Eighteen hundred and sixty-three was flood-tide on the Comstock.  Every mine was working full blast.  Every mill was roaring and crunching, turning out streams of silver and gold.  A little while ago an old resident wrote: 

When I close my eyes I hear again the respirations of hoisting- engines and the roar of stamps; I can see the “camels” after midnight packing in salt; I can see again the jam of teams on C Street and hear the anathemas of the drivers—­all the mighty work that went on in order to lure the treasures from the deep chambers of the great lode and to bring enlightenment to the desert.

Those were lively times.  In the midst of one of his letters home Mark Twain interrupts himself to say:  “I have just heard five pistol-shots down the street—­as such things are in my line, I will go and see about it,” and in a postscript added a few hours later: 

5 A.M.  The pistol-shot did its work well.  One man, a Jackson County Missourian, shot two of my friends (police officers) through the heart—­both died within three minutes.  The murderer’s name is John Campbell.

“Mark and I had our hands full,” says De Quille, “and no grass grew under our feet.”  In answer to some stray criticism of their policy, they printed a sort of editorial manifesto: 

Our duty is to keep the universe thoroughly posted concerning murders and street fights, and balls, and theaters, and pack-trains, and churches, and lectures, and school-houses, and city military affairs, and highway robberies, and Bible societies, and hay-wagons, and the thousand other things which it is in the province of local reporters to keep track of and magnify into undue importance for the instruction of the readers of a great daily newspaper.

It is easy to recognize Mark Twain’s hand in that compendium of labor, which, in spite of its amusing apposition, was literally true, and so intended, probably with no special thought of humor in its construction.  It may be said, as well here as anywhere, that it was not Mark Twain’s habit to strive for humor.  He saw facts at curious angles and phrased them accordingly.  In Virginia City he mingled with the turmoil of the Comstock and set down what he saw and thought, in his native speech.  The Comstock, ready to laugh, found delight in his expression and discovered a vast humor in his most earnest statements.

On the other hand, there were times when the humor was intended and missed its purpose.  We have already recalled the instance of the “Petrified Man” hoax, which was taken seriously; but the “Empire City Massacre” burlesque found an acceptance that even its author considered serious for a time.  It is remembered to-day in Virginia City as the chief incident of Mark Twain’s Comstock career.