THE BOYS' LIFE OF MARK TWAIN
he came to the little son of Henry VIII., Edward Tudor, and decided that he would do.
It was the kind of a story that Mark Twain loved to read and to write. By the end of that first summer he had finished a good portion of the exciting adventures of The Prince and the Pauper, and then, as was likely to happen, the inspiration waned and the manuscript was laid aside.
But with the completion of A Tramp Abroad—a task which had grown wearisome—he turned to the luxury of romance with a glad heart. To Howells he wrote that he was taking so much pleasure in the writing that he wanted to make it last.
Did I ever tell you the plot of it? It begins at 9 a.m., January 27, 1547. . . . My idea is to afford a realizing sense of the exceeding severity of the laws of that day by inflicting some of their penalties upon the king himself, and allowing him a chance to see the rest of them applied to others.
Susy and Clara Clemens were old enough now to understand the story, and as he finished the chapters he read them aloud to his small home audience—a most valuable audience, indeed, for he could judge from its eager interest, or lack of attention, just the measure of his success.
These little creatures knew all about the writing of books. Susy's earliest recollection was Tom Sawyer read aloud from the manuscript. Also they knew about plays. They could not remember a time when they did not take part in evening charades—a favorite amusement in the Clemens home.
220
