The principal request is for some incident that may prove helpful to the
young. There were a lot of incidents in my career to help me along
--sometimes they helped me along faster than I wanted to go.
Here is such a request. It is a telegram from Joplin, Missouri, and it
reads: "In what one of your works can we find the definition of a
gentleman?"
I have not answered that telegram, either; I couldn't. It seems to me
that if any man has just merciful and kindly instincts he would be a
gentleman, for he would need nothing else in the world.
I received the other day a letter from my old friend, William Dean
Howells--Howells, the head of American literature. No one is able to
stand with him. He is an old, old friend of mine, and he writes me,
"To-morrow I shall be sixty-nine years old." Why, I am surprised at
Howells writing that! I have known him longer than that. I'm sorry to
see a man trying to appear so young. Let's see. Howells says now,
"I see you have been burying Patrick. I suppose he was old, too."
No, he was never old--Patrick. He came to us thirty-six years ago. He
was my coachman on the morning that I drove my young bride to our new
home.
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