diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:15:18 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:15:18 -0700 |
| commit | d607b7f399278fed64a2bc92aab80e9b886b4c25 (patch) | |
| tree | f18b741ed2ee3cd9616c845c8fabd9eac7b1ee95 | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 515504 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/590-h.htm | 7293 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p0b.jpg | bin | 0 -> 93610 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p0s.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36119 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p20b.jpg | bin | 0 -> 51881 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p20s.jpg | bin | 0 -> 19844 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p262b.jpg | bin | 0 -> 97697 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p262s.jpg | bin | 0 -> 23230 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p6b.jpg | bin | 0 -> 38406 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590-h/images/p6s.jpg | bin | 0 -> 13191 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590.txt | 6811 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 590.zip | bin | 0 -> 155969 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/rlsjp10.txt | 7240 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/rlsjp10.zip | bin | 0 -> 166659 bytes |
17 files changed, 21360 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/590-h.zip b/590-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4b642bb --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h.zip diff --git a/590-h/590-h.htm b/590-h/590-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..84444e1 --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/590-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7293 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>Robert Louis Stevenson</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4 { + text-align: left; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + TD { vertical-align: top; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + color: gray;} + + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">Robert Louis Stevenson, by Alexander H. Japp</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Robert Louis Stevenson, by Alexander H. Japp + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Robert Louis Stevenson + a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial + + +Author: Alexander H. Japp + + + +Release Date: May 5, 2007 [eBook #590] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON*** +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Transcribed from the Charles Scribner’s Sons 1905 +edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<h1>ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON<br /> +<span class="smcap">a record</span>, <span class="smcap">an +estimate</span>, <span class="smcap">and a memorial</span></h1> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">By</span> +ALEXANDER H. JAPP, LL.D., F.R.S.E</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">author +of</span> “<span class="smcap">thoreau</span>: <span +class="smcap">his life and aims</span>”; “<span +class="smcap">memoir of thomas de quincey</span>”; +“<span class="smcap">de quincey memorials</span>,” +<span class="smcap">etc.</span>, <span +class="smcap">etc.</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center">WITH HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED LETTERS +FROM R. L. STEVENSON IN FACSIMILIE . . .</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="smcap">second +edition</span></p> +<p style="text-align: center">NEW YORK<br /> +CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS<br /> +153-157 FIFTH AVENUE<br /> +1905</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Printed in Great +Britain</i>.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p0b.jpg"> +<img alt="Robert Louis Stevenson, from a sketch in oils by Sir +William B. Richmond, K.G.B., R.A." src="images/p0s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p style="text-align: center">Dedicated to<br /> +C. A. LICHTENBERG, <span class="smcap">Esq.</span><br /> +<span class="smcap">and</span><br /> +Mrs LICHTENBERG,<br /> +<span class="smcap">of villa margherita</span>, <span +class="smcap">treviso</span>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">with most grateful regards</span>,</p> +<p style="text-align: right">ALEXANDER H. JAPP.</p> +<p>19<i>th</i> <i>December</i> 1904.</p> +<h2>PREFACE</h2> +<p>A few words may here be allowed me to explain one or two +points. First, about the facsimile of last page of Preface +to <i>Familiar Studies of Men and Books</i>. Stevenson was +in Davos when the greater portion of that work went through the +press. He felt so much the disadvantage of being there in +the circumstances (both himself and his wife ill) that he begged +me to read the proofs of the Preface for him. This illness +has record in the letter from him (pp. 28-29). The +printers, of course, had directions to send the copy and proofs +of the Preface to me. Hence I am able now to give this +facsimile.</p> +<p>With regard to the letter at p. 19, of which facsimile is also +given, what Stevenson there meant is not the “three +last” of that batch, but the three last sent to me +before—though that was an error on his part—he only +then sent two chapters, making the “eleven chapters +now”—sent to me by post.</p> +<p>Another point on which I might have dwelt and illustrated by +many instances is this, that though Stevenson was fond of +hob-nobbing with all sorts and conditions of men, this desire of +wide contact and intercourse has little show in his +novels—the ordinary fibre of commonplace human beings not +receiving much celebration from him there; another case in which +his private bent and sympathies received little illustration in +his novels. But the fact lies implicit in much I have +written.</p> +<p>I have to thank many authors for permission to quote extracts +I have used.</p> +<p>ALEXANDER H. JAPP.</p> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<p>I. INTRODUCTION AND FIRST +IMPRESSIONS<br /> +II. <i>TREASURE ISLAND</i> AND SOME +REMINISCENCES<br /> +III. THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN<br /> +IV. HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED<br /> +V. TRAVELS<br /> +VI. SOME EARLIER LETTERS<br /> +VII. THE VAILIMA LETTERS<br /> +VIII. WORK OF LATER YEARS<br /> +IX. SOME CHARACTERISTICS<br /> +X. A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. +STEVENSON<br /> +XI. MISS STUBBS’ RECORD OF A +PILGRIMAGE<br /> +XII. HIS GENIUS AND METHODS<br /> +XIII. PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST<br /> +XIV. STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST<br /> +XV. THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL<br /> +XVI. STEVENSON’S GLOOM<br /> +XVII. PROOFS OF GROWTH<br /> +XVIII. EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS<br /> +XIX. MR EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN’S +ESTIMATE<br /> +XX. EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS<br +/> +XXI. UNITY IN STEVENSON’S STORIES<br /> +XXII. PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED GLOOM<br /> +XXIII. EDINBURGH REVIEWERS’ DICTA INAPPLICABLE TO +LATER WORK<br /> +XXIV. MR HENLEY’S SPITEFUL PERVERSIONS<br /> +XXV. MR CHRISTIE MURRAY’S IMPRESSIONS<br +/> +XXVI. HERO-VILLAINS<br /> +XXVII. MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON, AND OTHERS<br /> +XXVIII. UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS<br /> +XXIX. LOVE OF VAGABONDS<br /> +XXX. LORD ROSEBERY’S CASE<br /> +XXXI. MR GOSSE AND MS. OF <i>TREASURE ISLAND</i><br +/> +XXXII. STEVENSON PORTRAITS<br /> +XXXIII. LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM<br /> +XXXIV. LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY<br /> +APPENDIX</p> +<h2>CHAPTER I—INTRODUCTION AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS</h2> +<p>My little effort to make Thoreau better known in England had +one result that I am pleased to think of. It brought me +into personal association with R. L. Stevenson, who had written +and published in <i>The Cornhill Magazine</i> an essay on +Thoreau, in whom he had for some time taken an interest. He +found in Thoreau not only a rare character for originality, +courage, and indefatigable independence, but also a master of +style, to whom, on this account, as much as any, he was inclined +to play the part of the “sedulous ape,” as he had +acknowledged doing to many others—a later exercise, perhaps +in some ways as fruitful as any that had gone before. A +recent poet, having had some seeds of plants sent to him from +Northern Scotland to the South, celebrated his setting of them +beside those native to the Surrey slope on which he dwelt, with +the lines—</p> +<blockquote><p>“And when the Northern seeds are growing,<br +/> +Another beauty then bestowing,<br /> +We shall be fine, and North to South<br /> +Be giving kisses, mouth to mouth.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>So the Thoreau influence on Stevenson was as if a tart +American wild-apple had been grafted on an English pippin, and +produced a wholly new kind with the flavours of both; and here +wild America and England kissed each other mouth to mouth.</p> +<p>The direct result was the essay in <i>The Cornhill</i>, but +the indirect results were many and less easily assessed, as +Stevenson himself, as we shall see, was ever ready to +admit. The essay on Thoreau was written in America, which +further, perhaps, bears out my point.</p> +<p>One of the authorities, quoted by Mr Hammerton, in +<i>Stevensoniana</i> says of the circumstances in which he found +our author, when he was busily engaged on that bit of work:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I have visited him in a lonely lodging in +California, it was previous to his happy marriage, and found him +submerged in billows of bed-clothes; about him floated the +scattered volumes of a complete set of Thoreau; he was preparing +an essay on that worthy, and he looked at the moment like a +half-drowned man, yet he was not cast down. His work, an +endless task, was better than a straw to him. It was to +become his life-preserver and to prolong his years. I feel +convinced that without it he must have surrendered long +since. I found Stevenson a man of the frailest physique, +though most unaccountably tenacious of life; a man whose pen was +indefatigable, whose brain was never at rest, who, as far as I am +able to judge, looked upon everybody and everything from a +supremely intellectual point of view.” <a +name="citation1"></a><a href="#footnote1" +class="citation">[1]</a></p> +</blockquote> +<p>We remember the common belief in Yorkshire and other parts +that a man could not die so long as he could stand up—a +belief on which poor Branwell Brontë was fain to act and to +illustrate, but R. L. Stevenson illustrated it, as this writer +shows, in a better, calmer, and healthier way, despite his lack +of health.</p> +<p>On some little points of fact, however, Stevenson was wrong; +and I wrote to the Editor of <i>The Spectator</i> a letter, +titled, I think, “Thoreau’s Pity and Humour,” +which he inserted. This brought me a private letter from +Stevenson, who expressed the wish to see me, and have some talk +with me on that and other matters. To this letter I at once +replied, directing to 17 Heriot Row, Edinburgh, saying that, as I +was soon to be in that City, it might be possible for me to see +him there. In reply to this letter Mr Stevenson wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“<span +class="smcap">The Cottage, Castleton of Braemar</span>,<br /> +<i>Sunday</i>, <i>August</i> (? <i>th</i>), 1881.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,—I should +long ago have written to thank you for your kind and frank +letter; but, in my state of health, papers are apt to get +mislaid, and your letter has been vainly hunted for until this +(Sunday) morning.</p> +<p>“I must first say a word as to not quoting your book by +name. It was the consciousness that we disagreed which led +me, I daresay, wrongly, to suppress <i>all</i> references +throughout the paper. But you may be certain a proper +reference will now be introduced.</p> +<p>“I regret I shall not be able to see you in Edinburgh: +one visit to Edinburgh has already cost me too dear in that +invaluable particular, health; but if it should be at all +possible for you to pass by Braemar, I believe you would find an +attentive listener, and I can offer you a bed, a drive, and +necessary food.</p> +<p>“If, however, you should not be able to come thus far, I +can promise two things. First, I shall religiously revise +what I have written, and bring out more clearly the point of view +from which I regarded Thoreau. Second, I shall in the +preface record your objection.</p> +<p>“The point of view (and I must ask you not to forget +that any such short paper is essentially only a <i>section +through</i> a man) was this: I desired to look at the man through +his books. Thus, for instance, when I mentioned his return +to the pencil-making, I did it only in passing (perhaps I was +wrong), because it seemed to me not an illustration of his +principles, but a brave departure from them. Thousands of +such there were I do not doubt; still they might be hardly to my +purpose; though, as you say so, I suppose some of them would +be.</p> +<p>“Our difference as to ‘pity,’ I suspect, was +a logomachy of my making. No pitiful acts, on his part, +would surprise me: I know he would be more pitiful in practice +than most of the whiners; but the spirit of that practice would +still seem to me to be unjustly described by the word pity.</p> +<p>“When I try to be measured, I find myself usually +suspected of a sneaking unkindness for my subject, but you may be +sure, sir, I would give up most other things to be as good a man +as Thoreau. Even my knowledge of him leads me thus far.</p> +<p>“Should you find yourself able to push on so +far—it may even lie on your way—believe me your visit +will be very welcome. The weather is cruel, but the place +is, as I daresay you know, the very <i>wale</i> of +Scotland—bar Tummelside.—Yours very sincerely,</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><span class="smcap">Robert Louis +Stevenson</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p6b.jpg"> +<img alt="Manuscript letter by R.L.S." src="images/p6s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p>Some delay took place in my leaving London for Scotland, and +hence what seemed a hitch. I wrote mentioning the reason of +my delay, and expressing the fear that I might have to forego the +prospect of seeing him in Braemar, as his circumstances might +have altered in the meantime. In answer came this note, +like so many, if not most of his, indeed, without +date:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right"><span class="smcap">The +Cottage, Castleton of Braemar</span>.<br /> +(<i>No date</i>.)</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,—I am here +as yet a fixture, and beg you to come our way. Would +Tuesday or Wednesday suit you by any chance? We shall then, +I believe, be empty: a thing favourable to talks. You get +here in time for dinner. I stay till near the end of +September, unless, as may very well be, the weather drive me +forth.—Yours very sincerely, <span class="smcap">Robert +Louis Stevenson</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I accordingly went to Braemar, where he and his wife and her +son were staying with his father and mother.</p> +<p>These were red-letter days in my calendar alike on account of +pleasant intercourse with his honoured father and himself. +Here is my pen-and-ink portrait of R. L. Stevenson, thrown down +at the time:</p> +<p>Mr Stevenson’s is, indeed, a very picturesque and +striking figure. Not so tall probably as he seems at first +sight from his extreme thinness, but the pose and air could not +be otherwise described than as distinguished. Head of fine +type, carried well on the shoulders and in walking with the +impression of being a little thrown back; long brown hair, +falling from under a broadish-brimmed Spanish form of soft felt +hat, Rembrandtesque; loose kind of Inverness cape when walking, +and invariable velvet jacket inside the house. You would +say at first sight, wherever you saw him, that he was a man of +intellect, artistic and individual, wholly out of the +common. His face is sensitive, full of expression, though +it could not be called strictly beautiful. It is longish, +especially seen in profile, and features a little irregular; the +brow at once high and broad. A hint of vagary, and just a +hint in the expression, is qualified by the eyes, which are set +rather far apart from each other as seems, and with a most +wistful, and at the same time possibly a merry impish expression +arising over that, yet frank and clear, piercing, but at the same +time steady, and fall on you with a gentle radiance and animation +as he speaks. Romance, if with an indescribable +<i>soupçon</i> of whimsicality, is marked upon him; +sometimes he has the look as of the Ancient Mariner, and could +fix you with his glittering e’e, and he would, as he points +his sentences with a movement of his thin white forefinger, when +this is not monopolised with the almost incessant +cigarette. There is a faint suggestion of a hair-brained +sentimental trace on his countenance, but controlled, after all, +by good Scotch sense and shrewdness. In conversation he is +very animated, and likes to ask questions. A favourite and +characteristic attitude with him was to put his foot on a chair +or stool and rest his elbow on his knee, with his chin on his +hand; or to sit, or rather to half sit, half lean, on the corner +of a table or desk, one of his legs swinging freely, and when +anything that tickled him was said he would laugh in the +heartiest manner, even at the risk of bringing on his cough, +which at that time was troublesome. Often when he got +animated he rose and walked about as he spoke, as if movement +aided thought and expression. Though he loved Edinburgh, +which was full of associations for him, he had no good word for +its east winds, which to him were as death. Yet he passed +one winter as a “Silverado squatter,” the story of +which he has inimitably told in the volume titled <i>The +Silverado Squatters</i>; and he afterwards spent several winters +at Davos Platz, where, as he said to me, he not only breathed +good air, but learned to know with closest intimacy John +Addington Symonds, who “though his books were good, was far +finer and more interesting than any of his books.” He +needed a good deal of nursery attentions, but his invalidism was +never obtrusively brought before one in any sympathy-seeking way +by himself; on the contrary, a very manly, self-sustaining spirit +was evident; and the amount of work which he managed to turn out +even when at his worst was truly surprising.