第174章

But now there was need of capital to manufacture and market the wonder.Clemens, casting about in his mind, remembered Senator Jones, of Nevada, a man of great wealth, and his old friend, Joe Goodman, of Nevada, in whom Jones had unlimited confidence.He wrote to Goodman, and in this letter we get a pretty full exposition of the whole matter as it stood in the fall of 1889.We note in this communication that Clemens says that he has been at the machine three years and seven months, but this was only the period during which he had spent the regular monthly sum of three thousand dollars.His interest in the invention had begun as far back as 1880.

To Joseph T.Goodman, in Nevada:

Private.HARTFORD, Oct.7, '89.

DEAR JOE,-I had a letter from Aleck Badlam day before yesterday, and in answering him I mentioned a matter which I asked him to consider a secret except to you and John McComb,--[This is Col.McComb, of the Alta-California, who had sent Mark Twain on the Quaker City excursion]--as Iam not ready yet to get into the newspapers.

I have come near writing you about this matter several times, but it wasn't ripe, and I waited.It is ripe, now.It is a type-setting machine which I undertook to build for the inventor(for a consideration).

I have been at it three years and seven months without losing a day, at a cost of $3,000 a month, and in so private a way that Hartford has known nothing about it.Indeed only a dozen men have known of the matter.

I have reported progress from time to time to the proprietors of the N.Y.Sun, Herald, Times, World, Harper Brothers and John F.Trow; also to the proprietors of the Boston Herald and the Boston Globe.Three years ago I asked all these people to squelch their frantic desire to load up their offices with the Mergenthaler (N.Y.Tribune) machine, and wait for mine and then choose between the two.They have waited--with no very gaudy patience--but still they have waited; and I could prove to them to-day that they have not lost anything by it.But I reserve the proof for the present--except in the case of the N.Y.Herald; I sent an invitation there the other day--a courtesy due a paper which ordered $240,000 worth of our machines long ago when it was still in a crude condition.The Herald has ordered its foreman to come up here next Thursday; but that is the only invitation which will go out for some time yet.

The machine was finished several weeks ago, and has been running ever since in the machine shop.It is a magnificent creature of steel, all of Pratt & Whitney's super-best workmanship, and as nicely adjusted and as accurate as a watch.In construction it is as elaborate and complex as that machine which it ranks next to, by every right--Man--and in performance it is as simple and sure.

Anybody can set type on it who can read--and can do it after only 15minutes' instruction.The operator does not need to leave his seat at the keyboard; for the reason that he is not required to do anything but strike the keys and set type--merely one function; the spacing, justifying, emptying into the galley, and distributing of dead matter is all done by the machine without anybody's help--four functions.

The ease with which a cub can learn is surprising.Day before yesterday I saw our newest cub set, perfectly space and perfectly justify 2,150 ems of solid nonpareil in an hour and distribute the like amount in the same hour--and six hours previously he had never seen the machine or its keyboard.It was a good hour's work for 3-year veterans on the other type-setting machines to do.We have 3 cubs.The dean of the trio is a school youth of 18.Yesterday morning he had been an apprentice on the machine 16 working days (8-hour days); and we speeded him to see what he could do in an hour.In the hour he set 5,900 ems solid nonpareil, and the machine perfectly spaced and justified it, and of course distributed the like amount in the same hour.Considering that a good fair compositor sets 700 and distributes 700 in the one hour, this boy did the work of about 8 x a compositors in that hour.This fact sends all other type-setting machines a thousand miles to the rear, and the best of them will never be heard of again after we publicly exhibit in New York.

We shall put on 3 more cubs.We have one school boy and two compositors, now,--and we think of putting on a type writer, a stenographer, and perhaps a shoemaker, to show that no special gifts or training are required with this machine.We shall train these beginners two or three months--or until some one of them gets up to 7,000 an hour--then we will show up in New York and run the machine 24 hours a day 7 days in the week, for several months--to prove that this is a machine which will never get out of order or cause delay, and can stand anything an anvil can stand.You know there is no other typesetting machine that can run two hours on a stretch without causing trouble and delay with its incurable caprices.

We own the whole field--every inch of it--and nothing can dislodge us.

Now then, above is my preachment, and here follows the reason and purpose of it.I want you to run over here, roost over the machine a week and satisfy yourself, and then go to John P.Jones or to whom you please, and sell me a hundred thousand dollars' worth of this property and take ten per cent in cash or the "property" for your trouble--the latter, if you are wise, because the price I ask is a long way short of the value.

What I call "property" is this.A small part of my ownership consists of a royalty of $500 on every machine marketed under the American patents.

My selling-terms are, a permanent royalty of one dollar on every American-marketed machine for a thousand dollars cash to me in hand paid.