Twain in His Own Time: A Biographical Chronicle of His Life, Drawn from Recollections, Interviews, and Memoirs by Family, Friends, and Associates

“Mark Twain Incognito—A Reminiscence” (1926)

[55] === “Mark Twain Incognito—A Reminiscence” (1926) Franklin H. Austin Judge Samuel L. Austin, the cofounder in 1863 of the Onomea sugar plantation seven miles north of Hilo, hosted Twain on a brief visit during his weeks in Hawaii. His son Franklin H. Austin later recalled the event. mark twain came bearing an introduction to my father in the name of Samuel Clemens. (We did not know it was Mark Twain until afterwards.) The letter was addressed, Judge S. L. Austin, Onomea Plantation, Hilo, Hawaii, Sandwich Islands. . . . Late one Friday afternoon we were sitting on the veranda laughing and talking when we spied two horsemen coming up the hill around the corner of the boiling house and wondered who they could be. . . . As the riders came up over the immediate rise, by the store, onto the green common in front, trotting up to the hitching rail, we saw that they were strangers. Father started down to the front gate to welcome them and I after him, while the horse boy came running from the store veranda to take charge of the horses. After they dismounted it could be seen that one of them was a tall immaculately dressed Englishman and the other, evidently an American, of medium height, rather slouchily dressed in a brown linen suit and a native lauhala straw hat pulled over his eyes. He had a flowing silky brown mustache, rather dark tanned complexion and bushy dark brown hair with bright hazel eyes. The shorter of the two men stepped up to father and handed him a letter while the boy unstrapped his sheepskin leggings and removed his big jingling Mexican spurs, which were all the vogue at the time. . . . After reading the letter father held out his hand and smiling said: “I am glad to see you Mr. Clemens. You are welcome anyway as all strangers are, but with this letter from my old friend, you are doubly welcome.” (I cannot think who the letter was from, but probably Mr. Williams of Williams , Dimond & Co., our San Francisco agents.)1 Clemens then turned to the Englishman: [56] “This is my friend Brown, Judge Austin.” “My name is not Brown. It is Howard,” hastily interposed the Englishman in some vexation as he shook hands. “My traveling companion persists in calling me Brown.”2 “Well, it’s easier to remember,” drawled Mr. Clemens. Father looked first at the vexed Englishman’s face, then caught a teasing twinkle in the eyes of the shorter man, and laughed: “Oh, well, what’s in a name,” and led the way up the slate blue walk through the garden to the house. . . . [At dinner that evening] Mr. Clemens had discarded his ridiculously starched brown linen coat. . . . From the start [he] dominated the conversation , keeping the table in roars of laughter with anecdotes and jokes, so much so, in fact, that father could hardly carve the roast and had to stand up to his job, while mother nearly spilled the vegetables she dished out. He seemed pleased with his seat at the head of the table where he could see all of the faces and note the effect of his jokes. The only one who did not seem to appreciate the fun was Howard, the Englishman, who wore a bored expression. I may be mistaken, but I imagined that Clemens was a little annoyed that he could not make “his friend Brown” laugh. His slow, drawling voice for which he became famous was too funny for anything. (In Roughing It he mentioned this “drawl” as an impediment of speech, but I doubt it.)3 After the most hilarious and enjoyable dinner in my memory, at Onomea , we retired to the parlor while the men filed out to their lodgings. The first thing Clemens did was to slap father on the back in a familiar way and remark: “Now, Judge, I want your strongest pipe and strongest tobacco.” Father was startled. He was a very dignified man, tall, an inch over six feet, weighing two hundred and forty pounds, and no one ever took such liberties with him. But a twinkle came into his eyes and I was sure he meant mischief—to have revenge on this fresh and familiar young man: “Wait just a few minutes until I have my man cut up some tobacco and we will retire to my smoking room and enjoy smoking to our hearts’ content ,” father said. Mahulualani had just come in with the baby for mother to nurse...