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Abroad with Mark Twain and Eugene Field cover

Abroad with Mark Twain and Eugene Field

Chapter 30: THE LEFT HAND DIDN’T KNOW
By Henry W. Fischer
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About This Book

A travel-writer recounts his time with two well-known American humorists while they lived and circulated in European cities, presenting a series of anecdotal sketches and recollections. The pieces capture their conversation, mannerisms, and responses to social customs, language, royalty, art, and contemporary personalities; they mix light-hearted episodes, reflections on fame and temperament, and brief critical remarks about literary and political topics. The arrangement is episodic rather than continuous, offering vivid vignettes that illuminate public and private behavior abroad.

THE LEFT HAND DIDN’T KNOW

“I saw your protégé in Paris—he is getting along finely with his painting,” I told Mark, meeting him in the Strand, London.

“I do not know what you mean by protégé,” he said evasively, “but I am glad to hear that the boy is progressing. Do you know,” he added quickly, “I hold with that famous English letter-writer, whose name I forget, that an artist has brush and pencil and that the public will reward him as it sees fit.”

Of course, Mark didn’t “hold” anything of the sort. He had then supported that bright American boy in Paris for three years, giving him the best of teachers and advancing his chances in every way possible, but he resented my touching upon the subject. I suppose he would have cut me dead the next time we met, if I had reminded him of the colored boy whom he was seeing through college in the States.