Chapter XXVI: The First Newspaper

by Mark Twain

　　When I told the king I was going out disguised asa petty freeman to scour the country andfamiliarize myself with the humbler life of the people,he was all afire with the novelty of the thing in aminute, and was bound to take a chance in the adventure himself -- nothing should stop him -- he woulddrop everything and go along -- it was the prettiestidea he had run across for many a day. He wantedto glide out the back way and start at once; but Ishowed him that that wouldn't answer. You see, hewas billed for the king's-evil -- to touch for it, I mean-- and it wouldn't be right to disappoint the houseand it wouldn't make a delay worth considering, anyway, it was only a one-night stand. And I thoughthe ought to tell the queen he was going away. Heclouded up at that and looked sad. I was sorry I hadspoken, especially when he said mournfully:"Thou forgettest that Launcelot is here; and whereLauncelot is, she noteth not the going forth of theking, nor what day he returneth."Of course, I changed the Subject. Yes, Gueneverwas beautiful, it is true, but take her all around shewas pretty slack. I never meddled in these matters,they weren't my affair, but I did hate to see the waythings were going on, and I don't mind saying thatmuch. Many's the time she had asked me, "SirBoss, hast seen Sir Launcelot about?" but if ever shewent fretting around for the king I didn't happen to bearound at the time.There was a very good lay-out for the king's-evilbusiness -- very tidy and creditable. The king satunder a canopy of state; about him were clustered alarge body of the clergy in full canonicals. Conspicuous, both for location and personal outfit, stoodMarinel, a hermit of the quack-doctor species, tointroduce the sick. All abroad over the spaciousfloor, and clear down to the doors, in a thick jumble,lay or sat the scrofulous, under a strong light. Itwas as good as a tableau; in fact, it had all the lookof being gotten up for that, though it wasn't. Therewere eight hundred sick people present. The workwas slow; it lacked the interest of novelty for me,because I had seen the ceremonies before; the thingsoon became tedious, but the proprieties required meto stick it out. The doctor was there for the reasonthat in all such crowds there were many people whoonly imagined something was the matter with them,and many who were consciously sound but wanted theimmortal honor of fleshly contact with a king, and yetothers who pretended to illness in order to get thepiece of coin that went with the touch. Up to thistime this coin had been a wee little gold piece worthabout a third of a dollar. When you consider howmuch that amount of money would buy, in that ageand country, and how usual it was to be scrofulous,when not dead, you would understand that the annualking's-evil appropriation was just the River and Harborbill of that government for the grip it took on thetreasury and the chance it afforded for skinning thesurplus. So I had privately concluded to touch thetreasury itself for the king's-evil. I covered sixsevenths of the appropriation into the treasury a weekbefore starting from Camelot on my adventures, andordered that the other seventh be inflated into fivecent nickels and delivered into the hands of the headclerk of the King's Evil Department; a nickel to takethe place of each gold coin, you see, and do its workfor it. It might strain the nickel some, but I judged itcould stand it. As a rule, I do not approve of watering stock, but I considered it square enough in thiscase, for it was just a gift, anyway. Of course, youcan water a gift as much as you want to; and I generally do. The old gold and silver coins of the countrywere of ancient and unknown origin, as a rule, butsome of them were Roman; they were ill-shapen, andseldom rounder than a moon that is a week past thefull; they were hammered, not minted, and they wereso worn with use that the devices upon them were asillegible as blisters, and looked like them. I judgedthat a sharp, bright new nickel, with a first-rate likeness of the king on one side of it and Guenever on theother, and a blooming pious motto, would take thetuck out of scrofula as handy as a nobler coin andplease the scrofulous fancy more; and I was right.This batch was the first it was tried on, and it workedto a charm. The saving in expense was a notableeconomy. You will see that by these figures: Wetouched a trifle over 700 of the 800 patients; at