Of such sort were the books that Mark Twain had loved best, and such were a few of his words concerning them. Some of them belong to his earlier reading, and among these is Darwin's 'Descent of Man', a book whose influence was always present, though I believe he did not read it any more in later years. In the days I knew him he read steadily not much besides Suetonius and Pepys and Carlyle. These and his simple astronomies and geologies and the Morte Arthure and the poems of Kipling were seldom far from his hand.
CCLXXXVIII. A BERMUDA BIRTHDAY
It was the middle of November, 1909, when Clemens decided to take another Bermuda vacation, and it was the 19th that we sailed. I went to New York a day ahead and arranged matters, and on the evening of the 18th received the news that Richard Watson Gilder had suddenly died.
Next morning there was other news. Clemens's old friend, William M. Laffan, of the Sun, had died while undergoing a surgical operation. I met Clemens at the train. He had already heard about Gilder; but he had not yet learned of Laffan's death. He said:
“That's just it. Gilder and Laffan get all the good things that come along and I never get anything.”
Then, suddenly remembering, he added:
“How curious it is! I have been thinking of Laffan coming down on the train, and mentally writing a letter to him on this Stetson-Eddy affair.”
I asked when he had begun thinking of Laffan.
He said: “Within the hour.”