I never could make it out; but that is what it indicates. And I have always felt friendly toward Satan. Of course that is ancestral; it must be in the blood, for I could not have originated it.

.....

As a child, Susy had a passionate temper; and it cost her much remorse and many tears before she learned to govern it, but after that it was a wholesome salt, and her character was the stronger and healthier for its presence. It enabled her to be good with dignity; it preserved her not only from being good for vanity’s sake, but from even the appearance of it. In looking back over the long vanished years, it seems but natural and excusable that I should dwell with longing affection and preference upon incidents of her young life which made it beautiful to us, and that I should let its few small offences go unsummoned and unreproached.

In the summer of 1880, when Susy was just eight years of age, the family were at Quarry Farm, as usual at that season of the year. Hay-cutting time was approaching, and Susy and Clara were counting the hours, for the time was big with a great event for them; they had been promised that they might mount the wagon and ride home from the fields on the summit of the hay mountain. This perilous privilege, so dear to their age and species, had never been granted them before. Their excitement had no bounds. They could talk of nothing but this epoch-making adventure, now. But misfortune overtook Susy on the very morning of the important day. In a sudden outbreak of passion, she corrected Clara – with a shovel, or stick, or something of the sort. At any rate, the offence committed was of a gravity clearly beyond the limit allowed in the nursery. In accordance with the rule and custom of the house, Susy went to her mother to confess, and to help decide upon the size and character of the punishment due. It was quite understood that, as a punishment could have but one rational object and function – to act as a reminder, and warn the transgressor against transgressing in the same way again – the children would know about as well as any how to choose a penalty which would be rememberable and effective. Susy and her mother discussed various punishments, but none of them seemed adequate. This fault was an unusually serious one, and required the setting up of a danger-signal in the memory that would not blow out nor burn out, but remain a fixture there and furnish its saving warning indefinitely. Among the punishments mentioned was deprivation of the hay-wagon ride. It was noticeable that this one hit Susy hard. Finally, in the summing up, the mother named over the list and asked:

.....