Page:Abroad with Mark Twain and Eugene Field.djvu/164

 MARK ENJOYED OTHER HUMORISTS

Mark and I were walking through a rather disreputable little street, lined by private hotels, which leads from the Strand to the Playhouse, London, when he suddenly stopped and pointed to a bronze tablet on an old house about the middle of the block.

"Read," he commanded, but my eyes refused to climb to the second story.

"Why this used to be the abode of the poet who has said:

"Heine," I ventured.

"Come to think of it, I am not absolutely sure, that Heine coined that political document,'* admitted Mark, "but it is very much in the manner of an epigram he did write, I believe.

I confess I heard this, too, for the first time; possibly Mark got off the fireworks all by his loneness, pour passer le temps.

"Howells introduced me to Heine," he explained during the entr'acte. "I am glad he did, for I never found in his writings 160