Then came out the explanation of this short and cryptic dialogue. In genial conversation with his visitors Twain got off some uncommonly “good things,” and, as he rarely recalled the items that went best, he was induced to engage a stenographer, who, concealed from him and from his visitors, should take down the coinage of his wit as it came hot from the mint. The shorthand writer was duly installed in his cave. Visitors arrived. But Twain’s conversational powers had deserted him. “Couldn’t scintillate worth a cent” would have been his own way of describing the situation. The knowledge of the fact that a paid reporter was taking him down seemed to sterilize his brain. The stenographer had got on the humorist’s nerves. Twain before his visitors opened not his mouth. I question, however, whether any stenographer could have conveyed, by the mere words uttered by Twain in conversation, the peculiar charm and savour of his impromptus, which lay in the manner rather than in the matter. Ready, apposite, and spontaneous, he undoubtedly was; but the melancholy drawl which he affected, the quaint American accent, the impassive features of the speaker, added enormously to the value of the utterance. And these, of course, transcend the powers of a reporter to reproduce. Against the advice of his agent—poor old George Dolby, who had acted in the same capacity for Dickens—Twain had stopped his lectures at the Hanover Square Rooms for a “spell” in the provinces. On the evening of the day on which we called he was to resume the course which he had abandoned. The low key in which we found him was the result of the fog, in the first place; and, in the second place, he was worrying himself by recalling the warnings Dolby had given him about the danger of interrupting the course originally, his fear of the power of some new attraction, his knowledge of the fickleness of public taste. And as the afternoon advanced the fog grew more dense. We remained with the depressed humorist until Dolby arrived to escort him to the rooms. An hour before the time for commencing the lecture all four of us got into a growler, and were swallowed by the fog. I have never measured the distance between the Langham Hotel and Hanover Square, but I think I could manage it in ten minutes. It took our cabby just three-quarters of an hour to land his fare. He lost his way twice, and finally was obliged to get off the box, engage the services of an imp carrying a link, and lead his dejected horse. Dolby had been right in getting us off early. When we arrived at the hall, we had just ten minutes in hand.