26 



MARK TWAIN'S SKETCHES. 



fireworks of a generation, put together and rained down simultaneously out of 

 heaven in one brilliant shower upon one helpless roof, would not have any advan- 

 tage of the pyrotechnic display that was making my house so magnificently con- 

 spicuous in the general gloom of the storm. By actual count, the lightning struck 

 at my establishment seven hundred and sixty-four times in forty minutes, but 

 tri'pped on one of those faithful rods every time, and slid down the spiral twist and 



shot into the earth before it probably had time to be surprised at the way the thing 

 was done. And through all that bombardment only one patch of slates was ripped 

 up, and that was because, for a single instant, the rods in the vicinity were trans- 

 porting all the lightning they could possibly accommodate. Well, nothing was ever 

 seen like it since the world began. For one whole day and night not a member 



