The Gilded Age is a novel written by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner, published in 1873. The book is set in the United States during the period of rapid industrialization and growth known as the Gilded Age. The story follows two young men, Philip Sterling and Henry Brierly, as they navigate the complex social and political landscape of the era.Sterling is a lawyer from a small town who moves to Washington, D.C. to seek his fortune. He becomes involved in politics and falls in love with Laura Hawkins, the daughter of a corrupt senator. Brierly, on the other hand, is a wealthy playboy who travels the country in search of excitement and adventure.The novel is a satire of the excesses and corruption of the Gilded Age, with Twain and Warner using humor and irony to expose the flaws of American society. The characters are drawn from real-life figures of the time, including Jay Gould, William Vanderbilt, and Ulysses S. Grant.Overall, The Gilded Age is a witty and insightful commentary on the social and political realities of 19th century America, and a classic work of American literature.The elders of the party were not long in discovering the fact, which almost all travelers to the west soon find out; that the water was poor. It must have been by a lucky premonition of this that they all had brandy flasks with which to qualify the water of the country; and it was no doubt from an uneasy feeling of the danger of being poisoned that they kept experimenting, mixing a little of the dangerous and changing fluid, as they passed along.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.