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Mark Twain was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens, on November 30, 1835, in Florida, Missouri. He is best known for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), The Prince and the Pauper (1882), Life on the Mississippi (1883), A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889), and what many would call a masterpiece, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885). Here is the story that first made him famous, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County The
Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
In compliance with the request of a friend of mine, who wrote me from the
East, I called on good-natured, garrulous old Simon Wheeler, and inquired
after my friend's friend, Leonidas W. Smiley, as requested to do, and I
hereunto append the result. I have a lurking suspicion that Leonidas W.
Smiley is a myth; that my friend never knew such a personage; and that he
only conjectured that, if I asked old Wheeler about him, it would remind
him of his infamous Jim Smiley, and he would go to work and bore me nearly
to death with some infernal reminiscence of him as long and tedious as it
should be useless to me. If that was the design, it certainly succeeded.
I found Simon Wheeler dozing comfortably by the barroom stove of the old,
dilapidated tavern in the ancient mining camp of Angel's, and I noticed
that he was fat and bald-headed, and had an expression of winning gentleness
and simplicity upon his tranquil countenance. He roused up and gave me good-day.
I told him a friend of mine had commissioned me to make some inquiries about
a cherished companion of his boyhood named Leonidas W. Smiley - Rev. Leonidas
W. Smiley - a young minister of the Gospel, who he had heard was at one
time a resident of Angel's Camp. I added that, if Mr. Wheeler could tell
me anything about this Rev. Leonidas W. Smiley, I would feel under many
obligations to him.
Simon Wheeler backed me into a corner and blockaded me there with his chair,
and then sat me down and reeled off the monotonous narrative which follows
this paragraph. He never smiled, he never frowned, he never changed his
voice from the gentle-flowing key to which he tuned the initial sentence,
he never betrayed the slightest suspicion of enthusiasm; but all through
the interminable narrative there ran a vein of impressive earnestness and
sincerity, which showed me plainly that, so far from his imagining that
there was anything ridiculous or funny about his story, he regarded it as
a really important matter, and admired its two heroes as men of transcendent
genius in finesse. To me, the spectacle of a man drifting serenely along
through such a queer yarn without ever smiling, was exquisitely absurd.
As I said before, I asked him to tell me what he knew of Rev. Leonidas W.
Smiley, and he replied as follows. I let him go on in his own way, and never
interrupted him once:
There was a feller here once by the name of Jim Smiley, in the winter of
'49 - or maybe it was the spring of '50 - I don't recollect exactly, somehow,
though what makes me think it was one or the other is because I remember
the big flume wasn't finished when he first came to the camp; but anyway,
he was the curiousest man about always betting on anything that turned up
you ever see, if he could get anybody to bet on the other side; and if he
couldn't, he'd change sides. Any way that suited the other man would suit
him - any way just so's he got a bet, he was satisfied. But still he was
lucky, uncommon lucky; he most always come out winner. He was always ready
and laying for a chance; there couldn't be no solit'ry thing mentioned but
that feller'd offer to bet on it, and take any side you please, as I was
just telling you. If there was a horse race, you'd find him flush, or you'd
find him busted at the end of it; if there was a dogfight, he'd bet on it;
if there was a cat-fight, he'd bet on it; if there was a chicken-fight,
he'd bet on it; why, if there was two birds setting on a fence, he would
bet you which one would fly first; or if there was a camp meeting, he would
be there regular, to bet on Parson Walker, which he judged to be the best
exhorter about here, and so he was, too, and a good man. If he even seen
a straddlebug start to go anywheres, he would bet you how long it would
take him to get wherever he was going to, and if you took him up, he would
foller that straddlebug to Mexico but what he would find out where he was
bound for and how long he was on the road. Lots of the boys here has seen
that Smiley, and can tell you about him. Why, it never made no difference
to him - he would bet on anything - the dangdest feller. Parson Walker's
wife laid very sick once, for a good while, and it seemed as if they warn't
going to save her; but one morning he come in, and Smiley asked how she
was, and he said she was considerable better - thank the Lord for his inf'nit
mercy - and coming on so smart that, with the blessing of Prov'dence, she'd
get well yet; and Smiley, before he thought, says, "Well, I'll risk two-and-a-half
that she don't, anyway."
Thish-yer Smiley had a mare - the boys called her the fifteen-minute nag,
but that was only in fun, you know, because, of course, she was faster than
that - and he used to win money on that horse, for all she was so slow and
always had the asthma, or the distemper, or the consumption, or something
of that kind. They used to give her two or three hundred yards start, and
then pass her under way; but always at the fag end of the race she'd get
excited and desperate-like, and come cavorting and straddling up, and scattering
her legs around limber, sometimes in the air, and sometimes out to one side
amongst the fences, and kicking up m-o-r-e dust, and raising m-o-r-e racket
with her coughing and sneezing and blowing her nose - and always fetch up
at the stand just about a neck ahead, as near as you could cipher it down.
And he had a little small bull pup, that to look at him you'd think he wan't
worth a cent, but to set around and look ornery, and lay for a chance to
steal something. But as soon as money was up on him, he was a different
dog; his underjaw'd begin to stick out like the fo-castle of a steamboat,
and his teeth would uncover, and shine savage like the furnaces. And a dog
might tackle him, and bullyrag him, and bite him, and throw him over his
shoulder two or three times, and Andrew Jackson - which was the name of
the pup - Andrew Jackson would never let on but what he was satisfied, and
hadn't expected nothing else - and the bets being doubled and doubled on
the other side all the time, till the money was all up; and then all of
a sudden he would grab that other dog jest by the j'int of his hind leg
and freeze to it - not chaw, you understand, but only jest grip and hang
on till they throwed up the sponge, if it was a year. Smiley always come
out winner on t! ! hat pup, till he harnessed a dog once that didn't have
no hind legs, because they'd been sawed off by a circular saw, and when
the thing had gone along far enough, and the money was all up, and he come
to make a snatch for his pet holt, he saw in a minute how he'd been imposed
on, and how the other dog had him in the door, so to speak, and he 'peared
surprised, and then he looked sorter discouraged-like, and didn't try no
more to win the fight, and so he got shucked out bad. He give Smiley a look,
as much as to say his heart was broke, and it was his fault for putting
up a dog that hadn't no hind legs for him to take holt of, which was his
main dependence in a fight, and then he limped off a piece and laid down
and died. It was a good pup, was that Andrew Jackson, and would have made
a name for hisself if he'd lived, for the stuff was in him, and he had genius
- I know it, because he hadn't had no opportunities to speak of, and it
don't stand to reason that a dog could make such a fight as he could under
them circumstances, if he hadn't no talent. It always makes me feel sorry
when I think of that last fight of his'n, and the way it turned out.
Well, thish-yer Smiley had rat-tarriers, and chicken cocks, and tomcats,
and all them kind of things, till you couldn't rest, and you couldn't fetch
nothing for him to bet on but he'd match you. He ketched a frog one day,
and took him home, and said he cal'klated to edercate him; and so he never
done nothing for three months but set in his back yard and learn that frog
to jump. And you bet you he did learn him too. He'd give him a little punch
behind, and the next minute you'd see that frog whirling in the air like
a doughnut - see him turn one summerset, or may be a couple, if he got a
good start, and come down flatfooted and all right, like a cat. He got him
up so in the matter of catching flies, and kept him in practice so constant,
that he'd nail a fly every time as far as he could see him. Smiley said
all a frog wanted was education, and he could do most anything - and I believe
him. Why, I've seen him set Dan'l Webster down here on this floor - Dan'l
Webster was the name of the frog - and sing out, "Flies, Dan'l, flies!"
and quicker'n you could wink, he'd spring straight up, and snake a fly off'n
the counter there, and flop down on the floor again as solid as a gob of
mud, and fall to scratching the side of his head with his hind foot as indifferent
as if he hadn't no idea he'd been doin' any more'n any frog might do. You
never see a frog so modest and straightfor'ard as he was, for all he was
so gifted. And when it came to fair and square jumping on a dead level,
he could get over more ground at one straddle than any animal of his breed
you ever see. Jumping on a dead level was his strong suit, you understand;
and when it come to that, Smiley would ante up money on him as long as he
had a red. Smiley was monstrous proud of his frog, and well he might be,
for fellers that had traveled and been everywheres, all said he laid over
any frog that ever they see.
