The notion regarding ownership of a guitar may have been helped along by Albert Bigelow Paine when "The Boys Life of Mark Twain" was serialized in _St. Nicholas Magazine_. The January 1916 issue features an illustration by E. F. Ward showing Sam playing a guitar. The question arises whether or not Paine approved the illustrations for _St. Nicholas_ or whether or not the illustrator used his own imagination. Paine writes when Sam was living in Keokuk he joined a music class but "He was never a great musician." While Paine never specified the instrument, the illustrator did. Barb