'could not move his body in the least'; the Californian frog 'give a heave, but it warn't no use—he couldn't budge.' In both the ancient and the modern cases the strangers departed with the money. The Boeotian and the Californian wonder what is the matter with their frogs; they lift them and examine; they turn them upside down and out spills the informing ballast.
Yes, the resemblances are curiously exact. I used to tell the story of the 'Jumping Frog' in San Francisco, and presently Artemus Ward came along and wanted it to help fill out a little book which he was about to publish; so I wrote it out and sent it to his publisher, Carleton; but Carleton thought the book had enough matter in it, so he gave the story to Henry Clapp as a present, and Clapp put it in his 'Saturday Press,' and it killed that paper with a suddenness that was beyond praise. At least the paper died with that issue, and none but envious people have ever tried to rob me of the honour and credit of killing it. The 'Jumping Frog' was the first piece of writing of mine that spread itself through the newspapers and brought me into public notice. Consequently, the 'Saturday Press' was a cocoon and I the worm in it; also, I was the gay-coloured literary moth which its death set free. This simile has been used before.
Early in '66 the 'Jumping Frog' was issued in book form, with other sketches of mine. A year or two later Madame Blanc translated it into French and published it in the 'Revue des Deux Mondes,' but the result was not what should have been expected, for the 'Revue' struggled along and pulled through, and is alive yet. I think the fault must have been in the translation. I ought to have translated it myself. I think so because I examined into the matter and finally retranslated the sketch from the French back into English, to see what the trouble was; that is, to see just what sort of a focus the French people got upon it. Then the mystery was explained. In French the story is too confused and chaotic and unreposeful and ungrammatical and insane; consequently it could only cause grief and sickness—it could not kill. A glance at my retranslation will show the reader that this must be true.
Eh bien! this Smiley nourished some terriers a rats, and some cocks of combat, and some cats, and all sorts of things: and with his rage of betting one no had more of repose. He trapped one day a frog and him imported with him (et l'emporta chez lui) saying that he pretended to make his education. You me believe if you will, but during three months he not has nothing done but to him apprehend to jump (apprendre a sauter) in a court retired of her mansion (de sa maison). And I you respond that he have succeeded. He him gives a small blow by behind, and the instant after you shall see the frog turn in the air like a grease-biscuit, make one summersault, sometimes two, when she was well started, and refall upon his feet like a cat. He him had accomplished in the art of to gobble the flies (gober des mouches), and him there exercised continually—so well that a fly at the most far that she appeared was a fly lost. Smiley had custom to say that all which lacked to a frog it was the education, but with the education she could do nearly all—and I him believe. Tenez, I him have seen pose Daniel Webster there upon this plank— Daniel Webster was the name of the frog—and to him sing, 'Some flies, Daniel, some flies!'—in a fash of the eye Daniel had bounded and seized a fly here upon the counter, then jumped anew at the earth, where he rested truly to himself scratch the head with his behind-foot, as if he no had not the least idea of his superiority. Never you not have seen frog as modest, as natural, sweet as she was. And when he himself agitated to jump purely and simply upon plain earth, she does more ground in one jump than any beast of his species than you can know.
To jump plain—this was his strong. When he himself agitated for that Smiley multiplied the bests upon her as long as there to him remained a red. It must to know, Smiley was monstrously proud of his frog, and he of it was right, for some men who were travelled, who had all seen, said that they to him would be injurious to him compare to another frog. Smiley guarded Daniel in a little box latticed which he carried bytimes to the village for some bet.
One day an individual stranger at the camp him arrested with his box and him said:
'What is this that you have then shut up there within?'
Smiley said, with an air indifferent:
'That could be a paroquet, or a syringe (ou un serin), but this no is nothing of such, it not is but a frog.'
The individual it took, it regarded with care, it turned from one side and from the other, then he said:
'Tiens! in effect!—At what is she good?'
'My God!' responded Smiley, always with an air disengaged, 'she is good for one thing, to my notice (a mon avis), she can better in jumping (elle peut batter en sautant) all frogs of the county of Calaveras.'
The individual retook the box, it examined of new longly, and it rendered to Smiley in saying with an air deliberate:
'Eh bien! I no saw not that that frog had nothing of better than each frog.' (Je ne vois pas que cette grenouille ait rien de mieux qu'aucune grenouille.) (If that isn't grammar gone to seed, then I count myself no judge.—M.T.)
'Possible that you not it saw not,' said Smiley; 'possible that you—you comprehend frogs; possible that you not you there comprehend nothing; possible that you had of the experience, and possible that you not be but an amateur. Of all manner (de toute maniere) I bet forty dollars that she batter in jumping no matter which frog of the country of Calaveras.'
The individual reflected a second, and said like sad:
'I not am but a stranger here, I no have not a frog; but if I of it had one, I would embrace the bet.'
'Strong, well!' respond Smiley; 'nothing of more facility. If you will hold my box a minute, I go you to search a frog (j'irai vous chercher.)'
Behold, then, the individual who guards the box, who puts his forty dollars upon those of Smiley, and who attends (et qui attendre). He attended enough longtimes, reflecting all solely. And figure you that he takes Daniel, him opens the mouth by force and with a teaspoon him fills with shot of the hunt, even him fills just to the chin, then he him puts by the earth. Smiley during these times was at slopping in a swamp. Finally he trapped (attrape) a frog, him carried to that individual, and said:
'Now if you be ready, put him all against Daniel, with their before-feet upon the same line, and I give the signal'—then he added: 'One, two three—advance!'
Him and the individual touched their frogs by behind, and the frog new put to jump smartly, but Daniel himself lifted ponderously, exhalted the shoulders thus, like a Frenchman—to what good? He could not budge, he is planted solid like a church, he not advance no more than if one him had put at the anchor.
Smiley was surprised and disgusted, but he not himself doubted not of the turn being intended (mais il ne se doutait pas du tour bien entendre). The indidivual empocketed the silver, himself with it went, and of it himself in going is that he no gives not a jerk of thumb over the shoulder—like that—at the poor Daniel, in saying with his air deliberate—(L'individu empoche l'argent, s'en va et en s'en allant est-ce qu'il ne donne pas un coup de pouce pas- dessus l'epaule, comme ca, au pauvre Daniel, en disant de son air delibere).
'Eh bien! I no see not that that frog has nothing of better than another.'
Smiley himself scratched longtimes the head, the eyes fixed upon Daniel, until that which at last he said:
'I me demand how the devil it makes itself that this beast has refused. Is it that she had something? One would believe that she is stuffed.'
He grasped Daniel by the skin of the neck, him lifted and said:
'The wolf me bite if he no weigh not five pounds.'
He him reversed and the unhappy belched two handfuls of shot (et le malheureux, etc.). When Smiley recognised how it was, he was like mad. He deposited his frog by the earth and ran after that individual, but he not him caught never.
It may be that there are people who can translate better than I can, but I am not acquainted with them.
So ends the private and public history of the Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, an incident which has this unique feature about it—that it is both old and new, a 'chestnut' and not a 'chestnut;' for it was original when it happened two thousand years ago, and was again original when it happened in California in our own time.
P.S.
London, July, 1900.—Twice, recently, I have been asked this question:
'Have you seen the Greek version of the 'Jumping Frog'?'
And twice I have answered—'No.'
'Has Professor Van Dyke seen it?'
'I suppose so.'
