letters for the home papers. Their solid wisdom soon began to lie heavy
on the camel's stomach: the jokes shook him until he began to gag and
gasp, and finally he struck statements that not even a camel could
swallow with impunity. He died in horrible agony; and Mark found on
examination that the camel had choked to death on one of the mildest
statements of fact that he had ever offered to a trusting public! Here
Mark gradually works up to an anticipated climax by piling on effect
after effect. Our risibility is excited almost as much by the
anticipation of the climax as by the recital.

Admirable instances of the ludicrous incident, of the nonsensical
recital, are found in the scene in 'Huckleberry Finn' dealing with the
performance of the King's Cameleopard or Royal Nonesuch, the address on
the occasion of the dinner in honour of the seventieth anniversary of
John Greenleaf Whittier (an historic failure), and the Turkish bath in
'The Innocents Abroad'.

In this prison filled with hot air, an attendant sat him down by a tank
of hot water and began to polish him all over with a coarse mitten.
Soon Mark noticed a disagreeable smell, and realized that the more he
was polished the worse he smelt. He urged the attendant to bury him
without unnecessary delay, as it was obvious that he couldn't possibly
"keep" long in such warm weather. But the phlegmatic attendant paid no
attention to Mark's commands and continued to scrub with renewed vigour.
Mark's consternation changed to alarm when he discovered that little
cylinders, like macaroni, began to roll from under the mitten. They
were too white to be dirt. He felt that he was gradually being pared
down to a convenient size. Realizing that it would take hours for the
attendant to trim him down to the proper size, Mark indignantly ordered
him to bring a jackplane at once and get the matter over. To all his