</p> +<p>His wife, an American lady, is highly cultured, and is herself +an author. In her speech there is just the slightest +suggestion of the American accent, which only made it the more +pleasing to my ear. She is heart and soul devoted to her +husband, proud of his achievements, and her delight is the +consciousness of substantially aiding him in his enterprises.</p> +<p>They then had with them a boy of eleven or twelve, Samuel +Lloyd Osbourne, to be much referred to later (a son of Mrs +Stevenson by a former marriage), whose delight was to draw the +oddest, but perhaps half intentional or unintentional +caricatures, funny, in some cases, beyond expression. His +room was designated the picture-gallery, and on entering I could +scarce refrain from bursting into laughter, even at the general +effect, and, noticing this, and that I was putting some restraint +on myself out of respect for the host’s feelings, Stevenson +said to me with a sly wink and a gentle dig in the ribs, +“It’s laugh and be thankful here.” On +Lloyd’s account simple engraving materials, types, and a +small printing-press had been procured; and it was +Stevenson’s delight to make funny poems, stories, and +morals for the engravings executed, and all would be duly printed +together. Stevenson’s thorough enjoyment of the +picture-gallery, and his goodness to Lloyd, becoming himself a +very boy for the nonce, were delightful to witness and in degree +to share. Wherever they were—at Braemar, in +Edinburgh, at Davos Platz, or even at Silverado—the +engraving and printing went on. The mention of the +picture-gallery suggests that it was out of his interest in the +colour-drawing and the picture-gallery that his first published +story, <i>Treasure Island</i>, grew, as we shall see.</p> +<p>I have some copies of the rude printing-press productions, +inexpressibly quaint, grotesque, a kind of literary horse-play, +yet with a certain squint-eyed, sprawling genius in it, and +innocent childish Rabelaisian mirth of a sort. At all +events I cannot look at the slight memorials of that time, which +I still possess, without laughing afresh till my eyes are +dewy. Stevenson, as I understood, began <i>Treasure +Island</i> more to entertain Lloyd Osbourne than anything else; +the chapters being regularly read to the family circle as they +were written, and with scarcely a purpose beyond. The lad +became Stevenson’s trusted companion and +collaborator—clearly with a touch of genius.</p> +<p>I have before me as I write some of these funny momentoes of +that time, carefully kept, often looked at. One of them is, +“<i>The Black Canyon</i>; <i>or</i>, <i>Wild Adventures in +the Far West</i>: a Tale of Instruction and Amusement for the +Young, by Samuel L. Osbourne, printed by the author; Davos +Platz,” with the most remarkable cuts. It would not +do some of the sensationalists anything but good to read it even +at this day, since many points in their art are absurdly +caricatured. Another is “<i>Moral Emblems</i>; <i>a +Collection of Cuts and Verses</i>, by R. L. Stevenson, author of +the <i>Blue Scalper</i>, etc., etc. Printers, S. L. +Osbourne and Company, Davos Platz.” Here are the +lines to a rare piece of grotesque, titled <i>A Peak in +Darien</i>—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Broad-gazing on untrodden lands,<br /> +See where adventurous Cortez stands,<br /> +While in the heavens above his head,<br /> +The eagle seeks its daily bread.<br /> +How aptly fact to fact replies,<br /> +Heroes and eagles, hills and skies.<br /> +Ye, who contemn the fatted slave,<br /> +Look on this emblem and be brave.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Another, <i>The Elephant</i>, has these lines—</p> +<blockquote><p>“See in the print how, moved by whim,<br /> +Trumpeting Jumbo, great and grim,<br /> +Adjusts his trunk, like a cravat,<br /> +To noose that individual’s hat;<br /> +The Sacred Ibis in the distance, <br /> +Joys to observe his bold resistance.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>R. L. Stevenson wrote from Davos Platz, in sending me <i>The +Black Canyon</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Sam sends as a present a work of his +own. I hope you feel flattered, for <i>this is simply the +first time he has ever given one away</i>. I have to buy my +own works, I can tell you.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Later he said, in sending a second:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I own I have delayed this letter till I +could forward the enclosed. Remembering the night at +Braemar, when we visited the picture-gallery, I hope it may amuse +you: you see we do some publishing hereaway.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Delightfully suggestive and highly enjoyable, too, were the +meetings in the little drawing-room after dinner, when the +contrasted traits of father and son came into full +play—when R. L. Stevenson would sometimes draw out a new +view by bold, half-paradoxical assertion, or compel advance on +the point from a new quarter by a searching question couched in +the simplest language, or reveal his own latest conviction +finally, by a few sentences as nicely rounded off as though they +had been written, while he rose and gently moved about, as his +habit was, in the course of those more extended remarks. +Then a chapter or two of <i>The Sea-Cook</i> would be read, with +due pronouncement on the main points by one or other of the +family audience.</p> +<p>The reading of the book is one thing. It was quite +another thing to hear Stevenson as he stood reading it aloud, +with his hand stretched out holding the manuscript, and his body +gently swaying as a kind of rhythmical commentary on the +story. His fine voice, clear and keen it some of its tones, +had a wonderful power of inflection and variation, and when he +came to stand in the place of Silver you could almost have +imagined you saw the great one-legged John Silver, joyous-eyed, +on the rolling sea. Yes, to read it in print was good, but +better yet to hear Stevenson read it.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER II—<i>TREASURE ISLAND</i> AND SOME +REMINISCENCES</h2> +<p>When I left Braemar, I carried with me a considerable portion +of the MS. of <i>Treasure Island</i>, with an outline of the rest +of the story. It originally bore the odd title of <i>The +Sea-Cook</i>, and, as I have told before, I showed it to Mr +Henderson, the proprietor of the <i>Young Folks’ Paper</i>, +who came to an arrangement with Mr Stevenson, and the story duly +appeared in its pages, as well as the two which succeeded it.</p> +<p>Stevenson himself in his article in <i>The Idler</i> for +August 1894 (reprinted in <i>My First Book</i> volume and in a +late volume of the <i>Edinburgh Edition</i>) has recalled some of +the circumstances connected with this visit of mine to Braemar, +as it bore on the destination of <i>Treasure Island</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“And now, who should come dropping in, <i>ex +machinâ</i>, but Dr Japp, like the disguised prince, who is +to bring down the curtain upon peace and happiness in the last +act; for he carried in his pocket, not a horn or a talisman, but +a publisher, in fact, ready to unearth new writers for my old +friend Mr Henderson’s <i>Young Folks</i>. Even the +ruthlessness of a united family recoiled before the extreme +measure of inflicting on our guest the mutilated members of +<i>The Sea-Cook</i>; at the same time, we would by no means stop +our readings, and accordingly the tale was begun again at the +beginning, and solemnly redelivered for the benefit of Dr +Japp. From that moment on, I have thought highly of his +critical faculty; for when he left us, he carried away the +manuscript in his portmanteau.</p> +<p>“<i>Treasure Island</i>—it was Mr Henderson who +deleted the first title, <i>The Sea-Cook</i>—appeared duly +in <i>Young Folks</i>, where it figured in the ignoble midst +without woodcuts, and attracted not the least attention. I +did not care. I liked the tale myself, for much the same +reason as my father liked the beginning: it was my kind of +picturesque. I was not a little proud of John Silver also; +and to this day rather admire that smooth and formidable +adventurer. What was infinitely more exhilarating, I had +passed a landmark. I had finished a tale and written The +End upon my manuscript, as I had not done since <i>The Pentland +Rising</i>, when I was a boy of sixteen, not yet at +college. In truth, it was so by a lucky set of accidents: +had not Dr Japp come on his visit, had not the tale flowed from +me with singular ease, it must have been laid aside, like its +predecessors, and found a circuitous and unlamented way to the +fire. Purists may suggest it would have been better +so. I am not of that mind. The tale seems to have +given much pleasure, and it brought (or was the means of +bringing) fire, food, and wine to a deserving family in which I +took an interest. I need scarcely say I mean my +own.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He himself gives a goodly list of the predecessors which had +“found a circuitous and unlamented way to the +fire”:</p> +<blockquote><p>“As soon as I was able to write, I became a +good friend to the paper-makers. Reams upon reams must have +gone to the making of <i>Rathillet</i>, <i>The Pentland +Rising</i>, <i>The King’s Pardon</i> (otherwise <i>Park +Whitehead</i>), <i>Edward Daven</i>, <i>A Country Dance</i>, and +<i>A Vendetta in the West</i>. <i>Rathillet</i> was +attempted before fifteen, <i>The Vendetta</i> at twenty-nine, and +the succession of defeats lasted unbroken till I was +thirty-one.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Another thing I carried from Braemar with me which I greatly +prize—this was a copy of <i>Christianity confirmed by +Jewish and Heathen Testimony</i>, by Mr Stevenson’s father, +with his autograph signature and many of his own marginal +notes. He had thought deeply on many +subjects—theological, scientific, and social—and had +recorded, I am afraid, but the smaller half of his thoughts and +speculations. Several days in the mornings, before R. L. +Stevenson was able to face the somewhat “snell” air +of the hills, I had long walks with the old gentleman, when we +also had long talks on many subjects—the liberalising of +the Scottish Church, educational reform, etc.; and, on one +occasion, a statement of his reason, because of the subscription, +for never having become an elder. That he had in some small +measure enjoyed my society, as I certainly had much enjoyed his, +was borne out by a letter which I received from the son in reply +to one I had written, saying that surely his father had never +meant to present me at the last moment on my leaving by coach +with that volume, with his name on it, and with pencilled notes +here and there, but had merely given it me to read and +return. In the circumstances I may perhaps be excused +quoting from a letter dated Castleton of Braemar, September 1881, +in illustration of what I have said—</p> +<blockquote><p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Dr +Japp</span>,—My father has gone, but I think I may take it +upon me to ask you to keep the book. Of all things you +could do to endear yourself to me you have done the best, for, +from your letter, you have taken a fancy to my father.</p> +<p>“I do not know how to thank you for your kind trouble in +the matter of <i>The Sea-Cook</i>, but I am not unmindful. +My health is still poorly, and I have added intercostal +rheumatism—a new attraction, which sewed me up nearly +double for two days, and still gives me ‘a list to +starboard’—let us be ever nautical. . . . I do not +think with the start I have, there will be any difficulty in +letting Mr Henderson go ahead whenever he likes. I will +write my story up to its legitimate conclusion, and then we shall +be in a position to judge whether a sequel would be desirable, +and I myself would then know better about its practicability from +the story-telling point of view.—Yours very sincerely, +<span class="smcap">Robert Louis Stevenson</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>A little later came the following:—</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“<span +class="smcap">The Cottage, Castleton of Braemar</span>.<br /> +(<i>No date</i>.)</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Dr +Japp</span>,—Herewith go nine chapters. I have been a +little seedy; and the two last that I have written seem to me on +a false venue; hence the smallness of the batch. I have +now, I hope, in the three last sent, turned the corner, with no +great amount of dulness.</p> +<p>“The map, with all its names, notes, soundings, and +things, should make, I believe, an admirable advertisement for +the story. Eh?</p> +<p>“I hope you got a telegram and letter I forwarded after +you to Dinnat.—Believe me, yours very sincerely, <span +class="smcap">Robert Louis Stevenson</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In the afternoon, if fine and dry, we went walking, and +Stevenson would sometimes tell us stories of his short experience +at the Scottish Bar, and of his first and only brief. I +remember him contrasting that with his experiences as an engineer +with Bob Bain, who, as manager, was then superintending the +building of a breakwater. Of that time, too, he told the +choicest stories, and especially of how, against all orders, he +bribed Bob with five shillings to let him go down in the +diver’s dress. He gave us a splendid +description—finer, I think, than even that in his +<i>Memories</i>—of his sensations on the sea-bottom, which +seems to have interested him as deeply, and suggested as many +strange fancies, as anything which he ever came across on the +surface. But the possibility of enterprises of this sort +ended—Stevenson lost his interest in engineering.</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p20b.jpg"> +<img alt="Manuscript letter by R.L.S." src="images/p20s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p>Stevenson’s father had, indeed, been much exercised in +his day by theological questions and difficulties, and though he +remained a staunch adherent of the Established Church of Scotland +he knew well and practically what is meant by the term +“accommodation,” as it is used by theologians in +reference to creeds and formulas; for he had over and over again, +because of the strict character of the subscription required from +elders of the Scottish Church declined, as I have said, to accept +the office. In a very express sense you could see that he +bore the marks of his past in many ways—a quick, sensitive, +in some ways even a fantastic-minded man, yet with a strange +solidity and common-sense amid it all, just as though ferns with +the veritable fairies’ seed were to grow out of a common +stone wall. He looked like a man who had not been without +sleepless nights—without troubles, sorrows, and +perplexities, and even yet, had not wholly risen above some of +them, or the results of them. His voice was “low and +sweet”—with just a possibility in it of rising to a +shrillish key. A sincere and faithful man, who had walked +very demurely through life, though with a touch of sudden, +bright, quiet humour and fancy, every now and then crossing the +grey of his characteristic pensiveness or melancholy, and drawing +effect from it. He was most frank and genial with me, and I +greatly honour his memory. <a name="citation2"></a><a +href="#footnote2" class="citation">[2]</a></p> +<p>Thomas Stevenson, with a strange, sad smile, told me how much +of a disappointment, in the first stage, at all events, Louis (he +always called his son Louis at home), had caused him, by failing +to follow up his profession at the Scottish Bar. How much +he had looked forward, after the engineering was abandoned, to +his devoting himself to the work of the Parliament House (as the +Hall of the Chief Court is called in Scotland, from the building +having been while yet there was a Scottish Parliament the place +where it sat), though truly one cannot help feeling how much +Stevenson’s very air and figure would have been out of +keeping among the bewigged, pushing, sharp-set, hard-featured, +and even red-faced and red-nosed (some of them, at any rate) +company, who daily walked the Parliament House, and talked and +gossiped there, often of other things than law and equity. +“Well, yes, perhaps it was all for the best,” he +said, with a sigh, on my having interjected the remark that R. L. +Stevenson was wielding far more influence than he ever could have +done as a Scottish counsel, even though he had risen rapidly in +his profession, and become Lord-Advocate or even a judge.</p> +<p>There was, indeed, a very pathetic kind of harking back on the +might-have-beens when I talked with him on this subject. He +had reconciled himself in a way to the inevitable, and, like a +sensible man, was now inclined to make the most and the best of +it. The marriage, which, on the report of it, had been but +a new disappointment to him, had, as if by magic, been +transformed into a blessing in his mind and his wife’s by +personal contact with Fanny Van der Griff Stevenson, which no one +who ever met her could wonder at; but, nevertheless, his dream of +seeing his only son walking in the pathways of the Stevensons, +and adorning a profession in Edinburgh, and so winning new and +welcome laurels for the family and the name, was still present +with him constantly, and by contrast, he was depressed with +contemplation of the real state of the case, when, as I have +said, I pointed out to him, as more than once I did, what an +influence his son was wielding now, not only over those near to +him, but throughout the world, compared with what could have come +to him as a lighthouse engineer, however successful, or it may be +as a briefless advocate or barrister, walking, hardly in glory +and in joy, the Hall of the Edinburgh Parliament House. And +when I pictured the yet greater influence that was sure to come +to him, he only shook his head with that smile which tells of +hopes long-cherished and lost at last, and of resignation gained, +as though at stern duty’s call and an honest desire for the +good of those near and dear to him. It moved me more than I +can say, and always in the midst of it he adroitly, and somewhat +abruptly, changed the subject. Such penalties do parents +often pay for the honour of giving geniuses to the world. +Here, again, it may be true, “the individual withers but +the world is more and more.”