Explore "Mark Twain" by Oliver Herford on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
A Pipe Dream
Well I recall how first I met / Mark Twain -- an infant barely three / Rolling a tiny cigarette / While cooing on his nurse's knee.
Since then in every sort of place / I've met with Mark and heard him joke, / Yet how can I describe his face? / I never saw it for the smoke.
At school he won a _smokership_, / At Harvard College (Cambridge, Mass.) / His name was soon on every lip, / They made him "smoker" of his class.
Who will forget his smoking bout / With Mount Vesuvius -- our cheers -- / When Mount Vesuvius went out / And didn't smoke again for years?
The news was flashed to England's King, / Who begged Mark Twain to come and stay, / Offered him dukedoms -- anything / To smoke the London fog away.
But Mark was firm. "I bow," said he, / "To no imperial command, / No ducal coronet for me, / My smoke is for my native land!"
For Mark there waits a brighter crown! / When Peter comes his card to read -- / He'll take the sign "No Smoking" down, / Then Heaven will be Heaven indeed.