“I know grammar by ear only, not by note, not by the rules.”

What does it mean?

Twain says he uses grammar the way some musicians play music: by what sounds right, not by studying the written rules. Many fluent speakers learn grammar this way.

Key vocabulary

by ear

by listening, without reading notes or rules

• “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter: 'tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning.”– Mark Twain
• “In Paris they simply stared when I spoke to them in French; I never did succeed in making those idiots understand their own language.”– Mark Twain
• “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”– Often attributed to Mark Twain
• “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear.”– Mark Twain