 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. This reading by Andrew Sorcini. Extracts from Adam's Diary. Translated from the original manuscript by Mark Twain. Note, I translated a portion of this diary some years ago, and a friend of mine printed a few copies in an incomplete form, but the public never got them. Since then I have deciphered some more of Adam's hieroglyphs, and think he has now become sufficiently important as a public character to justify this publication. MT Monday This new creature with the long hair is a good deal in the way. It is always hanging around and following me about. I don't like this. I'm not used to company. I wish it would stay with the other animals. Cloudy today, wind in the east, think we shall have rain. Where did I get that word? I remember now. The new creature uses it. Tuesday Been examining the Great Waterfall. It is the finest thing on the estate, I think. The new creature calls it Niagara Falls. Why, I am sure I do not know. Says it looks like Niagara Falls. That is not a reason it is mere waywardness and imbecility. I get no chance to name anything myself. The new creature names everything that comes along before I can get in a protest. And always that same pretext is offered. It looks like the thing. There is the dodo, for instance. Says the moment one looks at it, one sees at a glance that it looks like a dodo. It will have to keep that name, no doubt. It wearies me to fret about it, and it does no good anyway. Dodo. It looks no more like a dodo than I do. Wednesday Built me a shelter against the rain but could not have it to myself in peace. The new creature intruded. When I tried to put it out, it shed water out of the holes it looks with and wiped it away with the back of its paws and made a noise such as some of the other animals make when they are in distress. I wish it would not talk. It is always talking. That sounds like a cheap fling at the poor creature, a slur, but I do not mean it so. I've never heard the human voice before, and any new and strange sound intruding itself here upon the solemn hush of these dreaming solitudes offends my ear and seems a false note. And this new sound is so close to me it is right at my shoulder, right at my ear, first on one side and then on the other. And I'm used only to sounds that are more or less distant from me. Friday The naming thing goes recklessly on in spite of anything I can do. I had a very good name for the estate, and it was musical and pretty. Garden of Eden Privately I continue to call it that but not any longer publicly. The new creature says it is all woods and rocks and scenery and therefore has no resemblance to a garden. Says it looks like a park and does not look like anything but a park. Consequently, without consulting me, it has been new named Niagara Falls Park. This is sufficiently high-handed, it seems to me. And already there's a sign up. Keep off the grass. My life is not as happy as it was. Saturday The new creature eats too much fruit. We're gonna run short, most likely. We, again. That is its word. Mine too now from hearing it so much. Good deal of fog this morning. I do not go out in the fog myself. The new creature does. It goes out in all weathers and stumps right in with its muddy feet. And talks. Used to be so pleasant and quiet here. Sunday. Pulled through. This day is getting to be more and more trying. It was selected and set apart last November as a day of rest. I already had six of them per week before. This morning found the new creature trying to clot apples out of that forbidden tree. Monday. The new creature says its name is Eve. That is alright. I have no objections. Says it is to call it by when I want it to come. I said it was superfluous then. The word evidently raised me in its respect. And indeed it is a large good word and will bear repetition. It says it is not an it, it is a she. This is probably doubtful, yet it is all one to me. What she is were nothing to me if she would but go by herself and not talk. Tuesday. She has littered the whole estate with full names and offensive signs. This way to the whirlpool. This way to goat island. Cave of the winds this way. She says this park would make a tidy summer resort if there was any custom for it. Summer resort? Another invention of hers. Just words without any meaning. What is a summer resort? But its best not to ask her. She has such a rage for explaining. Friday. She is taken to beseeching me to stop going over the falls. What harm does it do? Says it makes her shudder. I wonder why. I have always done it. Always liked the plunge and the excitement and the coolness. I supposed it was what the falls were for. They have no other use that I can see and they must have been made for something. She says they were only made for scenery like the rhinoceros and the mastodon. I went over the falls in a barrel. Not satisfactory to her. Went over in a tub. Still not satisfactory. Swam the whirlpool and the rapids in a fig leaf suit. It got much damaged. Hence tedious complaints about my extravagance. I am too much hampered here. What I need is a change of scene. Saturday. I escaped last Tuesday night and traveled two days and built me another shelter in a secluded place and obliterated my tracks as well as I could. But she hunted me out by means of a beast which she has tamed and calls a wolf and came making that pitiful noise again and shedding that water out of the places she looks with. I was obliged to return with her, but will presently emigrate again when occasion offers. She engages herself in many foolish things, among others trying to study out why the animals, called lions and tigers, live on grass and flowers when as she says, the sort of teeth they wear would indicate that they were intended to eat each other. This is foolish because to do that would be to kill each other and that would introduce what, as I understand it, is called death. And death, as I've been told, has not yet entered the park, which is a pity on some accounts. Sunday. Pulled through. Monday. I believe I see what the week is for, is to give time to rest up from the weariness of Sunday. It seems a good idea. She's been climbing that tree again, clotted her out of it. She said nobody was looking. Seems to consider that a sufficient justification for chancing any dangerous thing. Told her that. The word justification moved her admiration and envy, too. I thought it is a good word. Thursday. She told me she was made out of a rib taken from my body. This is at least doubtful, if not more than that. I have not missed any rib. She's in much trouble but the buzzard. This grass does not agree with it, is afraid she can't raise it, thinks it was intended to live on decayed flesh. The buzzard must get along the best it can with what is provided. We cannot overturn the whole scheme to accommodate the buzzard. Saturday. She fell in the pond yesterday when she was looking at herself in it, which she is always doing. She nearly strangled and said it was most uncomfortable. This made her sorry for the creatures which live in there, which she calls fish, for she continues to fasten names on to things that don't need them and don't come when they are called by them, which is a matter of no consequence to her as she is such a numbskull anyway. So she got a lot of them out and brought them in last night and put them in my bed to keep warm. But I have noticed them now and then all day and I don't see that they are any happier there than they were before, only quieter. When night comes I shall throw them outdoors. I will not sleep with them again for I find them clammy and unpleasant to lie among when a person hasn't anything on. Sunday. Pulled through. Tuesday. She is taken up with a snake now. The other animals are glad for she was always experimenting with them and bothering them. And I am glad because the snake talks and this enables me to get a rest. Friday. The snake advises her to try the fruit of that tree and says the result will be a great and fine and noble education. I told her there would be another result too. It would introduce death into the world. That was a mistake. It had been better to keep the remark to myself. It only gave her an idea. She could save the sick buzzard and furnish fresh meat to the despondent lions and tigers. I advised her to keep away from the tree. She said she wouldn't. I foresee trouble will emigrate. Wednesday. I have had a variegated time. I escaped that night and rode a horse all night as fast as he could go hoping to get clear out of the park and hide in some other country before the trouble should begin. But it was not to be. About an hour after sun-up as I was riding through a flowery plain where thousands of animals were grazing slumbering or playing with each other according to their want and taste of frightful noises. And in one moment the plain was a frantic commotion and every beast was destroying its neighbor. I knew what it meant. Eve had eaten that fruit and death was come into the world. The tigers ate my horse paying no attention when I ordered them to desist and they would have eaten me if I had stayed which I didn't but went away in much haste. I found this place outside the park and was fairly comfortable for a few days but she has found me out. Found me out and has named the place Tana Wanda. Says it looks like that. In fact, I was not sorry she came for there are but meager pickings here and she brought some of those apples. I was obliged to eat them, I was so hungry. It was against my principles but I find that principles have no real force except for one as well fed. She came curtained in bows and bunches of leaves and when I asked her what she meant by such nonsense she snatched them away and threw them down. She tittered and blushed. I've never seen a person titter and blush before and to me it seemed unbecoming and idiotic. She said I would soon know how it was myself. This is correct. Hungry as I was, I laid down the apple half eaten certainly the best one I ever saw considering the lateness of the season and arrayed myself in the discarded bows and branches and then spoke to her with some severity and ordered her to go and get some more and not make such a spectacle of herself. She did it and after this we crept down to where the wild beast battle had been and collected some skins and I made her patch together a couple of suits proper for public occasions. They are uncomfortable it is true but stylish and that is the main point about clothes. I find she is a good deal of a companion. I see I should be lonesome and depressed without her now that I have lost my property. Another thing she says it is ordered that we work for our living hereafter. She will be useful. I will super intend. Ten days later she accuses me of being the cause of our