formerrates, this would have cost the government about$240; at the new rate we pulled through for about$35, thus saving upward of $200 at one swoop. Toappreciate the full magnitude of this stroke, considerthese other figures: the annual expenses of a nationalgovernment amount to the equivalent of a contributionof three days' average wages of every individual of thepopulation, counting every individual as if he were aman. If you take a nation of 60,000,000, whereaverage wages are $2 per day, three days' wages takenfrom each individual will provide $360,000,000 andpay the government's expenses. In my day, in myown country, this money was collected from imposts,and the citizen imagined that the foreign importer paidit, and it made him comfortable to think so; whereas,in fact, it was paid by the American people, and wasso equally and exactly distributed among them thatthe annual cost to the 100-millionaire and the annualcost to the sucking child of the day-laborer was precisely the same -- each paid $6. Nothing could beequaler than that, I reckon. Well, Scotland andIreland were tributary to Arthur, and the united populations of the British Islands amounted to somethingless than 1,000,000. A mechanic's average wage was3 cents a day, when he paid his own keep. By thisrule the national government's expenses were $90,000a year, or about $250 a day. Thus, by the substitution of nickels for gold on a king's-evil day, I notonly injured no one, dissatisfied no one, but pleasedall concerned and saved four-fifths of that day'snational expense into the bargain -- a saving whichwould have been the equivalent of $800,000 in myday in America. In making this substitution I haddrawn upon the wisdom of a very remote source -- thewisdom of my boyhood -- for the true statesman doesnot despise any wisdom, howsoever lowly may be itsorigin: in my boyhood I had always saved my penniesand contributed buttons to the foreign missionarycause. The buttons would answer the ignorant savageas well as the coin, the coin would answer me betterthan the buttons; all hands were happy and nobodyhurt.Marinel took the patients as they came. He examined the candidate; if he couldn't qualify he waswarned off; if he could he was passed along to theking. A priest pronounced the words, "They shalllay their hands on the sick, and they shall recover."Then the king stroked the ulcers, while the readingcontinued; finally, the patient graduated and got hisnickel -- the king hanging it around his neck himself --and was dismissed. Would you think that that wouldcure? It certainly did. Any mummery will cure ifthe patient's faith is strong in it. Up by Astolat therewas a chapel where the Virgin had once appeared to agirl who used to herd geese around there -- the girlsaid so herself -- and they built the chapel upon thatspot and hung a picture in it representing the occurrence -- a picture which you would think it dangerousfor a sick person to approach; whereas, on the contrary, thousands of the lame and the sick came andprayed before it every year and went away whole andsound; and even the well could look upon it and live.Of course, when I was told these things I did not believe them; but when I went there and saw them I hadto succumb. I saw the cures effected myself; andthey were real cures and not questionable. I sawcripples whom I had seen around Camelot for yearson crutches, arrive and pray before that picture, andput down their crutches and walk off without a limp.There were piles of crutches there which had been leftby such people as a testimony.In other places people operated on a patient's mind,without saying a word to him, and cured him. Inothers, experts assembled patients in a room andprayed over them, and appealed to their faith, andthose patients went away cured. Wherever you find aking who can't cure the king's-evil you can be surethat the most valuable superstition that supports histhrone -- the subject's belief in the divine appointmentof his sovereign -- has passed away. In my youth themonarchs of England had ceased to touch for the evil,but there was no occasion for this diffidence: theycould have cured it forty-nine times in fifty.Well, when the priest had been droning for threehours, and the good king polishing the evidences, andthe sick were still pressing forward as plenty as ever, Igot to feeling intolerably bored. I was sitting by anopen window not far from the canopy of state. Forthe five hundredth time a patient stood forward to havehis