sir. The first thing that catches the eye is the scissors at her feet.
Them scissors is too modern; thar warn't no scissors like them in them
days--by a d---d sight."

That was a brilliant and audacious conception, having the just
proportion of sanguinary humour, embodied in Mark Twain's offer, during
his lecture on the Sandwich Islands, to show his audience how the
cannibals consume their food--if only some lady would lend him a live
baby. There is the same wildly humorous tactlessness in the delicious
anecdote of Higgins.

Higgins was a simple creature, who used to haul rock; and on the day
Judge Bagley fell down the court-house steps and broke his neck, Higgins
was commissioned to carry the body in his wagon to the house of Mrs.
Bagley and break the news to her as gently as possible. When he
arrived, he shouted until Mrs. Bagley came to the door, and then
tactfully inquired if the Widder Bagley lived there! When she
indignantly replied in the negative, he gently humoured her whim; and
inquired next if Judge Bagley lived there. When she replied that he
did, Higgins offered to bet that he didn't; and delicately inquired if
the Judge were in. On being assured that he was not in at present,
Higgins triumphantly exclaimed that he expected as much. Because he had
the old Judge curled up out there in the wagon; and when Mrs. Bagley saw
him, she would doubtless admit that about all that could comfort the
Judge now would be an inquest!

Mark Twain was so fond of this bloody and ghastly humour that, on one
occasion, he utterly overreached himself and suffered serious
consequences. In the words of his fellow-journalist, Dan De Quille: