A FALSEHOOD.
MARK TWAIN at last sees that the "Saturday Review's" criticism of his "Innocents Abroad" was not serious, and he is intensely mortified at the thought of having been so badly sold. He takes the only course left him, and in the last GALAXY claims that he wrote the criticism himself, and published it in The GALAXY to sell the public. This is ingenious, but unfortunately it is not true. If any of our readers will take the trouble to call at this office we will show them the original article in the "Saturday Review" of October 8th, which, on comparison, will be found to be identical with the one published in THE GALAXY. The best thing for Mark to do will be to admit that he was sold, and say no more about it.
The above is from the Cincinnati "Enquirer", and is a falsehood. Come to the proof. If the "Enquirer" people, through any agent, will produce at THE GALAXY office a London "Saturday Review" of October 8th, containing an "article which, on comparison, will be found to be identical with the one published in THE GALAXY," I will pay to that agent five hundred dollars cash. Moreover, if at any specified time I fail to produce at the same place a copy of the London "Saturday Review" of October 8th, containing a lengthy criticism upon the "Innocents Abroad," entirely different, in every paragraph and sentence, from the one I published in THE GALAXY, I will pay to the "Enquirer's" agent another five hundred dollars cash. I offer Sheldon Co., publishers, 500 Broadway, New York, as my "backers." Any one in New York, authorized by the "Enquirer," will receive prompt attention. It is an easy and profitable way for the "Enquirer" people to prove that they have not uttered a pitiful, deliberate falsehood in the above paragraphs. Will they swallow that falsehood ignominiously, or will they send an agent to THE GALAXY office?
In next month's GALAXY, if they do not send the agent and take this chance at making a thousand dollars where they do not need to risk a single cent, they shall be exposed. I think the Cincinnati "Enquirer" must be edited by children.
