Mark Twain Speaking

13. On Governor James W. Nye

64 MARK TWAIN SPEAKING Steve / Stephen H. Gillis (1826-1912). He was a fellow reporter and crony of Mark Twain in Virginia City, a perpetrator of hoaxes, and probably the instigator of the abortive duel with James Laird, of the Virginia City Union in May 1864.· 13 · When Mark Twain was preparing for his first New York lecture in Cooper Union in 1867, he expectedJames W. Nye, senatorfrom Nevada andformer territorial and state governor, to come from Washington to introduce the speaker. But Nye did not appear, offered no apology, and later said that he had never intended to do any favors for "a damned secessionist." Mark Twain, nursing a grudge against the governor, made afew unflattering remarks about him preliminary to a "Roughing It" lecture in New York in 1872. On Governor Nye Steinway Hall, New York, January 24,1872 He was a real father to those poor Nevada Indians. He gave them, without regard to their sex or age, blankets and hoopskirts. You could see an Indian chief with a string of blacking boxes around his neck, and over his red blanket four or five of those hoopskirts, walking the streets as happy as a clam, with his hands sticking out of the slats. And yet, notwithstanding all the efforts and civilizing kindness of the good governor, those Indians didn't step out of their savage condition -they were just as degraded as if they had never seen a hoopskirt . Text / "Mark Twain's Lecture," New York Herald, January 25, 1872. hoopskirts / The apparently absurd allusion was based on fact. The San Rafael, California, Marin County Journal reported, August 10, MARK TWAIN SPEAKING 65 1861: "Gov. Nye brought some goods with him from New York for distribution among the Indians. Before starting out last Monday, the goods were overhauled and a fine assortment of hoops were found among the lot."· 14 · The Aldine, a monthly published in New York, called itself "A Typographic ArtJournal." In April 1871, itpublished a picture and "An Autobiography" of Mark Twain. He said: "I was born November 30, 1835. I continue to live,just the same." The 1872 dinner, given by the publisher, James Sutton, and the editor, R. H. Stoddard, attracted such banqueting and literary lights as Schuyler Colfax, E. C. Stedman, George P. Putnam, and Bayard Taylor. Mark Twain's speech was reported to have been received with "shouts oflaughter ." Dinner Speech The Aldine Dinner, St. James Hotel, New York, Early February 1872 Gentlemen, I would rather address a "stag" dinner party than any other assemblage in the world, for the reason that when you make a point, those who have been listening always applaud, and those who have been talking to each other and did not hear it, applaud louder than anybody else, and if I only had a speech prepared for this occasion, I would take genuine delight in delivering it. But I got the notification to be present at this dinner this evening, at half-past eleven o'clock this morning to pay what lowe to the Aldine establishment; and I had to leave an hour after that in order that I might take the trip, so I had no opportunity to prepare a speech, and I am not one of those geniuses who can make a speech impromptu. I have made a great many happy impromptu speeches but I had time to prepare them. Now, it is singular, and I suppose that, but for circumstances which ...