Can anyone say whether they have ever seen the following "Mark Twain"
story?
This comes from the Troy, (N.Y.) Daily Press of Sept. 4,  1869:

    Highly Probable. -- Mark  Twain tells the following story of Vanderbilt
and John Morrissey: "The Commodore  owed John forty cents. Morrissey went
down
to his office with a keg of powder  and a match. He locked the door. He
swallowed the key. He lit his match. His  brow darkened. He said that both
should
never leave that room alive again unless  one was a corpse. He lit another
match. He placed it close to Vanderbilt's head.  He said one or the other
must sit
down on the keg -- take your choice. Mr. V. is  not easily frightened, but
he
saw he was in a close place. He paid the forty  cents. Morrissey departed
with
his keg. Since that time both have been better  friends to each other than
both of them put together ever were before." Of  course it is a burlesque of
the
story recently going the rounds of Vanderbilt  and Garrison.

That is the complete item. I'm not sure about the Vanderbilt-Garrison
reference in the last sentence. It might refer to the commodore's famous
letter  to
associates Charles Morgan and Cornelius Garrison: "Gentlemen: You have
undertaken to cheat me. I will not sue you. for the law takes too long. I
will  ruin
you. Yours truly, Cornelius Vanderbilt." But that letter was written circa
1854 and would not seem to qualify as a "story recently going the rounds" 15
years later.

Morrissey grew up in Troy and the newspapers there were always interested
in
him. He was a champion boxer in the 1850s, ran gambling houses in New  York
City and Saratoga, served two terms in the House of Representatives and was
twice elected to the New York State Senate.

There is a reference to him in The Gilded Age: one character says  of
another, "...they say he has had a run of luck lately at Morrissey's." The
reference
required no explanation for contemporary readers and got none.

I would appreciate any opinions about whether Twain had anything to do with
this story. Or whether it was put in his mouth by the editor.

Robert Monroe