Now what is it?  There are mountains and mountains and mountains in this world—­but only these take you by the heart-strings.  I wonder what the secret of it is.  Well, time and time again it has seemed to me that I must drop everything and flee to Switzerland once more.  It is a longing —­a deep, strong, tugging longing—­that is the word.  We must go again, Joe.—­October days, let us get up at dawn and breakfast at the tower.  I should like that first rate.

Livy and all of us send deluges of love to you and Harmony and all the children.  I dreamed last night that I woke up in the library at home and your children were frolicing around me and Julia was sitting in my lap; you and Harmony and both families of Warners had finished their welcomes and were filing out through the conservatory door, wrecking Patrick’s flower pots with their dress skirts as they went.  Peace and plenty abide with you all! 
          
                              Mark.

I want the Blisses to know their part of this letter, if possible.  They will see that my delay was not from choice.

Following the life of Mark Twain, whether through his letters or along the sequence of detailed occurrence, we are never more than a little while, or a little distance, from his brother Orion.  In one form or another Orion is ever present, his inquiries, his proposals, his suggestions, his plans for improving his own fortunes, command our attention.  He was one of the most human creatures that ever lived; indeed, his humanity excluded every form of artificiality —­everything that needs to be acquired.  Talented, trusting, child-like, carried away by the impulse of the moment, despite a keen sense of humor he was never able to see that his latest plan or project was not bound to succeed.  Mark Twain loved him, pitied him—­also enjoyed him, especially with Howells.  Orion’s new plan to lecture in the interest of religion found its way to Munich, with the following result: 

To W. D. Howells, in Boston: 

Munich, Feb. 9. (1879) My dear Howells,—­I have just received this letter from Orion—­take care of it, for it is worth preserving.  I got as far as 9 pages in my answer to it, when Mrs. Clemens shut down on it, and said it was cruel, and made me send the money and simply wish his lecture success.  I said I couldn’t lose my 9 pages—­so she said send them to you.  But I will acknowledge that I thought I was writing a very kind letter.

Now just look at this letter of Orion’s.  Did you ever see the grotesquely absurd and the heart-breakingly pathetic more closely joined together?  Mrs. Clemens said “Raise his monthly pension.”  So I wrote to Perkins to raise it a trifle.

Now only think of it!  He still has 100 pages to write on his lecture, yet in one inking of his pen he has already swooped around the United States and invested the result!