was one-third--the purchase price, twenty-five thousand dollars, of
which he had paid a part, Jervis Langdon, his future father-in-law,
having furnished cash and security for the remainder. He was
already in possession in August, but he was not regularly in Buffalo
that autumn, for he had agreed with Redpath to deliver his Quaker
City lecture, and the tour would not end until a short time before
his wedding-day, February 2, 1870.

Our next letter hardly belongs in this collection; as it was
doubtless written with at least the possibility of publication in
view. But it is too amusing, too characteristic of Mark Twain, to
be omitted. It was sent in response to an invitation from the New
York Society of California Pioneers to attend a banquet given in New
York City, October 13, 1869, and was, of course, read to the
assembled diners.


To the New York Society of California Pioneers, in New York City:

ELMIRA, October 11, 1869.
GENTLEMEN,--Circumstances render it out of my power to take advantage of
the invitation extended to me through Mr. Simonton, and be present at
your dinner at New York. I regret this very much, for there are several
among you whom I would have a right to join hands with on the score of
old friendship, and I suppose I would have a sublime general right to
shake hands with the rest of you on the score of kinship in California
ups and downs in search of fortune.

If I were to tell some of my experience, you would recognize California
blood in me; I fancy the old, old story would sound familiar, no doubt.