Roe:"
"Had an old horse whose name was Methusalem,
Took him down and sold him in Jerusalem,
A long time ago."
Pretending to be surprised and startled at the burst of applause, he
sprang up and began to talk. How the audience enjoyed it!
Mark Twain continued his lecture tour into December, and then, on the
15th of that month, sailed by way of the Isthmus of Panama for New York.
He had made some money, and was going home to see his people. He had
planned to make a trip around the world later, contributing a series of
letters to the "Alta California," lecturing where opportunity afforded.
He had been on the Coast five and a half years, and to his professions of
printing and piloting had added three others--mining, journalism, and
lecturing. Also, he had acquired a measure of fame. He could come back
to his people with a good account of his absence and a good heart for the
future.
But it seems now only a chance that he arrived at all. Crossing the
Isthmus, he embarked for New York on what proved to be a cholera ship.
For a time there were one or more funerals daily. An entry in his diary
says:
"Since the last two hours all laughter, all levity, has ceased on the
ship--a settled gloom is upon the faces of the passengers.
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