" His love for practical
joking during the California days brought him unpopularity; and one
reads in a San Francisco paper of the early days: "There have been
moments in the lives of various kind-hearted and respectable citizens of
California and Nevada, when, if Mark Twain were before them as members
of a vigilance committee for any mild crime, such as mule-stealing or
arson, it is to be feared his shrift would have been short. What a
dramatic picture the idea conjures up, to be sure! Mark, before these
honest men, infuriated by his practical jokes, trying to show them what
an innocent creature he was when it came to mules, or how the only
policy of fire insurance he held had lapsed, how void of guile he was in
any direction, and all with that inimitable drawl, that perplexed
countenance and peculiar scraping of the left foot, like a boy speaking
his first piece at school." If he just escaped disaster, he likewise
just escaped millions; on one occasion, for the space of a few moments,
he owned the famous Comstock Lode, which was, though he never suspected
it, worth millions.
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