disaster. She says with apparent sincerity and truth that the serpent assured her that the forbidden fruit was not apples, it was chestnuts. I said I was innocent then for I had not eaten any chestnuts. She said the serpent informed her that chestnut was a figurative term meaning an aged and moldy joke. I turned pale at that for I have made many jokes to pass the weary time and some of them could have been of that sort though I'd honestly suppose that they were new when I made them. She asked me if I had made one just at the time of the catastrophe. I was obliged to admit that I had made one to myself though not allowed. It was this. I was thinking about the falls and I said to myself how wonderful it is to see that vast body of water tumble down there. Then in an instant a bright thought flashed into my head and I let it fly saying it would be a deal more wonderful to see it tumble up there. And I was just about to kill myself with laughing at it when all nature broke loose and war and death and I had to flee from my life. There she said with triumph that is just it. The serpent mentioned that very jest chestnut and said it was co-evil with the creation. Alas, I am indeed to blame. Would that I were not witty or would that I'd never had that radiant thought? Next year we have named it Cain. She caught it while I was up country trapping on the north shore of the eerie caught it in the timber a couple of miles from our dugout or it might have been four, she isn't a certain witch. It resembles us in some ways and maybe a relation. That is what she thinks but this is an error in my judgment. The difference in size warrants the conclusion that it is a different and new kind of animal a fish perhaps. Though when I put it in the water to see it sank and she plunged in and snatched it out before there was opportunity for the experiment to determine the matter. I still think it is a fish but she is indifferent about what it is and will not let me have it to try. The coming of this creature seems to have changed her whole nature and made her unreasonable about experiments. She thinks more of it than she does any of the other animals but is not able to explain why. Her mind is disordered, everything shows it. Sometimes she carries the fish in her arms half the night when it complains and wants to get to the water. At such times the water comes out of the places in her face that she looks out of and she pats the fish on the back and makes soft sounds with her mouth to soothe it with sorrow and solicitude in a hundred ways. I've never seen her do like this with any other fish and it troubles me greatly. She used to carry the young tigers around so and play with them before we lost our property but it was only play. She never took on about them like this when their dinner disagreed with them. Sunday. She doesn't work Sundays but lies around all tired out and likes to have the fish wallow over her and she makes full noises to amuse it and could laugh. I've not seen a fish before that could laugh. This makes me doubt. I've come to like Sunday myself super intending all the weak tires of body so. There ought to be more Sundays and the old days they were tough but now they come handy. Wednesday. It isn't a fish. I cannot quite make out what it is. It makes curious devilish noises when not satisfied and says, It is not one of us for it doesn't walk. It is not a bird for it doesn't fly. It is not a frog for it doesn't hop. It is not a snake for it doesn't crawl. I feel sure it is not a fish though I cannot get a chance to find out whether it can swim or not. It merely lies around and mostly on its back with its feet up. I've not seen any other animal do that before. I said I believed it was an enigma and heard the word without understanding it. In my judgment it is either an enigma or some kind of bug. If it dies I will take it apart and see what its arrangements are. I never had a thing perplex me so. Three months later the perplexity augments instead of diminishing. I sleep but little. It is ceased from lying around and goes about on its four legs now. Yet it differs from the other four-legged animals in that its front legs are unusually short. Consequently this causes the main part of its person to stick up uncomfortably high in the air and this is not attractive. It is built much as we are but its method of travelling shows that it is not of our breed. Its short front legs and long hind ones indicate that it is of the kangaroo family. But it is a marked variation of the species since the true kangaroo hops whereas this one never does. Still it is a curious and interesting variety and has not been catalogued before. As I discovered it I felt justified in securing the credit of the discovery by attaching my name to it and hence have called it kangarooim adamensis. It must have been a young one when it came for it has grown exceedingly since. It must be five times as big now as it was then and when discontented is able to make from 22 to 38 times the noise it made at first. Coercion does not modify this but has the contrary effect. For this reason I discontinued the system. She reconciles it by persuasion and by giving it things which she had previously told it she wouldn't give it. As already observed I was not at home when it first came and she told me she had found it in the woods. It seems odd that it should be the only one yet it must be so for I