The next newspaper article that attracted my attention was the following:
A SWEET CANDIDATE.
-- Mark Twain, who was to make such a blighting speech at the mass meeting of the Independents last night, didn't come to time!
A telegram from his physician (医师) stated that he had been knocked down by a runaway team and his leg broken in two places --
sufferer lying in great agony (极大的痛苦), and so forth, and so forth, and a lot more bosh of the same sort.
And the Independents tried hard to swallow the wretched subterfuge (托词) and pretend that they did not know what was the real reason of the absence of the abandoned creature whom they denominate their standard-bearer (领头人). {1}
A certain man was seen to reel into Mr. Twain's hotel last night in state of beastly intoxication (醉酒).
It is the imperative (必要的) duty of the Independents to prove that this besotted brute was not Mark Twain himself:
We have them at last! This is a case that admits of no shirking. The voice of the people demands in thunder-tones: "WHO WAS THAT MAN?"
It was incredible, absolutely incredible, for a moment, that it was really my name that was coupled with this disgraceful suspicion.
Three long years had passed over my head since I had tasted ale (麦芽酒), beer, wine, or liquor of any kind.
{It shows what effect the times were having on me when I say that I saw myself confidently dubbed "Mr. Delirium Tremens Twain" in the next issue of that journal without a pang -- {2}
notwithstanding I knew that with monotonous fidelity (尽职) the paper would go on calling me so to the very end.}
By this time anonymous (匿名的) letters were getting to be an important part of my mail matter. This form was common:
How about that old woman you kicked of your premises which was beging.
POL.PRY.
And this:
There is things which you have done which is unbeknown to anybody but me.
You better trot out a few dollars to yours truly or you'll hear thro' the papers from…
HANDY ANDY.
That is about the idea. I could continue them till the reader was surfeited (恶心), if desirable.
Shortly the principal Republican journal "convicted" me of wholesale bribery (行贿), and the leading Democratic paper "nailed" an aggravated case of blackmailing to me.
{In this way I acquired two additional names: "Twain, the Filthy Corruptionist (行贿者)," and "Twain, the Loathsome Embracer."}
By this time there had grown to be such a clamor for an "answer" to all the dreadful charges that were laid to me, that the editors and leaders of my party said it would be political ruin for me to remain silent any longer.
As if to make their appeal the more imperative, the following appeared in one of the papers the very next day:
BEHOLD (观察) THE MAN!
-- The Independent candidate still maintains Silence. Because he dare not speak.
Every accusation against him has been amply proved, and they have been endorsed and re-endorsed by his own eloquent silence till at this day he stands forever convicted.
Look upon your candidate, Independents! Look upon the Infamous Perjurer! The Montana Thief!
The Body-Snatcher! Contemplate (沉思) your incarnate Delirium Tremens! Your Filthy Corruptionist! Your Loathsome Embracer!
Gaze upon him -- ponder him well -- and then say if you can give your honest votes to a creature who has earned this dismal array of titles by his hideous (丑恶的) crimes, and dares not open his mouth in denial of any one of them!
There was no possible way of getting out of it, and so, in deep humiliation, I set about preparing to "answer" a mass of baseless charges and mean and wicked falsehoods (假话).
But I never finished the task, for the very next morning a paper came out with a new horror, a fresh malignity (恶意), and seriously charged me with burning a lunatic asylum (救济院) with all its inmates because it obstructed the view from my house.
This threw me into a sort of panic. Then came the charge of poisoning my uncle to get his property, with an imperative demand that the grave (墓穴) should be opened.
This drove me to the verge of distraction. On top of this I was accused of employing toothless and incompetent old relatives to prepare the food for the foundling hospital when I was warden (区长).
I was wavering (动摇的)-- wavering.
And at last, as a due and fitting climax to the shameless persecution (迫害) that party rancor had inflicted upon me, nine little toddling (刚学走步的小孩) children of all shades of colors and degrees of raggedness were taught to rush on to the platform at a public meeting and clasp me around the legs and call me PA (爸爸(口语))!
I gave up. I hauled down my colors and surrendered.
I was not equal to the requirements of a Gubernatorial campaign in the State of New York, and so I sent in my withdrawal from the candidacy, and in bitterness of spirit signed it,
"Truly yours,
"Once a decent man, but now
"MARK TWAIN, I. P., M. T., B. S., D. T., F. C., and L. E." {3}