</p> +<p>The impression of a kind of tragic fatality was but added to +when Stevenson would speak of his father in such terms of love +and admiration as quite moved one, of his desire to please him, +of his highest respect and gratitude to him, and pride in having +such a father. It was most characteristic that when, in his +travels in America, he met a gentleman who expressed plainly his +keen disappointment on learning that he had but been introduced +to the son and not to the father—to the as yet but budding +author—and not to the builder of the great lighthouse +beacons that constantly saved mariners from shipwreck round many +stormy coasts, he should record the incident, as his readers will +remember, with such a strange mixture of a pride and filial +gratitude, and half humorous humiliation. Such is the +penalty a son of genius often pays in heart-throbs for the +inability to do aught else but follow his destiny—follow +his star, even though as Dante says:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Se tu segui tua stella<br /> +Non puoi fallire a glorioso porto.” <a +name="citation3"></a><a href="#footnote3" +class="citation">[3]</a></p> +</blockquote> +<p>What added a keen thrill as of quivering flesh exposed, was +that Thomas Stevenson on one side was exactly the man to +appreciate such attainments and work in another, and I often +wondered how far the sense of Edinburgh propriety and worldly +estimates did weigh with him here.</p> +<p>Mr Stevenson mentioned to me a peculiar fact which has since +been noted by his son, that, notwithstanding the kind of work he +had so successfully engaged in, he was no mathematician, and had +to submit his calculations to another to be worked out in +definite mathematical formulæ. Thomas Stevenson gave +one the impression of a remarkably sweet, great personality, +grave, anxious, almost morbidly forecasting, yet full of +childlike hope and ready affection, but, perhaps, so earnestly +taken up with some points as to exaggerate their importance and +be too self-conscious and easily offended in respect to +them. But there was no affectation in him. He was +simple-minded, sincere to the core; most kindly, homely, +hospitable, much intent on brotherly offices. He had the +Scottish <i>perfervidum</i> too—he could tolerate nothing +mean or creeping; and his eye would lighten and glance in a +striking manner when such was spoken of. I have since heard +that his charities were very extensive, and dispensed in the most +hidden and secret ways. He acted here on the Scripture +direction, “Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand +doeth.” He was much exercised when I saw him about +some defects, as he held, in the methods of Scotch education (for +he was a true lover of youth, and cared more for character being +formed than for heads being merely crammed). Sagacious, +with fine forecast, with a high ideal, and yet up to a certain +point a most tolerant temper, he was a fine specimen of the +Scottish gentleman. His son tells that, as he was engaged +in work calculated to benefit the world and to save life, he +would not for long take out a patent for his inventions, and thus +lost immense sums. I can well believe that: it seems quite +in keeping with my impressions of the man. There was +nothing stolid or selfishly absorbed in him. He bore the +marks of deep, true, honest feeling, true benevolence, and +open-handed generosity, and despite the son’s great +pen-craft, and inventive power, would have forgiven my saying +that sometimes I have had a doubt whether the father was not, +after all, the greater man of the two, though certainly not, like +the hero of <i>In Memoriam</i>, moulded “in colossal +calm.”</p> +<p>In theological matters, in which Thomas Stevenson had been +much and deeply exercised, he held very strong views, leading +decisively to ultra-Calvinism; but, as I myself could well +sympathise with such views, if I did not hold them, knowing well +the strange ways in which they had gone to form grand, if +sometimes sternly forbidding characters, there were no +cross-purposes as there might have been with some on that +subject. And always I felt I had an original character and +a most interesting one to study.</p> +<p>This is another very characteristic letter to me from Davos +Platz:</p> +<blockquote><p>“<span class="smcap">Chalet Buol</span>, +<span class="smcap">Davos</span>, <span +class="smcap">Grisons</span>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">Switzerland</span>. (<i>No +date</i>.)</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Dr Japp</span>,—You +must think me a forgetful rogue, as indeed I am; for I have but +now told my publisher to send you a copy of the <i>Familiar +Studies</i>. However, I own I have delayed this letter till +I could send you the enclosed. Remembering the night at +Braemar, when we visited the picture-gallery, I hoped they might +amuse you.</p> +<p>“You see we do some publishing hereaway.</p> +<p>“With kind regards, believe me, always yours +faithfully,</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Robert Louis Stevenson</span>.”</p> +<p>“I shall hope to see you in town in May.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The enclosed was the second series of <i>Moral Emblems</i>, by +R. L. Stevenson, printed by Samuel Osbourne. My answer to +this letter brought the following:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“<span +class="smcap">Chalet-Buol</span>, <span +class="smcap">Davos</span>,<br /> +<i>April</i> 1<i>st</i>, 1882.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Dr Japp</span>,—A +good day to date this letter, which is, in fact, a confession of +incapacity. During my wife’s wretched +illness—or I should say the worst of it, for she is not yet +rightly well—I somewhat lost my head, and entirely lost a +great quire of corrected proofs. This is one of the +results: I hope there are none more serious. I was never so +sick of any volume as I was of that; I was continually receiving +fresh proofs with fresh infinitesimal difficulties. I was +ill; I did really fear, for my wife was worse than ill. +Well, ’tis out now; and though I have already observed +several carelessnesses myself, and now here is another of your +finding—of which indeed, I ought to be ashamed—it +will only justify the sweeping humility of the preface.</p> +<p>“Symonds was actually dining with us when your letter +came, and I communicated your remarks, which pleased him. +He is a far better and more interesting thing than his books.</p> +<p>“The elephant was my wife’s, so she is +proportionately elate you should have picked it out for praise +from a collection, let us add, so replete with the highest +qualities of art.</p> +<p>“My wicked carcass, as John Knox calls it, holds +together wonderfully. In addition to many other things, and +a volume of travel, I find I have written since December ninety +Cornhill pp. of Magazine work—essays and +stories—40,000 words; and I am none the worse—I am +better. I begin to hope I may, if not outlive this +wolverine upon my shoulders, at least carry him bravely like +Symonds or Alexander Pope. I begin to take a pride in that +hope.</p> +<p>“I shall be much interested to see your criticisms: you +might perhaps send them on to me. I believe you know that I +am not dangerous—one folly I have not—I am not touchy +under criticism.</p> +<p>“Sam and my wife both beg to be remembered, and Sam also +sends as a present a work of his own.—Yours very +sincerely,</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Robert Louis Stevenson</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>As indicating the estimate of many of the good Edinburgh +people of Stevenson and the Stevensons that still held sway up to +so late a date as 1893, I will here extract two characteristic +passages from the letters of the friend and correspondent of +these days just referred to, and to whom I had sent a copy of the +<i>Atalanta</i> Magazine, with an article of mine on +Stevenson.</p> +<blockquote><p>“If you can excuse the garrulity of age, I +can tell you one or two things about Louis Stevenson, his father +and even his grandfather, which you may work up some other day, +as you have so deftly embedded in the <i>Atalanta</i> article +that small remark on his acting. Your paper is pleasant and +modest: most of R. L. Stevenson’s admirers are inclined to +lay it on far too thick. That he is a genius we all admit; +but his genius, if fine, is limited. For example, he cannot +paint (or at least he never has painted) a woman. No more +could Fettes Douglas, skilful artist though he was in his own +special line, and I shall tell you a remark of Russel’s +thereon some day. <a name="citation4"></a><a href="#footnote4" +class="citation">[4]</a> There are women in his books, but +there is none of the beauty and subtlety of womanhood in +them.</p> +<p>“R. L. Stevenson I knew well as a lad and often met him +and talked with him. He acted in private theatricals got up +by the late Professor Fleeming Jenkin. But he had then, as +always, a pretty guid conceit o’ himsel’—which +his clique have done nothing to check. His father and his +grandfather (I have danced with his mother before her marriage) I +knew better; but ‘the family theologian,’ as some of +R. L. Stevenson’s friends dabbed his father, was a very +touchy theologian, and denounced any one who in the least +differed from his extreme Calvinistic views. I came under +his lash most unwittingly in this way myself. But for this +twist, he was a good fellow—kind and hospitable—and a +really able man in his profession. His father-in-law, R. L. +Stevenson’s maternal grandfather, was the Rev. Dr Balfour, +minister of Colinton—one of the finest-looking old men I +ever saw—tall, upright, and ruddy at eighty. But he +was marvellously feeble as a preacher, and often said things that +were deliciously, unconsciously, unintentionally laughable, if +not witty. We were near Colinton for some years; and Mr +Russell (of the <i>Scotsman</i>), who once attended the Parish +Church with us, was greatly tickled by Balfour discoursing on the +story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife, remarking that Mrs +P---’s conduct was ‘highly +improper’!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The estimate of R. L. Stevenson was not and could not be final +in this case, for <i>Weir of Hermiston</i> and <i>Catriona</i> +were yet unwritten, not to speak of others, but the passages +reflect a certain side of Edinburgh opinion, illustrating the old +Scripture doctrine that a prophet has honour everywhere but in +his own country. And the passages themselves bear evidence +that I violate no confidence then, for they were given to me to +be worked into any after-effort I might make on Stevenson. +My friend was a good and an acute critic who had done some +acceptable literary work in his day.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER III—THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN</h2> +<p>R. L. Stevenson was born on 13th November 1850, the very year +of the death of his grandfather, Robert Stevenson, whom he has so +finely celebrated. As a mere child he gave token of his +character. As soon as he could read, he was keen for books, +and, before very long, had read all the story-books he could lay +hands on; and, when the stock ran out, he would go and look in at +all the shop windows within reach, and try to piece out the +stories from the bits exposed in open pages and the woodcuts.</p> +<p>He had a nurse of very remarkable character—evidently a +paragon—who deeply influenced him and did much to form his +young mind—Alison Cunningham, who, in his juvenile lingo, +became “Cumy,” and who not only was never forgotten, +but to the end was treated as his “second +mother.” In his dedication of his <i>Child’s +Garden of Verses</i> to her, he says:</p> +<blockquote><p>“My second mother, my first wife,<br /> +The angel of my infant life.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Her copy of <i>Kidnapped</i> was inscribed to her by the hand +of Stevenson, thus:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“<span +class="smcap">To Cumy</span>, <span class="smcap">from her +boy</span>, <span class="smcap">the author</span>.<br /> +<span class="smcap">Skerryvore</span>, 18<i>th</i> <i>July</i> +1888.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Skerryvore was the name of Stevenson’s Bournemouth home, +so named after one of the Stevenson lighthouses. His first +volume, <i>An Inland Voyage</i> has this pretty dedication, +inscribed in a neat, small hand:</p> +<blockquote><p>“<span class="smcap">My dear +Cumy</span>,—If you had not taken so much trouble with me +all the years of my childhood, this little book would never have +been written. Many a long night you sat up with me when I +was ill. I wish I could hope, by way of return, to amuse a +single evening for you with my little book. But whatever +you think of it, I know you will think kindly of</p> +<p><span class="smcap">The Author</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Cumy” was perhaps the most influential teacher +Stevenson had. What she and his mother taught took effect +and abode with him, which was hardly the case with any other of +his teachers.</p> +<blockquote><p>“In contrast to Goethe,” says Mr +Baildon, “Stevenson was but little affected by his +relations to women, and, when this point is fully gone into, it +will probably be found that his mother and nurse in childhood, +and his wife and step-daughter in later life, are about the only +women who seriously influenced either his character or his +art.” (p. 32).</p> +</blockquote> +<p>When Mr Kelman is celebrating Stevenson for the consistency +and continuity of his undogmatic religion, he is almost +throughout celebrating “Cumy” and her influence, +though unconsciously. Here, again, we have an apt and yet +more striking illustration, after that of the good Lord +Shaftesbury and many others, of the deep and lasting effect a +good and earnest woman, of whom the world may never hear, may +have had upon a youngster of whom all the world shall hear. +When Mr Kelman says that “the religious element in +Stevenson was not a thing of late growth, but an integral part +and vital interest of his life,” he but points us back to +the earlier religious influences to which he had been effectually +subject. “His faith was not for himself alone, and +the phases of Christianity which it has asserted are peculiarly +suited to the spiritual needs of many in the present +time.”</p> +<p>We should not lay so much weight as Mr Kelman does on the mere +number of times “the Divine name” is found in +Stevenson’s writings, but there is something in such +confessions as the following to his father, when he was, amid +hardship and illness, in Paris in 1878:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Still I believe in myself and my fellow-men +and the God who made us all. . . . I am lonely and sick and out +of heart. Well, I still hope; I still believe; I still see +the good in the inch, and cling to it. It is not much, +perhaps, but it is always something.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Yes, “Cumy” was a very effective teacher, whose +influence and teaching long remained. His other teachers, +however famous and highly gifted, did not attain to such success +with him. And because of this non-success they blamed him, +as is usual. He was fond of playing truant—declared, +indeed, that he was about as methodic a truant as ever could have +existed. He much loved to go on long wanderings by himself +on the Pentland Hills and read about the Covenanters, and while +yet a youth of sixteen he wrote <i>The Pentland +Rising</i>—a pamphlet in size and a piece of fine +work—which was duly published, is now scarce, and fetches a +high price. He had made himself thoroughly familiar with +all the odd old corners of Edinburgh—John Knox’s +haunts and so on, all which he has turned to account in essays, +descriptions and in stories—especially in +<i>Catriona</i>. When a mere youth at school, as he tells +us himself, he had little or no desire to carry off prizes and do +just as other boys did; he was always wishing to observe, and to +see, and try things for himself—was, in fact, in the eyes +of schoolmasters and tutors something of an <i>idler</i>, with +splendid gifts which he would not rightly apply. He was +applying them rightly, though not in their way. It is not +only in his <i>Apology for Idlers</i> that this confession is +made, but elsewhere, as in his essay on <i>A College +Magazine</i>, where he says, “I was always busy on my own +private end, which was to learn to write. I kept always two +books in my pocket, one to read and one to write in!”</p> +<p>When he went to College it was still the same—he tells +us in the funniest way how he managed to wheedle a certificate +for Greek out of Professor Blackie, though the Professor owned +“his face was not familiar to him”! He fared +very differently when, afterwards his father, eager that he +should follow his profession, got him to enter the civil +engineering class under Professor Fleeming Jenkin. He still +stuck to his old courses—wandering about, and, in sheltered +corners, writing in the open air, and was not present in class +more than a dozen times. When the session was ended he went +up to try for a certificate from Fleeming Jenkin. +“No, no, Mr Stevenson,” said the Professor; “I +might give it in a doubtful case, but yours is not doubtful: you +have not kept my classes.” And the most +characteristic thing—honourable to both men—is to +come; for this was the beginning of a friendship which grew and +strengthened and is finally celebrated in the younger man’s +sketch of the elder. He learned from Professor Fleeming +Jenkin, perhaps unconsciously, more of the <i>humaniores</i>, +than consciously he did of engineering. A friend of mine, +who knew well both the Stevenson family and the Balfours, to +which R. L. Stevenson’s mother belonged, recalls, as we +have seen, his acting in the private theatricals that were got up +by the Professor, and adds, “He was then a very handsome +fellow, and looked splendidly as Sir Charles Pomander, and +essayed, not wholly without success, Sir Peter Teazle,” +which one can well believe, no less than that he acted such parts +splendidly as well as looked them.</p> +<p><i>Longman’s Magazine</i>, immediately after his death, +published the following poem, which took a very pathetic touch +from the circumstances of its appearance—the more that, +while it imaginatively and finely commemorated these days of +truant wanderings, it showed the ruling passion for home and the +old haunts, strongly and vividly, even not unnigh to death:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The tropics vanish, and meseems that I,<br +/> +From Halkerside, from topmost Allermuir,<br /> +Or steep Caerketton, dreaming gaze again.