Well, Smiley kept the beast in a little lattice box, and he used to fetch
him downtown sometimes and lay for a bet. One day a feller - a stranger
in the camp, he was - come across him with his box, and says:
"What might it be that you've got in the box?"
And Smiley says, sorter indifferent like, "It might be a parrot, or it might
be a canary, maybe, but it ain't - it's only just a frog."
And the feller took it, and looked at it careful, and turned it round this
way and that, and says, "H'm - so 'tis. Well, what's he good for?"
"Well," Smiley says, easy and careless, "he's good enough for one thing,
I should judge - he can outjump any frog in Calaveras county."
The feller took the box again, and took another long, particular look, and
give it back to Smiley, and says, very deliberate, "Well, I don't see no
p'ints about that frog that's any better'n any other frog."
"Maybe you don't," Smiley says. "Maybe you understand frogs, and maybe you
don't understand 'em; maybe you've had experience, and maybe you ain't only
a amature, as it were. Anyways, I've got my opinion, and I'll risk forty
dollars that he can outjump any frog in Calaveras county."
And the feller studied a minute, and then says, kinder sad like, "Well,
I'm only a stranger here, and I ain't got no frog; but if I had a frog,
I'd bet you."
And then Smiley says, "That's all right - that's all right - if you'll hold
my box a minute, I'll go and get you a frog." And so the feller took the
box, and put up his forty dollars along with Smiley's and set down to wait.
So he set there a good while thinking and thinking to hisself, and then
he got the frog out and prized his mouth open and took a teaspoon and filled
him full of quail shot - filled him pretty near up to his chin - and set
him on the floor. Smiley he went to the swamp and slopped around in the
mud for a long time, and finally he ketched a frog, and fetched him in,
and give him to this feller, and says:
"Now, if you're ready, set him alongside of Dan'l, with his fore-paws just
even with Dan'l and I'll give the word." Then he says, "one—two—three—jump!"
and him and the feller touched up the frogs from behind, and the new frog
hopped off, but Dan'l give a heave, and hysted up his shoulders - so - like
a French-man, but it wan't no use - he couldn't budge; he was planted as
solid as an anvil, and he couldn't no more stir than if he was anchored
out. Smiley was a good deal surprised, and he was disgusted too, but he
didn't have no idea what the matter was, of course.
The feller took the money and started away; and when he was going out at
the door, he sorter jerked his thumb over his shoulders - this way - at
Dan'l, and says again, very deliberate, "Well, I don't see no p'ints about
that frog that's any better'n any other frog."
Smiley he stood scratching his head and looking down at Dan'l a long time,
and at last he says, "I do wonder what in the nation that frog throw'd off
for - I wonder if there ain't something the matter with him - he 'pears
to look might baggy, somehow." And he ketched Dan'l by the nap of the neck,
and lifted him up and says, "Why, blame my cats, if he don't weigh five
pound!" and turned him upside down, and he belched out a double handful
of shot. And then he see how it was, and he was the maddest man - he set
the frog down and took out after that feller, but he never ketched him.
And — [Here Simon Wheeler heard his name called from the front yard, and
got up to see what was wanted.] And turning to me as he moved away, he said:
"Just set where you are, stranger, and rest easy - I ain't going to be gone
a second."
But, by your leave, I did not think that a continuation of the history of
the enterprising vagabond Jim Smiley would be likely to afford me much information
concerning the Rev. Leonidas W. Smiley, and so I started away.
At the door I met the sociable Wheeler returning, and he buttonholed me
and recommenced:
Well, thish-yer Smiley had a yaller one-eyed cow that didn't have no tail,
only jest a short stump like a bannanner, and —"
"Oh! hang Smiley and his afflicted cow!" I muttered, good-naturedly, and
bidding the old gentleman good-day, I departed.
Bonnie Mercure, your Fiction Guide at the dowse Fiction Hub, is a dark fantasy author. Visit her website
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