But then, by and by, came a failure more disastrous than anything he had foreseen—­the downfall of his firm through the Napoleonic rascality of Ward.  General Grant was utterly ruined; he was left without income and apparently without the means of earning one.  It was the period when the great War Series was appeasing in the Century Magazine.  General Grant, hard-pressed, was induced by the editors to prepare one or more articles, and, finding that he could write them, became interested in the idea of a book.  It is unnecessary to repeat here the story of how the publication of this important work passed into the hands of Mark Twain; that is to say, the firm of Charles L. Webster & Co., the details having been fully given elsewhere.—­[See Mark Twain:  A Biography, chap. cliv.]—­

We will now return for the moment to other matters, as reported in order by the letters.  Clemens and Cable had continued their reading-tour into Canada, and in February found themselves in Montreal.  Here they were invited by the Toque Bleue Snow-shoe Club to join in one of their weekly excursions across Mt.  Royal.  They could not go, and the reasons given by Mark Twain are not without interest.  The letter is to Mr. George Iles, author of Flame, Electricity, and the Camera, and many other useful works.

            To George Iles, far the Toque Blew Snow-shoe Club,
                                Montreal: 

Detroit, February 12, 1885. 
Midnight, P.S. 
My dear Iles,—­I got your other telegram a while ago, and answered it, explaining that I get only a couple of hours in the middle of the day for social life.  I know it doesn’t seem rational that a man should have to lie abed all day in order to be rested and equipped for talking an hour at night, and yet in my case and Cable’s it is so.  Unless I get a great deal of rest, a ghastly dulness settles down upon me on the platform, and turns my performance into work, and hard work, whereas it ought always to be pastime, recreation, solid enjoyment.  Usually it is just this latter, but that is because I take my rest faithfully, and prepare myself to do my duty by my audience.

I am the obliged and appreciative servant of my brethren of the Snow-shoe Club, and nothing in the world would delight me more than to come to their house without naming time or terms on my own part—­but you see how it is.  My cast iron duty is to my audience—­it leaves me no liberty and no option.

With kindest regards to the Club, and to you,
               I am Sincerely yours
                              S. L. Clemens.

In the next letter we reach the end of the Clemens-Cable venture and get a characteristic summing up of Mark Twain’s general attitude toward the companion of his travels.  It must be read only in the clear realization of Mark Twain’s attitude toward orthodoxy, and his habit of humor.  Cable was as rigidly orthodox as Mark Twain was revolutionary.  The two were never anything but the best of friends.

To W. D. Howells, in Boston: