MARK TWAIN'S SKETCHES. 



as he was passing he noticed that I needed some lightning-rods. I said, "Yes, yes — 

 go on — what about it?" He said there was nothing about it, in particular — nothing 

 except that he would like to put them up for me. I am new to housekeeping ; have 

 been used to hotels and boarding-houses all my life. Like anybody else of similar 

 experience, I try to appear (to strangers) to be an old housekeeper ; consequently 

 I said in an off-hand way that I had been intending for some time to have six or 



eight lightning-rods put up, but The stranger started, and looked inquiringly 



at me, but I was serene. I thought that if I chanced to make any mistakes, he 

 would not catch me by my countenance. He said he would rather have my custom 

 than any man's in town. I said, " All right," and started ofiF to wrestle with my 

 great subject again, when he called me back and said it would be necessary to 

 know exactly how many " points " I wanted put up, what parts of the house I wanted 

 them on, and what quality of rod I preferred. It was close quarters for a man not 

 used to the exigencies of housekeeping; but I went through creditably, and he 

 probably never suspected that I was a novice. I told him to put up eight " points," 

 and put them all on the roof, and use the best quality of rod. He said he could 

 furnish the " plain " article at 20 cents a foot; "coppered," 25 cents; "zinc-plated 

 spiral-twist," at 30 cents, that would stop a streak of lightning any time, no matter 

 where it was bound, and " render its errand harmless and its further progress 

 apocryphal." I said apocryphal was no slouch of a word, emanating from the source 

 it did, but, philology aside, I liked the spiral-twist and would take that brand. 

 Then he said he could make two hundred and fifty feet answer; but to do it right, 

 and make the best job in town of it, and attract the admiration of the just and the 

 unjust alike, and compel all parties to say they never saw a more symmetrical and 

 hypothetical display of lightning-rods since they were born, he supposed he really 

 couldn't get along without four hundred, though he was not vindictive, and trusted 

 he was willing to try. I said, go ahead and use four hundred, and make any kind 

 of a job he pleased out of it, but let me get back to my work. So I got rid of him 

 at last; and now, after half-an-hour spent in getting my train of political economy 

 thoughts coupled together again, I am ready to go on once more.] 



richest treasures of their genius, their -experience of life, and their learning. The great lights of 

 commercial jurisprudence, international confraternity, and biological deviation, of all ages, all 

 civilizations, and all nationalities, from Zoroaster down to Horace Greeley, have 



