The American Claimant. Mark Twain

got married, and began to breed savages for the Claimant market; wrote no letters home; was supposed to be dead; his younger brother softly took possession; presently the American did die, and straightway his eldest product put in his claim—by letter—letter still in existence—and died before the uncle in-possession found time—or maybe inclination—to—answer. The infant son of that eldest product grew up—long interval, you see—and he took to writing letters and furnishing evidences. Well, successor after successor has done the same, down to the present idiot. It was a succession of paupers; not one of them was ever able to pay his passage to England or institute suit. The Fairfaxes kept their lordship alive, and so they have never lost it to this day, although they live in Maryland; their friend lost his by his own neglect. You perceive now, that the facts in this case bring us to precisely this result: morally the American tramp is rightful earl of Rossmore; legally he has no more right than his dog. There now—are you satisfied?”

      There was a pause, then the son glanced at the crest carved in the great oaken mantel and said, with a regretful note in his voice:

      “Since the introduction of heraldic symbols,—the motto of this house has been ‘Suum cuique’—to every man his own. By your own intrepidly frank confession, my lord, it is become a sarcasm: If Simon Lathers—”

      “Keep that exasperating name to yourself! For ten years it has pestered my eye—and tortured my ear; till at last my very footfalls time themselves to the brain-racking rhythm of Simon Lathers!—Simon Lathers! —Simon Lathers! And now, to make its presence in my soul eternal, immortal, imperishable, you have resolved to—to—what is it you have resolved to do?”

      “To go to Simon Lathers, in America, and change places with him.”

      “What? Deliver the reversion of the earldom into his hands?”

      “That is my purpose.”

      “Make this tremendous surrender without even trying the fantastic case in the Lords?”

      “Ye—s—” with hesitation and some embarrassment.

      “By all that is amazing, I believe you are insane, my son. See here —have you been training with that ass again—that radical, if you prefer the term, though the words are synonymous—Lord Tanzy, of Tollmache?”

      The son did not reply, and the old lord continued:

      “Yes, you confess. That puppy, that shame to his birth and caste, who holds all hereditary lordships and privilege to be usurpation, all nobility a tinsel sham, all aristocratic institutions a fraud, all inequalities in rank a legalized crime and an infamy, and no bread honest bread that a man doesn’t earn by his own work—work, pah!”—and the old patrician brushed imaginary labor-dirt from his white hands. “You have come to hold just those opinions yourself, I suppose,”—he added with a sneer.

      A faint flush in the younger man’s cheek told that the shot had hit and hurt; but he answered with dignity:

      “I have. I say it without shame—I feel none. And now my reason for resolving to renounce my heirship without resistance is explained. I wish to retire from what to me is a false existence, a false position, and begin my life over again—begin it right—begin it on the level of mere manhood, unassisted by factitious aids, and succeed or fail by pure merit or the want of it. I will go to America, where all men are equal and all have an equal chance; I will live or die, sink or swim, win or lose as just a man—that alone, and not a single helping gaud or fiction back of it.”

      “Hear, hear!” The two men looked each other steadily in the eye a moment or two, then the elder one added, musingly, “Ab-so-lutely cra-zy—ab-solutely!” After another silence, he said, as one who, long troubled by clouds, detects a ray of sunshine, “Well, there will be one satisfaction—Simon Lathers will come here to enter into his own, and I will drown him in the horsepond. The poor devil—always so humble in his letters, so pitiful, so deferential; so steeped in reverence for our great line and lofty-station; so anxious to placate us, so prayerful for recognition as a relative, a bearer in his veins of our sacred blood—and withal so poor, so needy, so threadbare and pauper-shod as to raiment, so despised, so laughed at for his silly claimantship by the lewd American scum around him—ah, the vulgar, crawling, insufferable tramp! To read one of his cringing, nauseating letters—well?”

      This to a splendid flunkey, all in inflamed plush and buttons and knee-breeches as to his trunk, and a glinting white frost-work of ground-glass paste as to his head, who stood with his heels together and the upper half of him bent forward, a salver in his hands:

      “The letters, my lord.”

      My lord took them, and the servant disappeared.

      “Among the rest, an American letter. From the tramp, of course. Jove, but here’s a change! No brown paper envelope this time, filched from a shop, and carrying the shop’s advertisement in the corner. Oh, no, a proper enough envelope—with a most ostentatiously broad mourning border—for his cat, perhaps, since he was a bachelor—and fastened with red wax—a batch of it as big as a half-crown—and—and—our crest for a seal!—motto and all. And the ignorant, sprawling hand is gone; he sports a secretary, evidently—a secretary with a most confident swing and flourish to his pen. Oh indeed, our fortunes are improving over there—our meek tramp has undergone a metamorphosis.”

      “Read it, my lord, please.”

      “Yes, this time I will. For the sake of the cat:”

       14,042 SIXTEENTH. STREET,

       WASHINGTON, May 2.

       My Lord—

       It is my painful duty to announce to you that the head of our illustrious house is no more—The Right Honourable, The Most Noble, The Most Puissant Simon Lathers Lord Rossmore having departed this life (“Gone at last—this is unspeakably precious news, my son,”) at his seat in the environs of the hamlet of Duffy’s Corners in the grand old State of Arkansas,—and his twin brother with him, both being crushed by a log at a smoke-house-raising, owing to carelessness on the part of all present, referable to over-confidence and gaiety induced by overplus of sour-mash—(“Extolled be sour-mash, whatever that may be, eh Berkeley?”) five days ago, with no scion of our ancient race present to close his eyes and inter him with the honors due his historic name and lofty rank—in fact, he is on the ice yet, him and his brother—friends took up a collection for it. But I shall take immediate occasion to have their noble remains shipped to you (“Great heavens!”) for interment, with due ceremonies and solemnities, in the family vault or mausoleum of our house. Meantime I shall put up a pair of hatchments on my house-front, and you will of course do the same at your several seats.

       I have also to remind you that by this sad disaster I as sole heir, inherit and become seized of all the titles, honors, lands, and goods of our lamented relative, and must of necessity, painful as the duty is, shortly require at the bar of the Lords restitution of these dignities and properties, now illegally enjoyed by your titular lordship.

       With assurance of my distinguished consideration and warm cousinly regard, I remain

       Your titular lordship’s

       Most obedient servant,

       Mulberry Sellers Earl Rossmore.

      “Im-mense! Come, this one’s interesting. Why, Berkeley, his breezy impudence is—is—why, it’s colossal, it’s sublime.”

      “No, this one doesn’t seem to cringe much.”

      “Cringe—why, he doesn’t know the meaning of the word. Hatchments! To commemorate that sniveling tramp and his, fraternal duplicate. And he is going to send me the remains. The late Claimant was a fool, but plainly this new one’s a maniac. What a name! Mulberry Sellers—there’s music for you, Simon Lathers—Mulberry Sellers—Mulberry Sellers—Simon Lathers. Sounds like machinery working and churning. Simon Lathers, Mulberry Sel—Are you going?”

      “If I have your leave, father.”