The Russian-Japanese war was in progress that summer, and its settlement occurred in August.  The terms of it did not please Mark Twain.  When a newspaper correspondent asked him for an expression of opinion on the subject he wrote: 

Russia was on the highroad to emancipation from an insane and intolerable slavery.  I was hoping there would be no peace until Russian liberty was safe.  I think that this was a holy war, in the best and noblest sense of that abused term, and that no war was ever charged with a higher mission.

I think there can be no doubt that that mission is now defeated and Russia’s chain riveted; this time to stay.  I think the Tsar will now withdraw the small humanities that have been forced from him, and resume his medieval barbarisms with a relieved spirit and an immeasurable joy.  I think Russian liberty has had its last chance and has lost it.

I think nothing has been gained by the peace that is remotely comparable to what has been sacrificed by it.  One more battle would have abolished the waiting chains of billions upon billions of unborn Russians, and I wish it could have been fought.  I hope I am mistaken, yet in all sincerity I believe that this peace is entitled to rank as the most conspicuous disaster in political history.

It was the wisest public utterance on the subject—­the deep, resonant note of truth sounding amid a clamor of foolish joy-bells.  It was the message of a seer—­the prophecy of a sage who sees with the clairvoyance of knowledge and human understanding.  Clemens, a few days later, was invited by Colonel Harvey to dine with Baron Rosen and M. Sergius Witte; but an attack of his old malady—­rheumatism—­prevented his acceptance.  His telegram of declination apparently pleased the Russian officials, for Witte asked permission to publish it, and declared that he was going to take it home to show to the Tsar.  It was as follows: 

To colonel Harvey,—­I am still a cripple, otherwise I should be more than glad of this opportunity to meet the illustrious magicians who came here equipped with nothing but a pen, & with it have divided the honors of the war with the sword.  It is fair to presume that in thirty centuries history will not get done in admiring these men who attempted what the world regarded as the impossible & achieved it. 
                                   Mark twain.

But this was a modified form.  His original draft would perhaps have been less gratifying to that Russian embassy.  It read: 

To colonel Harvey,—­I am still a cripple, otherwise I should be more
than glad of this opportunity to meet those illustrious magicians
who with the pen have annulled, obliterated, & abolished every high
achievement of the Japanese sword and turned the tragedy of a
tremendous war into a gay & blithesome comedy.  If I may, let me in
all respect and honor salute them as my fellow-humorists, I taking
third place, as becomes one who was not born to modesty, but by
diligence & hard work is acquiring it. 

                                                                      Mark.