WH CHAPTER V PONKAPOG 1874-1880 THEN in the autumn of 1874 Aldrich moved his household goods and gods to Ponkapog, he was thirty-eight years old; he had labored for twenty years in the editorial mill; he had published seven volumes of verse and four of prose; and he had decisively established himself as one of the most delightful writers of his generation in both branches of literature. It was, therefore, with a serene and happy confidence that, after the final dissolution of "Every Saturday," he retired to his Sabine Farm, to taste the joys of entire freedom as only a weary editor can, and to realize the dream so dear to the heart of every man of letters of "doing his own work" secure from interruption. The five years to come were in a sense the most "literary" of his life. He had time at last to read, and his letters begin to reflect a new and broader interest in the methods of literary art, other men's art. He was, too, in his own writing, as he wrote Mr. Howells, "as prolific as the little old woman who lived in a shoe." The "Atlantic Monthly" was ready to take as much copy as he could send, and between 1875 and 1880 he printed in its pages twentythree poems, "The Queen of Sheba," "The Stillwater Tragedy," and most of the sketches that carry the reader "From Ponkapog to Pesth," or very nearly one half of his entire collected work in prose. The happiness that he found in his leisure for the work he loved best was reënforced by numerous pleasant factors in his daily life. He spent many hours with his boys, fishing for perch and pickerel in Ponkapog Pond; and, whenever he felt the need of a more mature companion he could depend on the comradeship of his nearest neighbor, Hon. Henry L. Pierce, who was destined for the next quarter of a century to hold a more intimate place in our poet's friendship than any one else outside his kindred. In December, 1874, Aldrich, desirous of embellishing therewith his library at Ponkapog, asked Mark Twain for his picture. Mr. Clemens obligingly began sending him one a day. After two weeks Aldrich mildly protested against the photographic deluge, with the result that, on New Year's Day, 1875, he received twenty separate copies of the effigies of Mr. Clemens, in twenty separate covers. The episode was the occasion of a brace of entertaining letters which reflect something of the exhilaration with which he entered upon his new life: PONKAPOG, MASS., Dec. 22, 1874. MY DEAR CLEMENS, - When I subscribed to "The Weekly Photograph" I had some doubts as to whether I should get the numbers regularly. The police, you know, have a way of swooping down on that kind of publication. The other day they gobbled up an entire edition of "The Life in New York." I trust that the "Life" of Hartford (or any other place he happens to be in) will not come to grief that way. It is a good portrait. Looks like a man who has just thrown off an epic in twelve books, for relaxation. I was glad to get the picture of where you live. It is apparently a comfortable little shanty. Cosy, and all that sort of thing. But you ought to see my Mansion at Ponkapog. It could n't have cost less than $1500 to build. And then the land. Land at Ponkapog brings $25 per acre; but then real estate has gone up everywhere. The soil there is so light that it would go up of itself, if you let it alone. They have to put manure on it to keep it down. The house is furnished in a style of Oriental splendor. Straw matting everywhere - even in the servants' rooms straw matting. It's as common with us as Turkey rugs and Wilton carpets in the houses of the poor. Of course you can't have these things, but you are content. I like to see a man living within his means and content. That day after I left you, or you left me, or we left each other - I don't know how to state the sorrowful occurrence correctly I went out and hunted up old Howells and carried him off with me to my suburban Palace. He wandered from room to room bewildered by the fluted pillars (on the beds!) and the gorgeous architecture of the coal-bins. We wished for you, but that goes without saying. Howells got to laughing in the early part of the evening, did n't let up at all, carried him off to bed at 1⁄2 past 11, still laughing-the same old laugh he had started at 7 o'clock. I woke up two or three times somewhere near daybreak, and he was a-going it! . . . Yours always, T. B. ALDRICH. POLICE HEADQUARTERS, PONKAPOG, MASS., Jan. 1, 1875 SIR, — At 4 P. M. this day, the entire Constabulary force of Ponkapog-consisting of two men and a resolute boy -broke camp on the border of Wampumsoagg Pond, and took up its march in four columns to the scene of action the post-office. There they formed in a hollow square, and moved upon the postmaster. The mail had already arrived, but the post agent refused to deliver it to the force. The truculent official was twice run through a mince-meat machine before he would disclose the place where he had secreted the mail-bag. The mail-bag was then unstitched with the aid of one of Wheeler & Wilson's sewing-machines and the contents examined. The bag, as was suspected, contained additional evidence of the dreadful persecution that is going on in our midst. There were found no fewer that 20 (twenty) of those seditious, iniquitous, diabolical and highly objectionable prints, engravings, and photographs, which have lately been showered-perhaps hurled would be the better word-upon Mr. Thomas Bailey Aldrich, a respectable and inoffensive citizen of Ponkapog. The perpetrator of the outrage is known to the police, and they are on his track in your city. An engraving with a green background, in which was a sprawling yellow We implore the I- of today Knowledge receipt complete. The Publisher FB. Aldrich lagy 萬 MARK TWAIN IN 1874, DRAWN BY HIMSELF Farmington Abrnur, Hartford. Dec. 31/74. The Latest over |