repulsivenesses stroked; again those words werebeing droned out: "they shall lay their hands on thesick" -- when outside there rang clear as a clarion anote that enchanted my soul and tumbled thirteenworthless centuries about my ears: "Camelot WeeklyHosannah and Literary Volcano! -- latest irruption --only two cents -- all about the big miracle in theValley of Holiness!" One greater than kings hadarrived -- the newsboy. But I was the only person inall that throng who knew the meaning of this mightybirth, and what this imperial magician was come intothe world to do.I dropped a nickel out of the window and got mypaper; the Adam-newsboy of the world went aroundthe corner to get my change; is around the corneryet. It was delicious to see a newspaper again, yet Iwas conscious of a secret shock when my eye fell uponthe first batch of display head-lines. I had lived in aclammy atmosphere of reverence, respect, deference,so long that they sent a quivery little cold wavethrough me:HIGH TIMES IN THE VALLEYOF HOLINESS!---THE WATER-WORKS CORKED!---BRER MERLIN WORKS HIS ARTS, BUT GETSLEFT?---But the Boss scores on his first Innings!---The Miraculous Well Uncorked amidawful outbursts ofINFERNAL FIRE AND SMOKEATHUNDER!---THE BUZZARD-ROOST ASTONISHED!---UNPARALLELED REJOIBINGS!-- and so on, and so on. Yes, it was too loud. OnceI could have enjoyed it and seen nothing out of theway about it, but now its note was discordant. It wasgood Arkansas journalism, but this was not Arkansas.Moreover, the next to the last line was calculated togive offense to the hermits, and perhaps lose us theiradvertising. Indeed, there was too lightsome a toneof flippancy all through the paper. It was plain I hadundergone a considerable change without noticing it.I found myself unpleasantly affected by pert littleirreverencies which would have seemed but proper andairy graces of speech at an earlier period of my life.There was an abundance of the following breed ofitems, and they discomforted me:LOCAL SMOKE AND CINDERS.Sir Launcelot met up with old KingAgrivance of Ireland unexpectedly lastweok over on the moor south of SirBalmoral le Merveilleuse's hog dasture.The widow has been notified.Expedition No. 3 will start adout thefirst of mext month on a search f8r SirSagramour le Desirous. It is in com and of the renowned Knight of the RedLawns, assissted by Sir Persant of Inde,who is compete9t. intelligent, courte ous, and in every way a brick, and fur tHer assisted by Sir Palamides the Sara cen, who is no huckleberry hinself.This is no pic-nic, these boys meanbusine&s.The readers of the Hosannah will re gret to learn that the hadndsome andpopular Sir Charolais of Gaul, who dur ing his four weeks' stay at the Bull andHalibut, this city, has won every heartby his polished manners and elegantcPnversation, will pUll out to-day forhome. Give us another call, Charley!The bdsiness end of the funeral ofthe late Sir Dalliance the duke's son ofCornwall, killed in an encounter withthe Giant of the Knotted Bludgeon lastTuesday on the borders of the Plain ofEnchantment was in the hands of theever affable and efficient Mumble,prince of un3ertakers, then whom thereexists none by whom it were a moresatisfying pleasure to have the last sadoffices performed. Give him a trial.The cordial thanks of the Hosannahoffice are due, from editor down todevil, to the ever courteous and thought ful Lord High Stew d of the Palace'sThird Assistant V t for several sau ceTs of ice crEam a quality calculatedto make the ey of the recipients hu mid with grt ude; and it done it.When this administration wants tochalk up a desirable name for earlypromotion, the Hosannah would like achance to sudgest.The Demoiselle Irene Dewlap, ofSouth Astolat, is visiting her uncle, thepopular host of the Cattlemen's Board ing Ho&se, Liver Lane, this city.Young Barker the bellows-mender ishoMe again, and looks much improvedby his vacation round-up among the out lying smithies. See his ad.Of course it was good enough journalism for a beginning; I knew that quite well, and yet it was somehow disappointing. The "Court Circular" pleasedme better; indeed, its simple and dignified respectfulness was a distinct refreshment to me after all thosedisgraceful familiarities. But even it could have beenimproved. Do what one may, there is no getting anair of variety into a court circular, I acknowledge that.There is a profound monotonousness about its factsthat baffles and defeats one's sincerest efforts to makethem