have worn myself out these many weeks trying to find another one to add to my collection and for this one to play with for surely then it would be quieter and we could tame it more easily. But I find none nor any vestige of any and strangest of all no tracks. It has to live on the ground it cannot help itself therefore how does it get about without leaving a track. I've set a dozen traps but they do no good. I catch all small animals except that one animals that merely go into the trap out of curiosity I think to see what the milk is there for. They never drink it. Three months later the kangaroo still continues to grow which is very strange and perplexing. I never knew when to be so long getting its growth. It has fur on its head now not like kangaroo fur but exactly like our hair except that it is much finer and softer instead of being black is red. I'm like to lose my mind over the capricious and harassing developments of this unclassifiable zoological freak. If I could catch another one but that is hopeless. It is a new variety and the only sample this is plain. But I caught a true kangaroo and brought it in thinking that this one being lonesome would rather have that for company than have no kin at all. Or any animal it could feel a nearness to or get sympathy from in its forlorn condition for strangers who do not know its ways or habits or what to do to make it feel that it is among friends but it was a mistake. It went into such fits at the side of the kangaroo that I was convinced it had never seen one before. I pity the poor noisy little animal but there is nothing I can do to make it happy. If I could tame it but that is out of the question. The more I try the worse I seem to make it. It grieves me to the heart to see it in its little storms of sorrow and passion. I wanted to let it go but she wouldn't hear of it. That seemed cruel and not like her and yet she may be right. It might be lonelier than ever for since I cannot find another one how could it? Five months later it is not a kangaroo. No for it supports itself by holding to her finger and thus goes a few steps on its hind legs and then falls down. It is probably some kind of a bear and yet it has no tail as yet and no fur except on its head. It still keeps growing that is a curious circumstance for bears get their growth earlier than this. Bears are dangerous since our catastrophe and I shall not be satisfied to have this one prowling about the place much longer without a muzzle on. I have offered to get her a kangaroo if she would let this one go but it did no good. She is determined to run us into all sorts of foolish risks I think. She was not like this before she lost her mind. A fortnight later I examined its mouth. There is no danger yet. It has only one tooth. It has no tail yet. It makes more noise now than it ever did before and mainly at night. I have moved out. But I shall go over mornings to breakfast and see if it has more teeth. If it gets a mouthful of teeth it will be time for it to go. Tail or no tail bear does not need a tail in order to be dangerous. Four months later I have been off hunting and fishing a month up in the region that she calls buffalo. I don't know why unless it is because there are not any buffaloes there. Meantime the bear has learned to paddle around all by itself on its hind legs and says papa and mama. It is certainly a new species. This resemblance to words may be purely accidental of course and may have no purpose or meaning even in that case it is still extraordinary and is a thing which no other bear can do. Three months later it has been a weary, weary hunt yet I have had no success. In the meantime without stirring from the home estate she has caught another one. I never saw such luck. I might have hunted these woods a hundred years I never should have run across that thing. Next day I have been comparing the new one with the old one and is perfectly plain that they are the same breed. I was going to stuff one of them for my collection but she is prejudiced against it for some reason or other so I have relinquished the idea though I think it is a mistake. It would be an irreparable loss to science if they should get away. The old one is tamer than it was and can laugh and talk like the parrot having learned this no doubt from being with the parrot so much and having the imitative faculty in a highly developed degree. I would be astonished if it turns out to be a new kind of parrot and yet I ought not to be astonished for it has already been everything else it could think of since those first days when it was a fish. The new one is as ugly now as the old one was at first has the same sulphur and raw meat complexion and the same singular head without any fur on it. She calls it Able. Ten years later they are boys we found it out long ago it was their coming in that small immature shape that puzzled us who were not used to it there's some girls now Able is a good boy but if Cain had stayed a bear would have improved him after all these years I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning it is better to live outside the garden with her than inside it without her at first I thought she'd talk too much but now I should be sorry to have that voice fall silent and pass out of my life blessed be the chestnut that brought us near together and taught me to know the goodness of her heart and the sweetness of her spirit