PREFACE.
I have scattered through this volume a mass of matter which has never been in print before (such as "Learned Fables for Good Old Boys and Girls," the "Jumping Frog restored to the English tongue after martyrdom in the French," the "Membranous Croup" sketch, and many others which I need not specify): not doing this in order to make an advertisement of it, but because these things seemed instructive.
HARTFORD, 1875.
MARK TWAIN.
SKETCHES NEW AND OLD MY WATCH--[Written about 1870.] AN INSTRUCTIVE LITTLE TALE My beautiful new watch had run eighteen months without losing or gaining, and without breaking any part of its machinery or stopping.

I had come to believe it infallible in its judgments about the time of day, and to consider its constitution and its anatomy imperishable.

But at last, one night, I let it run down.

I grieved about it as if it were a recognized messenger and forerunner of calamity.

But by and by I cheered up, set the watch by guess, and commanded my bodings and superstitions to depart.
Next day I stepped into the chief jeweler's to set it by the exact time, and the head of the establishment took it out of my hand and proceeded to set it for me.