sparkle and enthuse. The best way to manage --in fact, the only sensible way -- is to disguise repetitiousness of fact under variety of form: skin your facteach time and lay on a new cuticle of words. It deceives the eye; you think it is a new fact; it gives youthe idea that the court is carrying on like everything;this excites you, and you drain the whole column, witha good appetite, and perhaps never notice that it's abarrel of soup made out of a single bean. Clarence'sway was good, it was simple, it was dignified, it wasdirect and business-like; all I say is, it was not thebest way:COURT CIRCULAR.On Monday, the king rode in the park." Tuesday, " " "" Wendesday " " "" Thursday " " "" Friday, " " "" Saturday " " "" Sunday, " " "However, take the paper by and large, I was vastlypleased with it. Little crudities of a mechanical sortwere observable here and there, but there were notenough of them to amount to anything, and it wasgood enough Arkansas proof-reading, anyhow, andbetter than was needed in Arthur's day and realm.As a rule, the grammar was leaky and the construction more or less lame; but I did not much mind thesethings. They are common defects of my own, andone mustn't criticise other people on grounds where hecan't stand perpendicular himself.I was hungry enough for literature to want to takedown the whole paper at this one meal, but I got onlya few bites, and then had to postpone, because themonks around me besieged me so with eager questions: What is this curious thing? What is it for? Isit a handkerchief? -- saddle blanket? -- part of a shirt?What is it made of? How thin it is, and how daintyand frail; and how it rattles. Will it wear, do youthink, and won't the rain injure it? Is it writing thatappears on it, or is it only ornamentation? They suspected it was writing, because those among them whoknew how to read Latin and had a smattering ofGreek, recognized some of the letters, but they couldmake nothing out of the result as a whole. I put myinformation in the simplest form I could:"It is a public journal; I will explain what that is,another time. It is not cloth, it is made of paper;some time I will explain what paper is. The lines onit are reading matter; and not written by hand, butprinted; by and by I will explain what printing is. Athousand of these sheets have been made, all exactlylike this, in every minute detail -- they can't be toldapart." Then they all broke out with exclamations ofsurprise and admiration:"A thousand! Verily a mighty work -- a year'swork for many men.""No -- merely a day's work for a man and a boy."They crossed themselves, and whiffed out a protective prayer or two."Ah-h -- a miracle, a wonder! Dark work of enchantment."I let it go at that. Then I read in a low voice, to asmany as could crowd their shaven heads within hearingdistance, part of the account of the miracle of therestoration of the well, and was accompanied by astonished and reverent ejaculations all through: "Ah-h-h!""How true!" "Amazing, amazing!" "These bethe very haps as they happened, in marvelous exactness!" And might they take this strange thing intheir hands, and feel of it and examine it? -- theywould be very careful. Yes. So they took it, handling it as cautiously and devoutly as if it had beensome holy thing come from some supernatural region;and gently felt of its texture, caressed its pleasantsmooth surface with lingering touch, and scanned themysterious characters with fascinated eyes. Thesegrouped bent heads, these charmed faces, these speaking eyes -- how beautiful to me! For was not this mydarling, and was not all this mute wonder and interestand homage a most eloquent tribute and unforcedcompliment to it? I knew, then, how a mother feelswhen women, whether strangers or friends, take hernew baby, and close themselves about it with oneeager impulse, and bend their heads over it in atranced adoration that makes all the rest of the universe vanish out of their consciousness and be as if itwere not, for that time. I knew how she feels, andthat there is no other satisfied ambition, whether ofking, conqueror, or poet, that ever reaches half-way tothat serene far summit or yields half so divine a contentment.During all the rest of the seance my paper traveledfrom group to group all up and down and about thathuge hall, and my happy eye was upon it always, andI sat motionless, steeped in satisfaction, drunk withenjoyment. Yes, this was heaven; I was tasting itonce, if I might never taste it more.