On the contrary, it is obscure — and not only obscure,
but utterly incomprehensible. Was the breaking of
Mr. Schuyler's leg, fifteen years ago, the "distressing
accident" that plunged Mr. Bloke into unspeakable
grief, and caused him to come up here at dead of
night and stop our press to acquaint the w^orld with
the circumstance? Or did the "distressing accident''
consist in the destruction of Schuyler's mother-in-
law's property in early times? Or did it consist in
the death of that person herself three years ago?
(albeit it does not appear that she died by accident.)
In a word, what Jic? that "distressing accident" con-
sist in? What did that drivelling ass of a Schuyler
stand in the wake of a runaway horse for, with his
shouting and gesticulating, if he wanted to stop him?
And how themischief could he get run over by a horse
that had already paased beyond him ? And what ar^



174 MARK TWAIN'S SKETCHES

we to take ^^ warning" by? And how is this extraordi-
nary chapter of incomprehensibilities going to be a
''lesson" to us? And, above all, what has the intox-
icating ^'bowF'got to do with it, anyhow? It is not
stated that Schuyler drank, or that his wife drank,
or that his mother-in-law drank, or that the horse
drank — wherefore, then, the reference to the intoxi-
cating bowl ? It does seem to me that if Mr. Bloke
had let the intoxicating bowl alone himself, he never
would have got into, so much trouble about this
exasperating imaginary accident. I have read this
absurd item over and over again, with all its insin-
uating plausibilty, until my head swims; but I can
make neither head nor tail of it. There certainlv
seems to have been an accident of some kind or
other, but it is impossible to determine what the nat-
ure of it was, or who was the sufferer by it. I do
not like to do it, but I feel compelled to request that
the next time anything happens to one of Mr. Bloke's
friends, he will append such explanatory notes to his
account of it as will enable me to find out what sort
of an accident it was and whom it happened to. 