But Howells could not bring himself to print so frank a confession as Orion had been willing to make.  “It wrung my heart,” he said, “and I felt haggard after I had finished it.  The writer’s soul is laid bare; it is shocking.”  Howells added that the best touches in it were those which made one acquainted with the writer’s brother; that is to say, Mark Twain, and that these would prove valuable material hereafter—­a true prophecy, for Mark Twain’s early biography would have lacked most of its vital incident, and at least half of its background, without those faithful chapters, fortunately preserved.  Had Onion continued, as he began, the work might have proved an important contribution to literature, but he went trailing off into by-paths of theology and discussion where the interest was lost.  There were, perhaps, as many as two thousand pages of it, which few could undertake to read.

Mark Twain’s mind was always busy with plans and inventions, many of them of serious intent, some semi-serious, others of a purely whimsical character.  Once he proposed a “Modest Club,” of which the first and main qualification for membership was modesty.  “At present,” he wrote, “I am the only member; and as the modesty required must be of a quite aggravated type, the enterprise did seem for a time doomed to stop dead still with myself, for lack of further material; but upon reflection I have come to the conclusion that you are eligible.  Therefore, I have held a meeting and voted to offer you the distinction of membership.  I do not know that we can find any others, though I have had some thought of Hay, Warner, Twichell, Aldrich, Osgood, Fields, Higginson, and a few more —­together with Mrs. Howells, Mrs. Clemens, and certain others of the sex.”

Howells replied that the only reason he had for not joining the Modest Club was that he was too modest—­too modest to confess his modesty.  “If I could get over this difficulty I should like to join, for I approve highly of the Club and its object....  It ought to be given an annual dinner at the public expense.  If you think I am not too modest you may put my name down and I will try to think the same of you.  Mrs. Howells applauded the notion of the club from the very first.  She said that she knew one thing:  that she was modest enough, anyway.  Her manner of saying it implied that the other persons you had named were not, and created a painful impression in my mind.  I have sent your letter and the rules to Hay, but I doubt his modesty.  He will think he has a right to belong to it as much as you or I; whereas, other people ought only to be admitted on sufferance.”

Our next letter to Howells is, in the main, pure foolery, but we get in it a hint what was to become in time one of Mask Twain’s strongest interests, the matter of copyright.  He had both a personal and general interest in the subject.  His own books were constantly pirated in Canada,