<br /> +Far set in fields and woods, the town I see<br /> +Spring gallant from the shallows of her smoke,<br /> +Cragg’d, spired, and turreted, her virgin fort<br /> +Beflagg’d. About, on seaward drooping hills,<br /> +New folds of city glitter. Last, the Forth<br /> +Wheels ample waters set with sacred isles,<br /> +And populous Fife smokes with a score of towns,<br /> +There, on the sunny frontage of a hill,<br /> +Hard by the house of kings, repose the dead,<br /> +My dead, the ready and the strong of word.<br /> +Their works, the salt-encrusted, still survive;<br /> +The sea bombards their founded towers; the night<br /> +Thrills pierced with their strong lamps. The artificers,<br +/> +One after one, here in this grated cell,<br /> +Where the rain erases and the rust consumes,<br /> +Fell upon lasting silence. Continents<br /> +And continental oceans intervene;<br /> +A sea uncharted, on a lampless isle,<br /> +Environs and confines their wandering child<br /> +In vain. The voice of generations dead<br /> +Summons me, sitting distant, to arise,<br /> +My numerous footsteps nimbly to retrace,<br /> +And all mutation over, stretch me down<br /> +In that denoted city of the dead.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER IV—HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED</h2> +<p>At first sight it would seem hard to trace any illustration of +the doctrine of heredity in the case of this master of +romance. George Eliot’s dictum that we are, each one +of us, but an omnibus carrying down the traits of our ancestors, +does not appear at all to hold here. This fanciful realist, +this näive-wistful humorist, this dreamy mystical casuist, +crossed by the innocent bohemian, this serious and genial +essayist, in whom the deep thought was hidden by the gracious +play of wit and phantasy, came, on the father’s side, of a +stock of what the world regarded as a quiet, ingenious, demure, +practical, home-keeping people. In his rich colour, +originality, and graceful air, it is almost as though the bloom +of japonica came on a rich old orchard apple-tree, all out of +season too. Those who go hard on heredity would say, +perhaps, that he was the result of some strange +back-stroke. But, on closer examination, we need not go so +far. His grandfather, Robert Stevenson, the great +lighthouse-builder, the man who reared the iron-bound pillar on +the destructive Bell Rock, and set life-saving lights there, was +very intent on his professional work, yet he had his ideal, and +romantic, and adventurous side. In the delightful sketch +which his famous grandson gave of him, does he not tell of the +joy Robert Stevenson had on the annual voyage in the +<i>Lighthouse Yacht</i>—how it was looked forward to, +yearned for, and how, when he had Walter Scott on board, his fund +of story and reminiscence all through the tour never +failed—how Scott drew upon it in <i>The Pirate</i> and the +notes to <i>The Pirate</i>, and with what pride Robert Stevenson +preserved the lines Scott wrote in the lighthouse album at the +Bell Rock on that occasion:</p> +<blockquote><p>“PHAROS LOQUITUR</p> +<p>“Far in the bosom of the deep<br /> +O’er these wild shelves my watch I keep,<br /> +A ruddy gem of changeful light<br /> +Bound on the dusky brow of night.<br /> +The seaman bids my lustre hail,<br /> +And scorns to strike his timorous sail.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And how in 1850 the old man, drawing nigh unto death, was with +the utmost difficulty dissuaded from going the voyage once more, +and was found furtively in his room packing his portmanteau in +spite of the protests of all his family, and would have gone but +for the utter weakness of death.</p> +<p>His father was also a splendid engineer; was full of invention +and devoted to his profession, but he, too, was not without his +romances, and even vagaries. He loved a story, was a fine +teller of stories, used to sit at night and spin the most +wondrous yarns, a man of much reserve, yet also of much power in +discourse, with an aptness and felicity in the use of +phrases—so much so, as his son tells, that on his deathbed, +when his power of speech was passing from him, and he +couldn’t articulate the right word, he was silent rather +than use the wrong one. I shall never forget how in these +early morning walks at Braemar, finding me sympathetic, he unbent +with the air of a man who had unexpectedly found something he had +sought, and was fairly confidential.</p> +<p>On the mother’s side our author came of ministers. +His maternal grandfather, the Rev. Dr Balfour of Colinton, was a +man of handsome presence, tall, venerable-looking, and not +without a mingled authority and humour of his own—no very +great preacher, I have heard, but would sometimes bring a smile +to the faces of his hearers by very naïve and original ways +of putting things. R. L. Stevenson quaintly tells a story +of how his grandfather when he had physic to take, and was +indulged in a sweet afterwards, yet would not allow the child to +have a sweet because he had not had the physic. A veritable +Calvinist in daily action—from him, no doubt, our subject +drew much of his interest in certain directions—John Knox, +Scottish history, the ’15 and the ’45, and no doubt +much that justifies the line “something of +shorter-catechist,” as applied by Henley to Stevenson among +very contrasted traits indeed.</p> +<p>But strange truly are the interblendings of race, and the way +in which traits of ancestors reappear, modifying and transforming +each other. The gardener knows what can be done by grafts +and buddings; but more wonderful far than anything there, are the +mysterious blendings and outbursts of what is old and forgotten, +along with what is wholly new and strange, and all going to +produce often what we call sometimes eccentricity, and sometimes +originality and genius.</p> +<p>Mr J. F. George, in <i>Scottish Notes and Queries</i>, wrote +as follows on Stevenson’s inheritances and indebtedness to +certain of his ancestors:</p> +<blockquote><p>“About 1650, James Balfour, one of the +Principal Clerks of the Court of Session, married Bridget, +daughter of Chalmers of Balbaithan, Keithhall, and that estate +was for some time in the name of Balfour. His son, James +Balfour of Balbaithan, Merchant and Magistrate of Edinburgh, paid +poll-tax in 1696, but by 1699 the land had been sold. This +was probably due to the fact that Balfour was one of the +Governors of the Darien Company. His grandson, James +Balfour of Pilrig (1705-1795), sometime Professor of Moral +Philosophy in Edinburgh University, whose portrait is sketched in +<i>Catriona</i>, also made a Garioch [Aberdeenshire district] +marriage, his wife being Cecilia, fifth daughter of Sir John +Elphinstone, second baronet of Logie (Elphinstone) and Sheriff of +Aberdeen, by Mary, daughter of Sir Gilbert Elliot, first baronet +of Minto.</p> +<p>“Referring to the Minto descent, Stevenson claims to +have ‘shaken a spear in the Debatable Land and shouted the +slogan of the Elliots.’ He evidently knew little or +nothing of his relations on the Elphinstone side. The Logie +Elphinstones were a cadet branch of Glack, an estate acquired by +Nicholas Elphinstone in 1499. William Elphinstone, a +younger son of James of Glack, and Elizabeth Wood of Bonnyton, +married Margaret Forbes, and was father of Sir James Elphinstone, +Bart., of Logie, so created in 1701. . . .</p> +<p>“Stevenson would have been delighted to acknowledge his +relationship, remote though it was, to ‘the Wolf of +Badenoch,’ who burned Elgin Cathedral without the Earl of +Kildare’s excuse that he thought the Bishop was in it; and +to the Wolf’s son, the Victor of Harlaw [and] to his nephew +‘John O’Coull,’ Constable of France. . . . Also +among Tusitala’s kin may be noted, in addition to the later +Gordons of Gight, the Tiger Earl of Crawford, familiarly known as +‘Earl Beardie,’ the ‘Wicked Master’ of +the same line, who was fatally stabbed by a Dundee cobbler +‘for taking a stoup of drink from him’; Lady Jean +Lindsay, who ran away with ‘a common jockey with the +horn,’ and latterly became a beggar; David Lindsay, the +last Laird of Edzell [a lichtsome Lindsay fallen on evil days], +who ended his days as hostler at a Kirkwall inn, and +‘Mussel Mou’ed Charlie,’ the Jacobite +ballad-singer.</p> +<p>“Stevenson always believed that he had a strong +spiritual affinity to Robert Fergusson. It is more than +probable that there was a distant maternal affinity as +well. Margaret Forbes, the mother of Sir James Elphinstone, +the purchaser of Logie, has not been identified, but it is +probable she was of the branch of the Tolquhon Forbeses who +previously owned Logie. Fergusson’s mother, Elizabeth +Forbes, was the daughter of a Kildrummy tacksman, who by constant +tradition is stated to have been of the house of Tolquhon. +It would certainly be interesting if this suggested connection +could be proved.” <a name="citation5"></a><a +href="#footnote5" class="citation">[5]</a></p> +<p>“From his Highland ancestors,” says the +<i>Quarterly Review</i>, “Louis drew the strain of Celtic +melancholy with all its perils and possibilities, and its +kinship, to the mood of day-dreaming, which has flung over so +many of his pages now the vivid light wherein figures imagined +grew as real as flesh and blood, and yet, again, the ghostly, +strange, lonesome, and stinging mist under whose spell we see the +world bewitched, and every object quickens with a throb of +infectious terror.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here, as in many other cases, we see how the traits of +ancestry reappear and transform other strains, strangely the more +remote often being the strongest and most persistent and +wonderful.</p> +<p>“It is through his father, strange as it may +seem,” says Mr Baildon, “that Stevenson gets the +Celtic elements so marked in his person, character, and genius; +for his father’s pedigree runs back to the Highland clan +Macgregor, the kin of Rob Roy. Stevenson thus drew in +Celtic strains from both sides—from the Balfours and the +Stevensons alike—and in his strange, dreamy, beautiful, and +often far-removed fancies we have the finest and most effective +witness of it.”</p> +<p>Mr William Archer, in his own characteristic way, has brought +the inheritances from the two sides of the house into more direct +contact and contrast in an article he wrote in <i>The Daily +Chronicle</i> on the appearance of the <i>Letters to Family and +Friends</i>.</p> +<blockquote><p>“These letters show,” he says, +“that Stevenson’s was not one of those sunflower +temperaments which turn by instinct, not effort, towards the +light, and are, as Mr Francis Thompson puts it, ‘heartless +and happy, lackeying their god.’ The strains of his +heredity were very curiously, but very clearly, mingled. It +may surprise some readers to find him speaking of ‘the +family evil, despondency,’ but he spoke with +knowledge. He inherited from his father not only a stern +Scottish intentness on the moral aspect of life (‘I would +rise from the dead to preach’), but a marked disposition to +melancholy and hypochondria. From his mother, on the other +hand, he derived, along with his physical frailty, a resolute and +cheery stoicism. These two elements in his nature fought +many a hard fight, and the besieging forces from +without—ill-health, poverty, and at one time family +dissensions—were by no means without allies in the inner +citadel of his soul. His spirit was courageous in the +truest sense of the word: by effort and conviction, not by +temperamental insensibility to fear. It is clear that there +was a period in his life (and that before the worst of his bodily +ills came upon him) when he was often within measurable distance +of Carlylean gloom. He was twenty-four when he wrote thus, +from Swanston, to Mrs Sitwell:</p> +<p>“‘It is warmer a bit; but my body is most +decrepit, and I can just manage to be cheery and tread down +hypochondria under foot by work. I lead such a funny life, +utterly without interest or pleasure outside of my work: nothing, +indeed, but work all day long, except a short walk alone on the +cold hills, and meals, and a couple of pipes with my father in +the evening. It is surprising how it suits me, and how +happy I keep.’</p> +<p>“This is the serenity which arises, not from the absence +of fuliginous elements in the character, but from a potent +smoke-consuming faculty, and an inflexible will to use it. +Nine years later he thus admonishes his backsliding parent:</p> +<p>“‘<span class="smcap">My dear +Mother</span>,—I give my father up. I give him a +parable: that the Waverley novels are better reading for every +day than the tragic <i>Life</i>. And he takes it back-side +foremost, and shakes his head, and is gloomier than ever. +Tell him that I give him up. I don’t want no such a +parent. This is not the man for my money. I do not +call that by the name of religion which fills a man with +bile. I write him a whole letter, bidding him beware of +extremes, and telling him that his gloom is gallows-worthy; and I +get back an answer—. Perish the thought of it.</p> +<p>“‘Here am I on the threshold of another year, +when, according to all human foresight, I should long ago have +been resolved into my elements: here am I, who you were persuaded +was born to disgrace you—and, I will do you the justice to +add, on no such insufficient grounds—no very burning +discredit when all is done; here am I married, and the marriage +recognised to be a blessing of the first order. A1 at +Lloyd’s. There is he, at his not first youth, able to +take more exercise than I at thirty-three, and gaining a +stone’s weight, a thing of which I am incapable. +There are you; has the man no gratitude? . . .</p> +<p>“‘Even the Shorter Catechism, not the merriest +epitome of religion, and a work exactly as pious although not +quite so true as the multiplication table—even that +dry-as-dust epitome begins with a heroic note. What is +man’s chief end? Let him study that; and ask himself +if to refuse to enjoy God’s kindest gifts is in the spirit +indicated.’</p> +<p>“As may be judged from this half-playful, half-serious +remonstrance, Stevenson’s relation to his parents was +eminently human and beautiful. The family dissensions above +alluded to belonged only to a short but painful period, when the +father could not reconcile himself to the discovery that the son +had ceased to accept the formulas of Scottish Calvinism. In +the eyes of the older man such heterodoxy was for the moment +indistinguishable from atheism; but he soon arrived at a better +understanding of his son’s position. Nothing appears +more unmistakably in these letters than the ingrained theism of +Stevenson’s way of thought. The poet, the romancer +within him, revolted from the conception of formless force. +A personal deity was a necessary character in the drama, as he +conceived it. And his morality, though (or inasmuch as) it +dwelt more on positive kindness than on negative lawlessness, +was, as he often insisted, very much akin to the morality of the +New Testament.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Anyway it is clear that much in the interminglings of blood we +<i>can</i> trace, may go to account for not a little in +Stevenson. His peculiar interest in the enormities of +old-time feuds, the excesses, the jealousies, the queer +psychological puzzles, the desire to work on the outlying and +morbid, and even the unallowed and unhallowed, for purposes of +romance—the delight in dealing with revelations of +primitive feeling and the out-bursts of the mere natural man +always strangely checked and diverted by the uprise of other +tendencies to the dreamy, impalpable, vague, weird and +horrible. There was the undoubted Celtic element in him +underlying what seemed foreign to it, the disregard of +conventionality in one phase, and the falling under it in +another—the reaction and the retreat from what had +attracted and interested him, and then the return upon it, as +with added zest because of the retreat. The confessed +Hedonist, enjoying life and boasting of it just a little, and yet +the Puritan in him, as it were, all the time eyeing himself as +from some loophole of retreat, and then commenting on his own +behaviour as a Hedonist and Bohemian. This clearly was not +what most struck Beerbohm Tree, during the time he was in close +contact with Stevenson, while arranging the production of <i>Beau +Austin</i> at the Haymarket Theatre, for he sees, or confesses to +seeing, only one side, and that the most assertive, and in a +sense, unreal one:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Stevenson,” says Mr Tree, +“always seemed to me an epicure in life. He was +always intent on extracting the last drop of honey from every +flower that came in his way. He was absorbed in the +business of the moment, however trivial. As a companion, he +was delightfully witty; as a personality, as much a creature of +romance as his own creations.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>This is simple, and it looks sincere; but it does not touch +’tother side, or hint at, not to say, solve the problem of +Stevenson’s personality. Had he been the mere +Hedonist he could never have done the work he did. Mr +Beerbohm Tree certainly did not there see far or all round.</p> +<p>Miss Simpson says:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Mr Henley recalls him to Edinburgh folk as +he was and as the true Stevenson would have wished to be +known—a queer, inexplicable creature, his Celtic blood +showing like a vein of unknown metal in the stolid, steady rock +of his sure-founded Stevensonian pedigree. His cousin and +model, ‘Bob’ Stevenson, the art critic, showed that +this foreign element came from the men who lit our guiding lights +for seamen, not from the gentle-blooded Balfours.</p> +<p>“Mr Henley is right in saying that the gifted boy had +not much humour. When the joke was against himself he was +very thin-skinned and had a want of balance. This made him +feel his honest father’s sensible remarks like the sting of +a whip.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Miss Simpson then proceeds to say:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The R. L. Stevenson of old Edinburgh days +was a conceited, egotistical youth, but a true and honest one: a +youth full of fire and sentiment, protesting he was +misunderstood, though he was not. Posing as ‘Velvet +Coat’ among the slums, he did no good to himself. He +had not the Dickens aptitude for depicting the ways of life of +his adopted friends. When with refined judgment he wanted a +figure for a novel, he went back to the Bar he scorned in his +callow days and then drew in <i>Weir of Hermiston</i>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER V—TRAVELS</h2> +<p>His interest in engineering soon went—his mind full of +stories and fancies and human nature. As he had told his +mother: he did not care about finding what was “the strain +on a bridge,” he wanted to know something of human +beings.</p> +<p>No doubt, much to the disappointment and grief of his father, +who wished him as an only son to carry on the traditions of the +family, though he had written two engineering essays of utmost +promise, the engineering was given up, and he consented to study +law. He had already contributed to College Magazines, and +had had even a short spell of editing one; of one of these he has +given a racy account. Very soon after his call to the Bar +articles and essays from his pen began to appear in +<i>Macmillan’s</i>, and later, more regularly in the +<i>Cornhill</i>. Careful readers soon began to note here +the presence of a new force. He had gone on the <i>Inland +Voyage</i> and an account of it was in hand; and had done that +tour in the Cevennes which he has described under the title +<i>Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes</i>, with Modestine, +sometimes doubting which was the donkey, but on that tour a chill +caught either developed a germ of lung disease already present, +or produced it; and the results unfortunately remained.</p> +<p>He never practised at the Bar, though he tells facetiously of +his one brief. He had chosen his own vocation, which was +literature, and the years which followed were, despite the +delicacy which showed itself, very busy years. He produced +volume on volume. He had written many stories which had +never seen the light, but, as he says, passed through the ordeal +of the fire by more or less circuitous ways.</p> +<p>By this time some trouble and cause for anxiety had arisen +about the lungs, and trials of various places had been +made. <i>Ordered South</i> suggests the Mediterranean, +sunny Italy, the Riviera. Then a sea-trip to America was +recommended and undertaken. Unfortunately, he got worse +there, his original cause of trouble was complicated with others, +and the medical treatment given was stupid, and exaggerated some +of the symptoms instead of removing them, All along—up, at +all events, to the time of his settlement in +Samoa—Stevenson was more or less of an invalid.</p> +<p>Indeed, were I ever to write an essay on the art of wisely +“laying-to,” as the sailors say, I would point it by +a reference to R. L. Stevenson. For there is a wise way of +“laying-to” that does not imply inaction, but +discreet, well-directed effort, against contrary winds and rough +seas, that is, amid obstacles and drawbacks, and even ill-health, +where passive and active may balance and give effect to each +other. Stevenson was by native instinct and temperament a +rover—a lover of adventure, of strange by-ways, errant +tracts (as seen in his <i>Inland Voyage</i> and <i>Travels with a +Donkey through the Cevennes</i>—seen yet more, perhaps, in +a certain account of a voyage to America as a steerage +passenger), lofty mountain-tops, with stronger air, and strange +and novel surroundings. He would fain, like Ulysses, be at +home in foreign lands, making acquaintance with outlying races, +with</p> + +<blockquote><p> “Cities +of men,<br /> +And manners, climates, councils, governments:<br /> +Myself not least, but honoured of them all,<br /> +Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If he could not move about as he would, he would invent, make +fancy serve him instead of experience. We thus owe +something to the staying and restraining forces in him, and a +wise “laying-to”—for his works, which are, in +large part, finely-healthy, objective, and in almost everything +unlike the work of an invalid, yet, in some degree, were but the +devices to beguile the burdens of an invalid’s days. +Instead of remaining in our climate, it might be, to lie listless +and helpless half the day, with no companion but his own thoughts +and fancies (not always so pleasant either, if, like +Frankenstein’s monster, or, better still like the imp in +the bottle in the <i>Arabian Nights</i>, you cannot, once for all +liberate them, and set them adrift on their own charges to visit +other people), he made a home in the sweeter air and more steady +climate of the South Pacific, where, under the Southern Cross, he +could safely and beneficially be as active as he would be +involuntarily idle at home, or work only under pressure of +hampering conditions. That was surely an illustration of +the true “laying-to” with an unaffectedly brave, +bright resolution in it.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VI—SOME EARLIER LETTERS</h2> +<p>Carlyle was wont to say that, next to a faithful portrait, +familiar letters were the best medium to reveal a man. The +letters must have been written with no idea of being used for +this end, however—free, artless, the unstudied +self-revealings of mind and heart. Now, these letters of R. +L. Stevenson, written to his friends in England, have a vast +value in this way—they reveal the man—reveal him in +his strength and his weakness—his ready gift in pleasing +and adapting himself to those with whom he corresponded, and his +great power at once of adapting himself to his circumstances and +of humorously rising superior to them. When he was ill and +almost penniless in San Francisco, he could give Mr Colvin this +account of his daily routine:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Any time between eight and half-past nine +in the morning a slender gentleman in an ulster, with a volume +buttoned into the breast of it, maybe observed leaving No. 608 +Bush and descending Powell with an active step. The +gentleman is R. L. Stevenson; the volume relates to Benjamin +Franklin, on whom he meditates one of his charming essays. +He descends Powell, crosses Market, and descends in Sixth on a +branch of the original Pine Street Coffee-House, no less. . . . +He seats himself at a table covered with waxcloth, and a pampered +menial of High-Dutch extraction, and, indeed, as yet only +partially extracted, lays before him a cup of coffee, a roll, and +a pat of butter, all, to quote the deity, very good. A +while ago, and R. L. Stevenson used to find the supply of butter +insufficient; but he has now learned the art to exactitude, and +butter and roll expire at the same moment. For this +rejection he pays ten cents, or fivepence sterling (£0 0s. +5d.).</p> +<p>“Half an hour later, the inhabitants of Bush Street +observed the same slender gentleman armed, like George +Washington, with his little hatchet, splitting kindling, and +breaking coal for his fire. He does this quasi-publicly +upon the window-sill; but this is not to be attributed to any +love of notoriety, though he is indeed vain of his prowess with +the hatchet (which he persists in calling an axe), and daily +surprised at the perpetuation of his fingers. The reason is +this: That the sill is a strong supporting beam, and that blows +of the same emphasis in other parts of his room might knock the +entire shanty into hell. Thenceforth, for from three hours, +he is engaged darkly with an ink-bottle. Yet he is not +blacking his boots, for the only pair that he possesses are +innocent of lustre, and wear the natural hue of the material +turned up with caked and venerable slush. The youngest +child of his landlady remarks several times a day, as this +strange occupant enters or quits the house, ‘Dere’s +de author.’ Can it be that this bright-haired +innocent has found the true clue to the mystery? The being +in question is, at least, poor enough to belong to that +honourable craft.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here are a few letters belonging to the winter of 1887-88, +nearly all written from Saranac Lake, in the Adirondacks, +celebrated by Emerson, and now a most popular holiday resort in +the United States, and were originally published in +<i>Scribner’s Magazine</i>. . . “It should be said +that, after his long spell of weakness at Bournemouth, Stevenson +had gone West in search of health among the bleak hill +summits—‘on the Canadian border of New York State, +very unsettled and primitive and cold.’ He had made +the voyage in an ocean tramp, the <i>Ludgate Hill</i>, the sort +of craft which any person not a born child of the sea would shun +in horror. Stevenson, however, had ‘the finest time +conceivable on board the “strange floating +menagerie.”’” Thus he describes it in a +letter to Mr Henry James:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Stallions and monkeys and matches made our +cargo; and the vast continent of these incongruities rolled the +while like a haystack; and the stallions stood hypnotised by the +motion, looking through the port at our dinner-table, and winked +when the crockery was broken; and the little monkeys stared at +each other in their cages, and were thrown overboard like little +bluish babies; and the big monkey, Jacko, scoured about the ship +and rested willingly in my arms, to the ruin of my clothing; and +the man of the stallions made a bower of the black tarpaulin, and +sat therein at the feet of a raddled divinity, like a picture on +a box of chocolates; and the other passengers, when they were not +sick, looked on and laughed. Take all this picture, and +make it roll till the bell shall sound unexpected notes and the +fittings shall break loose in our stateroom, and you have the +voyage of the <i>Ludgate Hill</i>. She arrived in the port +of New York without beer, porter, soda-water, curaçoa, +fresh meat, or fresh water; and yet we lived, and we regret +her.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He discovered this that there is no joy in the Universe +comparable to life on a villainous ocean tramp, rolling through a +horrible sea in company with a cargo of cattle.</p> +<blockquote><p>“I have got one good thing of my sea voyage; +it is proved the sea agrees heartily with me, and my mother likes +it; so if I get any better, or no worse, my mother will likely +hire a yacht for a month or so in the summer. Good Lord! +what fun! Wealth is only useful for two things: a yacht and +a string quartette. For these two I will sell my +soul. Except for these I hold that £700 a year is as +much as anybody can possibly want; and I have had more, so I +know, for the extra coins were of no use, excepting for illness, +which damns everything. I was so happy on board that ship, +I could not have believed it possible; we had the beastliest +weather, and many discomforts; but the mere fact of its being a +tramp ship gave us many comforts. We could cut about with +the men and officers, stay in the wheel-house, discuss all manner +of things, and really be a little at sea. And truly there +is nothing else. I had literally forgotten what happiness +was, and the full mind—full of external and physical +things, not full of cares and labours, and rot about a +fellow’s behaviour. My heart literally sang; I truly +care for nothing so much as for that.</p> +<p>“To go ashore for your letters and hang about the pier +among the holiday yachtsmen—that’s fame, that’s +glory—and nobody can take it away.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>At Saranac Lake the Stevensons lived in a +“wind-beleaguered hill-top hat-box of a house,” which +suited the invalid, but, on the other hand, invalided his +wife. Soon after getting there he plunged into <i>The +Master of Ballantrae</i>.</p> +<blockquote><p>“No thought have I now apart from it, and I +have got along up to page ninety-two of the draught with great +interest. It is to me a most seizing tale: there are some +fantastic elements, the most is a dead genuine human +problem—human tragedy, I should say rather. It will +be about as long, I imagine, as <i>Kidnapped</i>. . . . I have +done most of the big work, the quarrel, duel between the +brothers, and the announcement of the death to Clementina and my +Lord—Clementina, Henry, and Mackellar (nicknamed +Squaretoes) are really very fine fellows; the Master is all I +know of the devil; I have known hints of him, in the world, but +always cowards: he is as bold as a lion, but with the same +deadly, causeless duplicity I have watched with so much surprise +in my two cowards. ’Tis true, I saw a hint of the +same nature in another man who was not a coward; but he had other +things to attend to; the Master has nothing else but his +devilry.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>His wife grows seriously ill, and Stevenson has to turn to +household work.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Lloyd and I get breakfast; I have now, +10.15, just got the dishes washed and the kitchen all clean, and +sit down to give you as much news as I have spirit for, after +such an engagement. Glass is a thing that really breaks my +spirit; and I do not like to fail, and with glass I cannot reach +the work of my high calling—the artist’s.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In the midst of such domestic tasks and entanglements he +writes <i>The Master</i>, and very characteristically gets +dissatisfied with the last parts, “which shame, perhaps +degrade, the beginning.”</p> +<p>Of Mr Kipling this is his judgment—in the year 1890:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Kipling is by far the most promising young +man who has appeared since—ahem—I appeared. He +amazes me by his precocity and various endowments. But he +alarms me by his copiousness and haste. He should shield +his fire with both hands, ‘and draw up all his strength and +sweetness in one ball.’ (‘Draw all his strength +and all his sweetness up into one ball’? I cannot +remember Marvell’s words.) So the critics have been +saying to me; but I was never capable of—and surely never +guilty of—such a debauch of production. At this rate +his works will soon fill the habitable globe, and surely he was +armed for better conflicts than these succinct sketches and +flying leaves of verse? I look on, I admire, I rejoice for +myself; but in a kind of ambition we all have for our tongue and +literature I am wounded. If I had this man’s +fertility and courage, it seems to me I could heave a +pyramid.</p> +<p>“Well, we begin to be the old fogies now, and it was +high time <i>something</i> rose to take our places. +Certainly Kipling has the gifts; the fairy godmothers were all +tipsy at his christening. What will he do with +them?”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Of the rest of Stevenson’s career we cannot speak at +length, nor is it needful. How in steady succession came +his triumphs: came, too, his trials from ill-health—how he +spent winters at Davos Platz, Bournemouth, and tried other places +in America; and how, at last, good fortune led him to the South +Pacific. After many voyagings and wanderings among the +islands, he settled near Apia, in Samoa, early in 1890, cleared +some four hundred acres, and built a house; where, while he wrote +what delighted the English-speaking race, he took on himself the +defence of the natives against foreign interlopers, writing under +the title <i>A Footnote to History</i>, the most powerful +<i>exposé</i> of the mischief they had done and were doing +there. He was the beloved of the natives, as he made +himself the friend of all with whom he came in contact. +There, as at home, he worked—worked with the same +determination and in the enjoyment of better health. The +obtaining idea with him, up to the end, as it had been from early +life, was a brave, resolute, cheerful endeavour to make the best +of it.</p> +<p>“I chose Samoa instead of Honolulu,” he told Mr W. +H. Trigg, who reports the talk in <i>Cassells’ +Magazine</i>, “for the simple and eminently satisfactory +reason that it is less civilised. Can you not conceive that +it is awful fun?” His house was called +“Vailima,” which means Five Waters in the Samoan, and +indicates the number of streams that flow by the spot.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VII—THE VAILIMA LETTERS</h2> +<p>The Vailima Letters, written to Mr Sidney Colvin and other +friends, are in their way delightful if not inimitable: and this, +in spite of the idea having occurred to him, that some use might +hereafter be made of these letters for publication +purposes. There is, indeed, as little trace of any change +in the style through this as well could be—the utterly +familiar, easy, almost child-like flow remains, unmarred by +self-consciousness or tendency “to put it on.”</p> +<p>In June, 1892, Stevenson says:</p> +<blockquote><p>“It came over me the other day suddenly that +this diary of mine to you would make good pickings after I am +dead, and a man could make some kind of a book out of it, without +much trouble. So for God’s sake don’t lose +them, and they will prove a piece of provision for ‘my +floor old family,’ as Simelé calls it.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But their great charm remains: they are as free and gracious +and serious and playful and informal as before. +Stevenson’s traits of character are all here: his largeness +of heart, his delicacy, his sympathy, his fun, his pathos, his +boylike frolicsomeness, his fine courage, his love of the sea +(for he was by nature a sailor), his passion for action and +adventure despite his ill-health, his great patience with others +and fine adaptability to their temper (he says that he never gets +out of temper with those he has to do with), his unbounded, +big-hearted hopefulness, and fine perseverance in face of +difficulties. What could be better than the way in which he +tells that in January, 1892, when he had a bout of influenza and +was dictating <i>St Ives</i> to his stepdaughter, Mrs Strong, he +was “reduced to dictating to her in the deaf-and-dumb +alphabet”?—and goes on:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The amanuensis has her head quite turned, +and believes herself to be the author of this novel [<i>and is to +some extent</i>.—A.M.] and as the creature (!) has not been +wholly useless in the matter [<i>I told you so</i>!—A.M.] I +propose to foster her vanity by a little commemoration gift! . . +. I shall tell you on some other occasion, and when the A.M. is +out of hearing, how <i>very</i> much I propose to invest in this +testimonial; but I may as well inform you at once that I intend +it to be cheap, sir—damned cheap! My idea of running +amanuenses is by praise, not pudding, flattery, and not +coins.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Truly, a rare and rich nature which could thus draw sunshine +out of its trials!—which, by aid of the true +philosopher’s stone of cheerfulness and courage, could +transmute the heavy dust and clay to gold.</p> +<p>His interests are so wide that he is sometimes pulled in +different and conflicting directions, as in the contest between +his desire to aid Mataafa and the other chiefs, and his literary +work—between letters to the <i>Times</i> about Samoan +politics, and, say, <i>David Balfour</i>. Here is a +characteristic bit in that strain:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I have a good dose of the devil in my +pipestem atomy; I have had my little holiday outing in my kick at +<i>The Young Chevalier</i>, and I guess I can settle to <i>David +Balfour</i>, to-morrow or Friday like a little man. I +wonder if any one had ever more energy upon so little +strength? I know there is a frost; . . . but I mean to +break that frost inside two years, and pull off a big success, +and Vanity whispers in my ear that I have the strength. If +I haven’t, whistle owre the lave o’t! I can do +without glory, and perhaps the time is not far off when I can do +without corn. It is a time coming soon enough, anyway; and +I have endured some two and forty years without public shame, and +had a good time as I did it. If only I could secure a +violent death, what a fine success! I wish to die in my +boots; no more Land of Counterpane for me. To be drowned, +to be shot, to be thrown from a horse—ay, to be hanged, +rather than pass again through that slow dissolution.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He would not consent to act the invalid unless the spring ran +down altogether; was keen for exercise and for mixing among +men—his native servants if no others were near by. +Here is a bit of confession and casuistry quite <i>à +la</i> Stevenson:</p> +<blockquote><p>“To come down covered with mud and drenched +with sweat and rain after some hours in the bush, change, rub +down, and take a chair in the verandah, is to taste a quiet +conscience. And the strange thing that I mark is this: If I +go out and make sixpence, bossing my labourers and plying the +cutlass or the spade, idiot conscience applauds me; if I sit in +the house and make twenty pounds, idiot conscience wails over my +neglect and the day wasted.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>His relish for companionship is indeed strong. At one +place he says:</p> +<blockquote><p>“God knows I don’t care who I chum +with perhaps I like sailors best, but to go round and sue and +sneak to keep a crowd together—never!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If Stevenson’s natural bent was to be an explorer, a +mountain-climber, or a sailor—to sail wide seas, or to +range on mountain-tops to gain free and extensive views—yet +he inclines well to farmer work, and indeed, has to confess it +has a rare attraction for him.</p> +<blockquote><p>“I went crazy over outdoor work,” he +says at one place, “and had at last to confine myself to +the house, or literature must have gone by the board. +<i>Nothing</i> is so interesting as weeding, clearing, and +path-making: the oversight of labourers becomes a disease. +It is quite an effort not to drop into the farmer; and it does +make you feel so well.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The odd ways of these Samoans, their pride of position, their +vices, their virtues, their vanities, their small thefts, their +tricks, their delightful <i>insouciance</i> sometimes, all amused +him. He found in them a fine field of study and +observation—a source of fun and fund of humanity—as +this bit about the theft of some piglings will sufficiently +prove:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Last night three piglings were stolen from +one of our pig-pens. The great Lafaele appeared to my wife +uneasy, so she engaged him in conversation on the subject, and +played upon him the following engaging trick: You advance your +two forefingers towards the sitter’s eyes; he closes them, +whereupon you substitute (on his eyelids) the fore and middle +fingers of the left hand, and with your right (which he supposes +engaged) you tap him on the head and back. When you let him +open his eyes, he sees you withdrawing the two forefingers. +‘What that?’ asked Lafaele. ‘My +devil,’ says Fanny. ‘I wake um, my devil. +All right now. He go catch the man that catch my +pig.’ About an hour afterwards Lafaele came for +further particulars. ‘Oh, all right,’ my wife +says. ‘By-and-by that man be sleep, devil go sleep +same place. By-and-by that man plenty sick. I no +care. What for he take my pig?’ Lafaele cares +plenty; I don’t think he is the man, though he may be; but +he knows him, and most likely will eat some of that pig +to-night. He will not eat with relish.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Yet in spite of this R. L. Stevenson declares that:</p> +<blockquote><p>“They are a perfectly honest people: nothing +of value has ever been taken from our house, where doors and +windows are always wide open; and upon one occasion when white +ants attacked the silver chest, the whole of my family treasure +lay spread upon the floor of the hall for two days +unguarded.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here is a bit on a work of peace, a reflection on a +day’s weeding at Vailima—in its way almost as +touching as any:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I wonder if any one had ever the same +attitude to Nature as I hold, and have held for so long? +This business fascinates me like a tune or a passion; yet all the +while I thrill with a strong distaste. The horror of the +thing, objective and subjective, is always present to my mind; +the horror of creeping things, a superstitious horror of the void +and the powers about me, the horror of my own devastation and +continual murders. The life of the plants comes through my +finger-tips, their struggles go to my heart like +supplications. I feel myself blood-boltered; then I look +back on my cleared grass, and count myself an ally in a fair +quarrel, and make stout my heart.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here, again, is the way in which he celebrates an act of +friendly kindness on the part of Mr Gosse:</p> +<blockquote><p>“<span class="smcap">My dear +Gosse</span>,—Your letter was to me such a bright spot that +I answer it right away to the prejudice of other correspondents +or—dants (don’t know how to spell it) who have prior +claims. . . . It is the history of our kindnesses that alone +makes this world tolerable. If it were not for that, for +the effect of kind words, kind looks, kind letters, multiplying, +spreading, making one happy through another and bringing forth +benefits, some thirty, some fifty, some a thousandfold, I should +be tempted to think our life a practical jest in the worst +possible spirit. So your four pages have confirmed my +philosophy as well as consoled my heart in these ill +hours.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII—WORK OF LATER YEARS</h2> +<p>Mr Hammerton, in his <i>Stevensoniana</i> (pp. 323-4), has +given the humorous inscriptions on the volumes of his works which +Stevenson presented to Dr Trudeau, who attended him when he was +in Saranac in 1887-88—very characteristic in every way, and +showing fully Stevenson’s fine appreciation of any +attention or service. On the <i>Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i> +volume he wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Trudeau was all the winter at my side:<br +/> +I never saw the nose of Mr Hyde.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And on <i>Kidnapped</i> is this:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Here is the one sound page of all my +writing,<br /> +The one I’m proud of and that I delight in.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Stevenson was exquisite in this class of efforts, and were +they all collected they would form indeed, a fine supplement and +illustration of the leading lesson of his essays—the true +art of pleasing others, and of truly pleasing one’s self at +the same time. To my thinking the finest of all in this +line is the legal (?) deed by which he conveyed his birthday to +little Miss Annie Ide, the daughter of Mr H. C. Ide, a well-known +American, who was for several years a resident of Upolo, in +Samoa, first as Land Commissioner, and later as Chief Justice +under the joint appointment of England, Germany, and the United +States. While living at Apia, Mr Ide and his family were +very intimate with the family of R. L. Stevenson. Little +Annie was a special pet and protégé of Stevenson +and his wife. After the return of the Ides to their +American home, Stevenson “deeded” to Annie his +birthday in the following unique document:</p> +<blockquote><p>I, <span class="smcap">Robert Louis +Stevenson</span>, advocate of the Scots Bar, author of <i>The +Master of Ballantrae</i> and <i>Moral Emblems</i>, civil +engineer, sole owner and patentee of the palace and plantation +known as Vailima, in the island of Upolo, Samoa, a British +subject, being in sound mind, and pretty well, I thank you, in +mind and body;</p> +<p>In consideration that Miss Annie H. Ide, daughter of H. C. +Ide, in the town of Saint Johnsbury, in the County of Caledonia, +in the State of Vermont, United States of America, was born, out +of all reason, upon Christmas Day, and is, therefore, out of all +justice, denied the consolation and profit of a proper +birthday;</p> +<p>And considering that I, the said Robert Louis Stevenson, have +attained the age when we never mention it, and that I have now no +further use for a birthday of any description;</p> +<p>And in consideration that I have met H. C. Ide, the father of +the said Annie H. Ide, and found him as white a land commissioner +as I require, I have transferred, and do hereby transfer, to the +said Annie H. Ide, all and whole of my rights and privileges in +the 13th day of November, formerly my birthday, now, hereby and +henceforth, the birthday of the said Annie H. Ide, to have, hold, +exercise, and enjoy the same in the customary manner, by the +sporting of fine raiment, eating of rich meats, and receipt of +gifts, compliments, and copies of verse, according to the manner +of our ancestors;</p> +<p>And I direct the said Annie H. Ide to add to the said name of +Annie H. Ide the name of Louisa—at least in +private—and I charge her to use my said birthday with +moderation and humanity, <i>et tamquam bona filia familias</i>, +the said birthday not being so young as it once was and having +carried me in a very satisfactory manner since I can +remember;</p> +<p>And in case the said Annie H. Ide shall neglect or contravene +either of the above conditions, I hereby revoke the donation and +transfer my rights in the said birthday to the President of the +United States of America for the time being.</p> +<p>In witness whereof I have hereto set my hand and seal this +19th day of June, in the year of grace eighteen hundred and +ninety-one.</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><span class="smcap">Robert Louis +Stevenson</span>. [Seal.]</p> +<p><i>Witness</i>, <span class="smcap">Lloyd Osbourne</span>.</p> +<p><i>Witness</i>, <span class="smcap">Harold Watts</span>.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>He died in Samoa in December 1894—not from phthisis or +anything directly connected with it, but from the bursting of a +blood-vessel and suffusion of blood on the brain. He had up +to the moment almost of his sudden and unexpected death been busy +on <i>Weir of Hermiston</i> and <i>St Ives</i>, which he left +unfinished—the latter having been brought to a conclusion +by Mr Quiller-Couch.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER IX—SOME CHARACTERISTICS</h2> +<p>In Stevenson we lost one of the most powerful writers of our +day, as well as the most varied in theme and style. When I +use the word “powerful,” I do not mean merely the +producing of the most striking or sensational results, nor the +facility of weaving a fascinating or blood-curdling plot; I mean +the writer who seemed always to have most in reserve—a +secret fund of power and fascination which always pointed beyond +the printed page, and set before the attentive and careful reader +a strange but fascinating <i>personality</i>. Other authors +have done that in measure. There was Hawthorne, behind +whose writings there is always the wistful, cold, far-withdrawn +spectator of human nature—eerie, inquisitive, and, I had +almost said, inquisitorial—a little bloodless, eerie, +weird, and cobwebby. There was Dr Wendell Holmes, with his +problems of heredity, of race-mixture and weird inoculation, as +in <i>Elsie Venner</i> and <i>The Guardian Angel</i>, and there +were Poe and Charles Whitehead. Stevenson, in a few of his +writings—in one of the <i>Merry Men</i> chapters and in +<i>Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i>, and, to some extent, in <i>The +Master of Ballantrae</i>—showed that he could enter on the +obscure and, in a sense, weird and metaphysical elements in human +life; though always there was, too, a touch at least of gloomy +suggestion, from which, as it seemed, he could not there wholly +escape. But always, too, there was a touch that suggests +the universal.</p> +<p>Even in the stories that would be classed as those of incident +and adventure merely, <i>Treasure Island</i>, <i>Kidnapped</i>, +and the rest, there is a sense as of some unaffected but fine +symbolism that somehow touches something of possibility in +yourself as you read. The simplest narrative from his hand +proclaimed itself a deep study in human nature—its motives +tendencies, and possibilities. In these stories there is +promise at once of the most realistic imagination, the most +fantastic romance, keen insights into some sides of human nature, +and weird fancies, as well as the most delicate and dainty +pictures of character. And this is precisely what we +have—always with a vein of the finest autobiography—a +kind of select and indirect self-revelation—often with a +touch of quaintness, a subdued humour, and sweet-blooded vagary, +if we may be allowed the word, which make you feel towards the +writer as towards a friend. He was too much an artist to +overdo this, and his strength lies there, that generally he +suggests and turns away at the right point, with a smile, as you +ask for <i>more</i>. Look how he sets, half slyly, these +words into the mouth of David Balfour on his first meeting with +Catriona in one of the steep wynds or closes off the High Street +of Edinburgh:</p> +<blockquote><p>“There is no greater wonder than the way the +face of a young woman fits in a man’s mind, and stays +there, and he never could tell you why: it just seems it was the +thing he wanted.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Take this alongside of his remark made to his mother while +still a youth—“that he did not care to understand the +strain on a bridge” (when he tried to study engineering); +what he wanted was something with human nature in it. His +style, in his essays, etc., where he writes in his own person, is +most polished, full of phrases finely drawn; when he speaks +through others, as in <i>Kidnapped</i> and <i>David Balfour</i>, +it is still fine and effective, and generally it is fairly true +to the character, with cunning glimpses, nevertheless, of his own +temper and feeling too. He makes us feel his confidants and +friends, as has been said. One could almost construct a +biography from his essays and his novels—the one would give +us the facts of his life suffused with fancy and ideal colour, +humour and fine observation not wanting; the other would give us +the history of his mental and moral being and development, and of +the traits and determinations which he drew from along a +lengthened line of progenitors. How characteristic it is of +him—a man who for so many years suffered as an +invalid—that he should lay it down that the two great +virtues, including all others, were cheerfulness and delight in +labour.</p> +<p>One writer has very well said on this feature in +Stevenson:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Other authors have struggled bravely +against physical weakness, but their work has not usually been of +a creative order, dependent for its success on high animal +spirits. They have written histories, essays, contemplative +or didactic poems, works which may more or less be regarded as +‘dull narcotics numbing pain.’ But who, in so +fragile a frame as Robert Louis Stevenson’s, has retained +such indomitable elasticity, such fertility of invention, such +unflagging energy, not merely to collect and arrange, but to +project and body forth? Has any true ‘maker’ +been such an incessant sufferer? From his childhood, as he +himself said apropos of the <i>Child’s Garden</i>, he could +‘speak with less authority of gardens than of that other +“land of counterpane.”’ There were, +indeed, a few years of adolescence during which his health was +tolerable, but they were years of apprenticeship to life and art +(‘pioching,’ as he called it), not of serious +production. Though he was a precocious child, his genius +ripened slowly, and it was just reaching maturity when the +‘wolverine,’ as he called his disease, fixed its +fangs in his flesh. From that time forward not only did he +live with death at his elbow in an almost literal sense (he used +to carry his left arm in a sling lest a too sudden movement +should bring on a hæmorrhage), but he had ever-recurring +intervals of weeks and months during which he was totally unfit +for work; while even at the best of times he had to husband his +strength most jealously. Add to all this that he was a slow +and laborious writer, who would take more pains with a phrase +than Scott with a chapter—then look at the stately shelf of +his works, brimful of impulse, initiative, and the joy of life, +and say whether it be an exaggeration to call his tenacity and +fortitude unique!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Samoa, with its fine climate, prolonged his life—we had +fain hoped that in that air he found so favourable he might have +lived for many years, to add to the precious stock of innocent +delight he has given to the world—to do yet more and +greater. It was not to be. They buried him, with full +native honours as to a chief, on the top of Vaea mountain, 1300 +feet high—a road for the coffin to pass being cut through +the woods on the slopes of the hill. There he has a +resting-place not all unfit—for he sought the pure and +clearer air on the heights from whence there are widest +prospects; yet not in the spot he would have chosen—for his +heart was at home, and not very long before his death he sang, +surely with pathetic reference now:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Spring shall come, come again, calling up +the moorfowl,<br /> +Spring shall bring the sun and rain, bring the bees and +flowers,<br /> +Red shall the heather bloom over hill and valley,<br /> +Soft flow the stream thro’ the even-flowing hours;<br /> +Fair the day shine, as it shone upon my childhood—<br /> + Fair shine the day on the house with open door;<br +/> +Birds come and cry there, and twitter in the chimney—<br /> + But I go for ever and come again no more.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER X—A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON</h2> +<p>A few weeks after his death, the mail from Samoa, brought to +Stevenson’s friends, myself among the number, a precious, +if pathetic, memorial of the master. It is in the form of +“A Letter to Mr Stevenson’s Friends,” by his +stepson, Mr Lloyd Osbourne, and bears the motto from Walt +Whitman, “I have been waiting for you these many +years. Give me your hand and welcome.” Mr +Osbourne gives a full account of the last hours.</p> +<blockquote><p>“He wrote hard all that morning of the last +day; his half-finished book, <i>Hermiston</i>, he judged the best +he had ever written, and the sense of successful effort made him +buoyant and happy as nothing else could. In the afternoon +the mail fell to be answered—not business correspondence, +for this was left till later—but replies to the long, +kindly letters of distant friends received but two days since, +and still bright in memory. At sunset he came downstairs; +rallied his wife about the forebodings she could not shake off; +talked of a lecturing tour to America that he was eager to make, +‘as he was now so well’; and played a game of cards +with her to drive away her melancholy. He said he was +hungry; begged her assistance to help him make a salad for the +evening meal; and, to enhance the little feast he brought up a +bottle of old Burgundy from the cellar. He was helping his +wife on the verandah, and gaily talking, when suddenly he put +both hands to his head and cried out, ‘What’s +that?’ Then he asked quickly, ‘Do I look +strange?’ Even as he did so he fell on his knees +beside her. He was helped into the great hall, between his +wife and his body-servant, Sosimo, losing consciousness instantly +as he lay back in the armchair that had once been his +grandfather’s. Little time was lost in bringing the +doctors—Anderson of the man-of-war, and his friend, Dr +Funk. They looked at him and shook their heads; they +laboured strenuously, and left nothing undone. But he had +passed the bounds of human skill. He had grown so well and +strong, that his wasted lungs were unable to bear the stress of +returning health.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Then ’tis told how the Rev. Mr Clarke came and prayed by +him; and how, soon after, the chiefs were summoned, and came, +bringing their fine mats, which, laid on the body, almost hid the +Union jack in which it had been wrapped. One of the old +Mataafa chiefs, who had been in prison, and who had been one of +those who worked on the making of the “Road of the Loving +Heart” (the road of gratitude which the chiefs had made up +to Mr Stevenson’s house as a mark of their appreciation of +his efforts on their behalf), came and crouched beside the body +and said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I am only a poor Samoan, and +ignorant. Others are rich, and can give Tusitala <a +name="citation6"></a><a href="#footnote6" +class="citation">[6]</a> the parting presents of rich, fine mats; +I am poor, and can give nothing this last day he receives his +friends. Yet I am not afraid to come and look the last time +in my friend’s face, never to see him more till we meet +with God. Behold! Tusitala is dead; Mataafa is also +dead. These two great friends have been taken by God. +When Mataafa was taken, who was our support but Tusitala? +We were in prison, and he cared for us. We were sick, and +he made us well. We were hungry, and he fed us. The +day was no longer than his kindness. You are great people, +and full of love. Yet who among you is so great as +Tusitala? What is your love to his love? Our clan was +Mataafa’s clan, for whom I speak this day; therein was +Tusitala also. We mourn them both.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>A select company of Samoans would not be deterred, and watched +by the body all night, chanting songs, with bits of Catholic +prayers; and in the morning the work began of clearing a path +through the wood on the hill to the spot on the crown where Mr +Stevenson had expressed a wish to be buried. The following +prayer, which Mr Stevenson had written and read aloud to his +family only the night before, was read by Mr Clarke in the +service:</p> +<blockquote><p>“We beseech thee, Lord, to behold us with +favour, folk of many families and nations, gathered together in +the peace of this roof; weak men and women, subsisting under the +covert of Thy patience. Be patient still; suffer us yet a +while longer—with our broken purposes of good, with our +idle endeavours against evil—suffer us a while longer to +endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better. Bless to +us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these must be +taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our +friends; be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest: if +any awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when +the day returns to us, our Sun and Comforter, call us up with +morning faces and with morning hearts—eager to +labour—eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our +portion; and if the day be marked for sorrow, strong to endure +it.</p> +<p>“We thank Thee and praise Thee, and in the words of Him +to whom this day is sacred, close our oblations.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Bazzet M. Haggard, H.B.M., Land-Commissioner, tells, by way +of reminiscence, the story of “The Road of Good +Heart,” how it came to be built, and of the great feast Mr +Stevenson gave at the close of the work, at which, in the course +of his speech, he said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“You are all aware in some degree of what +has happened. You know those chiefs to have been prisoners; +you perhaps know that during the term of their confinement I had +it in my power to do them certain favours. One thing some +of you cannot know, that they were immediately repaid by +answering attentions. They were liberated by the new +Administration. . . . As soon as they were free +men—owing no man anything—instead of going home to +their own places and families, they came to me. They +offered to do this work (to make this road) for me as a free +gift, without hire, without supplies, and I was tempted at first +to refuse their offer. I knew the country to be poor; I +knew famine threatening; I knew their families long disorganised +for want of supervision. Yet I accepted, because I thought +the lesson of that road might be more useful to Samoa than a +thousand bread-fruit trees, and because to myself it was an +exquisite pleasure to receive that which was so handsomely +offered. It is now done; you have trod it to-day in coming +hither. It has been made for me by chiefs; some of them +old, some sick, all newly delivered from a harassing confinement, +and in spite of weather unusually hot and insalubrious. I +have seen these chiefs labour valiantly with their own hands upon +the work, and I have set up over it, now that it is finished the +name of ‘The Road of Gratitude’ (the road of loving +hearts), and the names of those that built it. ‘In +perpetuam memoriam,’ we say, and speak idly. At +least, as long as my own life shall be spared it shall be here +perpetuated; partly for my pleasure and in my gratitude; partly +for others continually to publish the lesson of this +road.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And turning to the chiefs, Mr Stevenson said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I will tell you, chiefs, that when I saw +you working on that road, my heart grew warm; not with gratitude +only, but with hope. It seemed to me that I read the +promise of something good for Samoa; it seemed to me as I looked +at you that you were a company of warriors in a battle, fighting +for the defence of our common country against all +aggression. For there is a time to fight and a time to +dig. You Samoans may fight, you may conquer twenty times, +and thirty times, and all will be in vain. There is but one +way to defend Samoa. Hear it, before it is too late. +It is to make roads and gardens, and care for your trees, and +sell their produce wisely; and, in one word, to occupy and use +your country. If you do not, others will. . . .</p> +<p>“I love Samoa and her people. I love the +land. I have chosen it to be my home while I live, and my +grave after I am dead, and I love the people, and have chosen +them to be my people, to live and die with. And I see that +the day is come now of the great battle; of the great and the +last opportunity by which it shall be decided whether you are to +pass away like those other races of which I have been speaking, +or to stand fast and have your children living on and honouring +your memory in the land you received of your fathers.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr James H. Mulligan, U.S. Consul, told of the feast of +Thanksgiving Day on the 29th November prior to Mr +Stevenson’s death, and how at great pains he had procured +for it the necessary turkey, and how Mrs Stevenson had found a +fair substitute for the pudding. In the course of his +speech in reply to an unexpected proposal of “The +Host,” Mr Stevenson said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“There on my right sits she who has but +lately from our own loved native land come back to me—she +to whom, with no lessening of affection to those others to whom I +cling, I love better than all the world besides—my +mother. From the opposite end of the table, my wife, who +has been all in all to me, when the days were very dark, looks +to-night into my eyes—while we have both grown a bit +older—with undiminished and undiminishing affection.</p> +<p>“Childless, yet on either side of me sits that good +woman, my daughter, and the stalwart man, my son, and both have +been and are more than son and daughter to me, and have brought +into my life mirth and beauty. Nor is this all. There +sits the bright boy dear to my heart, full of the flow and the +spirits of boyhood, so that I can even know that for a time at +least we have still the voice of a child in the house.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr A. W. Mackay gives an account of the funeral and a +description of the burial-place, ending:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Tofa Tusitala! Sleep peacefully! on +thy mountain-top, alone in Nature’s sanctity, where the +wooddove’s note, the moaning of the waves as they break +unceasingly on the distant reef, and the sighing of the winds in +the distant tavai trees chant their requiem.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The Rev. Mr Clarke tells of the constant and active interest +Mr Stevenson took in the missionaries and their work, often +aiding them by his advice and fine insight into the character of +the natives; and a translation follows of a dirge by one of the +chiefs, so fine that we must give it:</p> +<blockquote><p>I.</p> +<p>“Listen, O this world, as I tell of the disaster<br /> +That befell in the late afternoon;<br /> +That broke like a wave of the sea<br /> +Suddenly and swiftly, blinding our eyes.<br /> +Alas for Loia who speaks tears in his voice!</p> +<p><i>Refrain</i>—Groan and weep, O my heart, in its +sorrow.<br /> +Alas for Tusitala, who rests in the forest!<br /> +Aimlessly we wait, and sorrowing. Will he again return?<br +/> +Lament, O Vailima, waiting and ever waiting!<br /> +Let us search and inquire of the captain of ships,<br /> +‘Be not angry, but has not Tusitala come?’</p> +<p>II.</p> +<p>“Teuila, sorrowing one, come thou hither!<br /> +Prepare me a letter, and I will carry it.<br /> +Let her Majesty Victoria be told<br /> +That Tusitala, the loving one, has been taken hence.</p> +<p><i>Refrain</i>—Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., +etc.</p> +<p>III.</p> +<p>“Alas! my heart weeps with anxious grief<br /> +As I think of the days before us:<br /> +Of the white men gathering for the Christmas assembly!<br /> +Alas for Aolele! left in her loneliness,<br /> +And the men of Vailima, who weep together<br /> +Their leader—their leader being taken.</p> +<p><i>Refrain</i>—Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., +etc.</p> +<p>IV.</p> +<p>“Alas! O my heart! it weeps unceasingly<br /> +When I think of his illness<br /> +Coming upon him with fatal swiftness.<br /> +Would that it waited a glance or a word from him,<br /> +Or some token, some token from us of our love.</p> +<p><i>Refrain</i>—Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., +etc.</p> +<p>V.</p> +<p>“Grieve, O my heart! I cannot bear to look on<br +/> +All the chiefs who are there now assembling:<br /> +Alas, Tusitala! Thou art not here!<br /> +I look hither and thither in vain for thee.</p> +<p><i>Refrain</i>—Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., +etc.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And the little booklet closes with Mr Stevenson’s own +lines:</p> +<blockquote><p>“REQUIEM.</p> +<p>Under the wide and starry sky,<br /> +Dig the grave and let me lie;<br /> +Glad did I live and gladly die,<br /> +And I laid me down with a will.<br /> +This be the verse you grave for me:<br /> +‘Here he lies where he longed to be;<br /> +Home is the sailor, home from sea;<br /> +And the hunter home from the hill.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Every touch tells here was a man, with heart and head, with +soul and mind intent on the loftiest things; simple, great,</p> +<blockquote><p>“Like one of the simple great ones gone<br +/> +For ever and ever by.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>His character towered after all far above his books; great and +beautiful though they were. Ready for friendship; from all +meanness free. So, too, the Samoans felt. This, +surely, was what Goethe meant when he wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The clear head and stout heart,<br /> +However far they roam,<br /> +Yet in every truth have part,<br /> +Are everywhere at home.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>His manliness, his width of sympathy, his practicality, his +range of interests were in nothing more seen than in his +contributions to the history of Samoa, as specially exhibited in +<i>A Footnote to History</i> and his letters to the +<i>Times</i>. He was, on this side, in no sense a dreamer, +but a man of acute observation and quick eye for passing events +and the characters that were in them with sympathy equal to his +discernments. His portraits of certain Germans and others +in these writings, and his power of tracing effects to remote and +underlying causes, show sufficiently what he might have done in +the field of history, had not higher voices called him. His +adaptation to the life in Samoa, and his assumption of the +semi-patriarchal character in his own sphere there, were only +tokens of the presence of the same traits as have just been dwelt +on.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XI—MISS STUBBS’ RECORD OF A +PILGRIMAGE</h2> +<p>Mrs Strong, in her chapter of <i>Table Talk in Memories of +Vailima</i>, tells a story of the natives’ love for +Stevenson. “The other day the cook was away,” +she writes, “and Louis, who was busy writing, took his +meals in his room. Knowing there was no one to cook his +lunch, he told Sosimo to bring him some bread and cheese. +To his surprise he was served with an excellent meal—an +omelette, a good salad, and perfect coffee. ‘Who +cooked this?’ asked Louis in Samoan. ‘I +did,’ said Sosimo. ‘Well,’ said Louis, +‘great is your wisdom.’ Sosimo bowed and +corrected him—‘Great is my love!’”</p> +<p>Miss Stubbs, in her <i>Stevenson’s Shrine</i>; <i>the +Record of a Pilgrimage</i>, illustrates the same devotion. +On the top of Mount Vaea, she writes, is the massive sarcophagus, +“not an ideal structure by any means, not even beautiful, +and yet in its massive ruggedness it somehow suited the man and +the place.”</p> +<p>“The wind sighed softly in the branches of the +‘Tavau’ trees, from out the green recesses of the +‘Toi’ came the plaintive coo of the +wood-pigeon. In and out of the branches of the magnificent +‘Fau’ tree, which overhangs the grave, a king-fisher, +sea-blue, iridescent, flitted to and fro, whilst a scarlet +hibiscus, in full flower, showed up royally against the gray +lichened cement. All around was light and life and colour, +and I said to myself, ‘He is made one with nature’; +he is now, body and soul and spirit, commingled with the +loveliness around. He who longed in life to scale the +height, he who attained his wish only in death, has become in +himself a parable of fulfilment. No need now for that +heart-sick cry:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“‘Sing me a song of a lad that is +gone,<br /> +Say, could that lad be I?’</p> +</blockquote> +<p>No need now for the despairing finality of:</p> +<blockquote><p>“‘I have trod the upward and the +downward slope,<br /> +I have endured and done in the days of yore,<br /> +I have longed for all, and bid farewell to hope,<br /> +And I have lived, and loved, and closed the door.’</p> +<p>“Death has set his seal of peace on the unequal conflict +of mind and matter; the All-Mother has gathered him to +herself.</p> +<p>“In years to come, when his grave is perchance +forgotten, a rugged ruin, home of the lizard and the bat, +Tusitala—the story-teller—‘the man with a heart +of gold’ (as I so often heard him designated in the +Islands), will live, when it may be his tales have ceased to +interest, in the tender remembrance of those whose lives he +beautified, and whose hearts he warmed into gratitude.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The chiefs have prohibited the use of firearms or other +weapons on Mount Vaea, “in order that the birds may live +there undisturbed and unafraid, and build their nests in the +trees around Tusitala’s grave.”</p> +<p>Miss Stubbs has many records of the impression produced on +those he came in contact with in Samoa—white men and women +as well as natives. She met a certain Austrian Count, who +adored Stevenson’s memory. Over his camp bed was a +framed photograph of R. L. Stevenson.</p> +<blockquote><p>“So,” he said, “I keep him +there, for he was my saviour, and I wish ‘good-night’ +and ‘good-morning,’ every day, both to himself and to +his old home.” The Count then told us that when he +was stopping at Vailima he used to have his bath daily on the +verandah below his room. One lovely morning he got up very +early, got into the bath, and splashed and sang, feeling very +well and very happy, and at last beginning to sing very loudly, +he forgot Mr Stevenson altogether. All at once there was +Stevenson himself, his hair all ruffled up, his eyes full of +anger. “Man,” he said, “you and your +infernal row have cost me more than two hundred pounds in +ideas,” and with that he was gone, but he did not address +the Count again the whole of that day. Next morning he had +forgotten the Count’s offence and was just as friendly as +ever, but—the noise was never repeated!