The committee, still hoping for his consent, again appealed to him.  But again he wrote: 

While I am deeply touched by the desire of my friends of Hannibal to confer these great honors upon me I must still forbear to accept them.  Spontaneous and unpremeditated honors, like those which came to me at Hannibal, Columbia, St. Louis, and at the village stations all down the line, are beyond all price and are a treasure for life in the memory, for they are a free gift out of the heart and they come without solicitation; but I am a Missourian, and so I shrink from distinctions which have to be arranged beforehand and with my privity, for I then become a party to my own exalting.  I am humanly fond of honors that happen, but chary of those that come by canvass and intention.

Somewhat later he suggested a different feature for the fair; one that was not practical, perhaps, but which certainly would have aroused interest—­that is to say, an old-fashioned six-day steamboat-race from New Orleans to St. Louis, with the old-fashioned accessories, such as torch-baskets, forecastle crowds of negro singers, with a negro on the safety-valve.  In his letter to President Francis he said: 

As to particulars, I think that the race should be a genuine reproduction of the old-time race, not just an imitation of it, and that it should cover the whole course.  I think the boats should begin the trip at New Orleans, and side by side (not an interval between), and end it at North St. Louis, a mile or two above the Big Mound.

In a subsequent letter to Governor Francis he wrote: 

It has been a dear wish of mine to exhibit myself at the great Fair & get a prize, but circumstances beyond my control have interfered . . . .

I suppose you will get a prize, because you have created the most prodigious Fair the planet has ever seen.  Very well, you have indeed earned it, and with it the gratitude of the State and the nation.

Newspaper men used every inducement to get interviews from him.  They invited him to name a price for any time he could give them, long or short.  One reporter offered him five hundred dollars for a two-hour talk.  Another proposed to pay him one hundred dollars a week for a quarter of a day each week, allowing him to discuss any subject he pleased.  One wrote asking him two questions:  the first, “Your favorite method of escaping from Indians”; the second, “Your favorite method of escaping capture by the Indians when they were in pursuit of you.”  They inquired as to his favorite copy-book maxim; as to what he considered most important to a young man’s success; his definition of a gentleman.  They wished to know his plan for the settlement of labor troubles.  But they did not awaken his interest, or his cupidity.  To one applicant he wrote: 

No, there are temptations against which we are fire-proof.  Your proposition is one which comes to me with considerable frequency, but it never tempts me.  The price isn’t the objection; you offer plenty.  It is the nature of the work that is the objection—­a kind of work which I could not do well enough to satisfy me.  To multiply the price by twenty would not enable me to do the work to my satisfaction, & by consequence would make no impression upon me.