</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Another of the Count’s stories greatly amused the +visitors:</p> +<blockquote><p>“An English lord came all the way to Samoa +in his yacht to see Mr Stevenson, and found him in his cool +Kimino sitting with the ladies, and drinking tea on his verandah; +the whole party had their feet bare. The English lord +thought that he must have called at the wrong time, and offered +to go away, but Mr Stevenson called out to him, and brought him +back, and made him stay to dinner. They all went away to +dress, and the guest was left sitting alone in the +verandah. Soon they came back, Mr Osbourne and Mr Stevenson +wearing the form of dress most usual in that hot climate a white +mess jacket, and white trousers, but their feet were still +bare. The guest put up his eyeglass and stared for a bit, +then he looked down upon his own beautifully shod feet, and +sighed. They all talked and laughed until the ladies came +in, the ladies in silk dresses, befrilled with lace, but still +with bare feet, and the guest took a covert look through his +eyeglass and gasped, but when he noticed that there were gold +bangles on Mrs Strong’s ankles and rings upon her toes, he +could bear no more and dropped his eyeglass on the ground of the +verandah breaking it all to bits.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Miss Stubbs met on the other side of the island a photographer +who told her this:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I had but recently come to Samoa,” he +said, “and was standing one day in my shop when Mr +Stevenson came in and spoke. ‘Man,’ he said, +‘I tak ye to be a Scotsman like mysel’.’</p> +<p>“I would I could have claimed a kinship,” deplored +the photographer, “but, alas! I am English to the +backbone, with never a drop of Scotch blood in my veins, and I +told him this, regretting the absence of the blood +tie.”</p> +<p>“‘I could have sworn your back was the back of a +Scotsman,’ was his comment, ‘but,’ and he held +out his hand, ‘you look sick, and there is a fellowship in +sickness not to be denied.’ I said I was not strong, and +had come to the Island on account of my health. +‘Well, then,’ replied Mr Stevenson, ‘it shall +be my business to help you to get well; come to Vailima whenever +you like, and if I am out, ask for refreshment, and wait until I +come in, you will always find a welcome there.’”</p> +<p>At this point my informant turned away, and there was a break +in his voice as he exclaimed, “Ah, the years go on, and I +don’t miss him less, but more; next to my mother he was the +best friend I ever had: a man with a heart of gold; his house was +a second home to me.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Stevenson’s experience shows how easy it is with a +certain type of man, to restore the old feudal conditions of +service and relationship. Stevenson did this in essentials +in Samoa. He tells us how he managed to get good service +out of the Samoans (who are accredited with great unwillingness +to work); and this he <i>did</i> by firm, but generous, kindly, +almost brotherly treatment, reviving, as it were, a kind of clan +life—giving a livery of certain colours—symbol of all +this. A little fellow of eight, he tells, had been taken +into the household, made a pet of by Mrs Strong, his +stepdaughter, and had had a dress given to him, like that of the +men; and, when one day he had strolled down by himself as far as +the hotel, and the master of it, seeing him, called out in +Samoan, “Hi, youngster, who are you?” The +eight-year-old replied, “Why, don’t you see for +yourself? I am one of the Vailima men!”</p> +<p>The story of the <i>Road of the Loving Heart</i> was but +another fine attestation of it.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XII—HIS GENIUS AND METHODS</h2> +<p>To have created a school of idolaters, who will out and out +swear by everything, and as though by necessity, at the same +time, a school of studious detractors, who will suspiciously +question everything, or throw out suggestions of disparagement, +is at all events, a proof of greatness, the countersign of +undoubted genius, and an assurance of lasting fame. R. L. +Stevenson has certainly secured this. Time will tell what +of virtue there is with either party. For me, who knew +Stevenson, and loved him, as finding in the sweet-tempered, +brave, and in some things, most generous man, what gave at once +tone and elevation to the artist, I would fain indicate here my +impressions of him and his genius—impressions that remain +almost wholly uninfluenced by the vast mass of matter about him +that the press now turns out. Books, not to speak of +articles, pour forth about him—about his style, his art, +his humour and his characters—aye, and even about his +religion.</p> +<p>Miss Simpson follows Mr Bellyse Baildon with the <i>Edinburgh +Days</i>, Miss Moyes Black comes on with her picture in the +<i>Famous Scots</i>, and Professor Raleigh succeeds her; Mr +Graham Balfour follows with his<i> Life</i>; Mr Kelman’s +volume about his Religion comes next, and that is reinforced by +more familiar letters and <i>Table Talk</i>, by Lloyd Osbourne +and Mrs Strong, his step-children; Mr J. Hammerton then comes on +handily with <i>Stevensoniana</i>—fruit lovingly gathered +from many and far fields, and garnered with not a little tact and +taste, and catholicity; Miss Laura Stubbs then presents us with +her touching <i>Stevenson’s Shrine</i>: <i>the Record of a +Pilgrimage</i>; and Mr Sidney Colvin is now busily at work on his +<i>Life of Stevenson</i>, which must do not a little to enlighten +and to settle many questions.</p> +<p>Curiosity and interest grow as time passes; and the places +connected with Stevenson, hitherto obscure many of them, are now +touched with light if not with romance, and are known, by name at +all events, to every reader of books. Yes; every place he +lived in, or touched at, is worthy of full description if only on +account of its associations with him. If there is not a +land of Stevenson, as there is a land of Scott, or of Burns, it +is due to the fact that he was far-travelled, and in his works +painted many scenes: but there are at home—Edinburgh, and +Halkerside and Allermuir, Caerketton, Swanston, and Colinton, and +Maw Moss and Rullion Green and Tummel, “the <i>wale</i> of +Scotland,” as he named it to me, and the Castletown of +Braemar—Braemar in his view coming a good second to Tummel, +for starting-points to any curious worshipper who would go the +round in Scotland and miss nothing. Mr Geddie’s work +on <i>The Home Country of Stevenson</i> may be found very helpful +here.</p> +<p>1. It is impossible to separate Stevenson from his work, +because of the imperious personal element in it; and so I shall +not now strive to gain the appearance of cleverness by affecting +any distinction here. The first thing I would say is, that +he was when I knew him—what pretty much to the end he +remained—a youth. His outlook on life was boyishly +genial and free, despite all his sufferings from +ill-health—it was the pride of action, the joy of +endurance, the revelry of high spirits, and the sense of victory +that most fascinated him; and his theory of life was to take +pleasure and give pleasure, without calculation or stint—a +kind of boyish grace and bounty never to be overcome or disturbed +by outer accident or change. If he was sometimes haunted +with the thought of changes through changed conditions or +circumstances, as my very old friend, Mr Charles Lowe, has told +even of the College days that he was always supposing things to +undergo some sea-change into something else, if not “into +something rich and strange,” this was but to add to his +sense of enjoyment, and the power of conferring delight, and the +luxuries of variety, as boys do when they let fancy loose. +And this always had, with him, an individual reference or +return. He was thus constantly, and latterly, +half-consciously, trying to interpret himself somehow through all +the things which engaged him, and which he so +transmogrified—things that especially attracted him and +took his fancy. Thus, if it must be confessed, that even in +his highest moments, there lingers a touch—if no more than +a touch—of self-consciousness which will not allow him to +forget manner in matter, it is also true that he is cunningly +conveying traits in himself; and the sense of this is often at +the root of his sweet, gentle, naïve humour. There is, +therefore, some truth in the criticisms which assert that even +“long John Silver,” that fine pirate, with his one +leg, was, after all, a shadow of Stevenson himself—the +genial buccaneer who did his tremendous murdering with a smile on +his face was but Stevenson thrown into new circumstances, or, as +one has said, Stevenson-cum-Henley, so thrown as was also Archer +in <i>Weir of Hermiston</i>, and more than this, that his most +successful women-folk—like Miss Grant and +Catriona—are studies of himself, and that in all his +heroes, and even heroines, was an unmistakable touch of R. L. +Stevenson. Even Mr Baildon rather maladroitly admits that +in Miss Grant, the Lord Advocate’s daughter, <i>there is a +good deal of the author himself disguised in +petticoats</i>. I have thought of Stevenson in many suits, +beside that which included the velvet jacket, +but—petticoats!</p> +<p>Youth is autocratic, and can show a grand indifferency: it +goes for what it likes, and ignores all else—it fondly +magnifies its favourites, and, after all, to a great extent, it +is but analysing, dealing with and presenting itself to us, if we +only watch well. This is the secret of all prevailing +romance: it is the secret of all stories of adventure and +chivalry of the simpler and more primitive order; and in one +aspect it is true that R. L. Stevenson loved and clung to the +primitive and elemental, if it may not be said, as one +distinguished writer has said, that he even loved savagery in +itself. But hardly could it be seriously held, as Mr I. +Zangwill held:</p> +<blockquote><p>“That women did not cut any figure in his +books springs from this same interest in the elemental. +Women are not born, but made. They are a social product of +infinite complexity and delicacy. For a like reason +Stevenson was no interpreter of the modern. . . . A child to the +end, always playing at ‘make-believe,’ dying young, +as those whom the gods love, and, as he would have died had he +achieved his centenary, he was the natural exponent in literature +of the child.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But there were subtly qualifying elements beyond what Mr +Zangwill here recognises and reinforces. That is just about +as correct and true as this other deliverance:</p> +<blockquote><p>“His Scotch romances have been as +over-praised by the zealous Scotsmen who cry ‘genius’ +at the sight of a kilt, and who lose their heads at a waft from +the heather, as his other books have been under-praised. +The best of all, <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i>, ends in a bog; +and where the author aspires to exceptional subtlety of +character-drawing he befogs us or himself altogether. We +are so long weighing the brothers Ballantrae in the balance, +watching it incline now this way, now that, scrupulously removing +a particle of our sympathy from the one brother to the other, to +restore it again in the next chapter, that we end with a +conception of them as confusing as Mr Gilbert’s conception +of Hamlet, who was idiotically sane with lucid intervals of +lunacy.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If Stevenson was, as Mr Zangwill holds, “the child to +the end,” and the child only, then if we may not say what +Carlyle said of De Quincey: “<i>Eccovi</i>, that child has +been in hell,” we may say, “<i>Eccovi</i>, that child +has been in unchildlike haunts, and can’t forget the memory +of them.” In a sense every romancer is a +child—such was Ludwig Tieck, such was Scott, such was James +Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd. But each is something +more—he has been touched with the wand of a fairy, and +knows, at least, some of Elfin Land as well as of +childhood’s home.</p> +<p>The sense of Stevenson’s youthfulness seems to have +struck every one who had intimacy with him. Mr Baildon +writes (p. 21 of his book):</p> +<blockquote><p>I would now give much to possess but one of +Stevenson’s gifts—namely, that extraordinary +vividness of recollection by which he could so astonishingly +recall, not only the doings, but the very thoughts and emotions +of his youth. For, often as we must have communed together, +with all the shameless candour of boys, hardly any remark has +stuck to me except the opinion already alluded to, which struck +me—his elder by some fifteen months—as very amusing, +that at sixteen ‘we should be men.’ <i>He of +all mortals</i>, <i>who was</i>, <i>in a sense</i>, <i>always +still a boy</i>!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Gosse tells us:</p> +<blockquote><p>“He had retained a great deal of the +temperament of a child, and it was his philosophy to encourage +it. In his dreary passages of bed, when his illness was +more than commonly heavy on him, he used to contrive little +amusements for himself. He played on the flute, or he +modelled little groups and figures in clay.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>2. One of the qualifying elements unnoted by Mr Zangwill is +simply this, that R. L. Stevenson never lost the strange tint +imparted to his youth by the religious influences to which he was +subject, and which left their impress and colour on him and all +that he did. Henley, in his striking sonnet, hit it when he +wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“A deal of Ariel, just a streak of Puck,<br +/> +Much Antony, of Hamlet most of all,<br /> +<i>And something of the Shorter Catechist</i>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p><i>Something</i>! he was a great deal of Shorter +Catechist! Scotch Calvinism, its metaphysic, and all the +strange whims, perversities, and questionings of “Fate, +free-will, foreknowledge absolute,” which it inevitably +awakens, was much with him—the sense of reprobation and the +gloom born of it, as well as the abounding joy in the sense of +the elect—the Covenanters and their wild resolutions, the +moss-troopers and their dare-devilries—Pentland Risings and +fights of Rullion Green; he not only never forgot them, but they +mixed themselves as in his very breath of life, and made him a +great questioner. How would I have borne myself in this or +in that? Supposing I had been there, how would it have +been—the same, or different from what it was with those +that were there? His work is throughout at bottom a series +of problems that almost all trace to this root, directly or +indirectly. “There, but for the grace of God, goes +John Bradford,” said the famous Puritan on seeing a felon +led to execution; so with Stevenson. Hence his fondness for +tramps, for scamps (he even bestowed special attention and pains +on Villon, the poet-scamp); he was rather impatient with poor +Thoreau, because he was a purist solitary, and had too little of +vice, and, as Stevenson held, narrow in sympathy, and too +self-satisfied, and bent only on self-improvement. He held +a brief for the honest villain, and leaned to him +brotherly. Even the anecdotes he most prizes have a fine +look this way—a hunger for completion in achievement, even +in the violation of fine humane feeling or morality, and all the +time a sense of submission to God’s will. +“Doctor,” said the dying gravedigger in <i>Old +Mortality</i>, “I hae laid three hunner an’ fower +score in that kirkyaird, an’ had it been His wull,” +indicating Heaven, “I wad hae likeit weel to hae made oot +the fower hunner.” That took Stevenson. Listen +to what Mr Edmond Gosse tells of his talk, when he found him in a +private hotel in Finsbury Circus, London, ready to be put on +board a steamer for America, on 21st August, 1887:</p> +<blockquote><p>“It was church time, and there was some talk +of my witnessing his will, which I could not do because there +could be found no other reputable witness, the whole crew of the +hotel being at church. ‘This,’ he said, +‘is the way in which our valuable city hotels—packed +no doubt with gems and jewellery—are deserted on a Sunday +morning. Some bold piratical fellow, defying the spirit of +Sabbatarianism, might make a handsome revenue by sacking the +derelict hotels between the hours of ten and twelve. One +hotel a week would enable such a man to retire in course of a +year. A mask might perhaps be worn for the mere fancy of +the thing, and to terrify kitchen-maids, but no real disguise +would be needful.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I would rather agree with Mr Chesterton than with Mr Zangwill +here:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Stevenson’s enormous capacity for joy +flowed directly out of his profoundly religious +temperament. He conceived himself as an unimportant guest +at one eternal and uproarious banquet, and instead of grumbling +at the soup, he accepted it with careless gratitude. . . . His +gaiety was neither the gaiety of the pagan, nor the gaiety of the +<i>bon vivant</i>. It was the greater gaiety of the +mystic. He could enjoy trifles because there was to him no +such thing as a trifle. He was a child who respected his +dolls because they were the images of the image of God, portraits +at only two removes.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here, then, we have the child crossed by the dreamer and the +mystic, bred of Calvinism and speculation on human fate and +chance, and on the mystery of temperament and inheritance, and +all that flows from these—reprobation, with its dire +shadows, assured Election with its joys, etc., etc.</p> +<p>3. If such a combination is in favour of the story-teller up +to a certain point, it is not favourable to the highest flights, +and it is alien to dramatic presentation pure and simple. +This implies detachment from moods and characters, high as well +as low, that complete justice in presentation may be done to all +alike, and the one balance that obtains in life grasped and +repeated with emphasis. But towards his leading characters +Stevenson is unconsciously biassed, because they are more or less +shadowy projections of himself, or images through which he would +reveal one or other side or aspect of his own personality. +Attwater is a confessed failure, because it, more than any other, +testifies this: he is but a mouth-piece for one side or tendency +in Stevenson. If the same thing is not more decisively felt +in some other cases, it is because Stevenson there showed the +better art o’ hidin’, and not because he was any more +truly detached or dramatic. “Of Hamlet most of +all,” wrote Henley in his sonnet. The Hamlet in +Stevenson—the self-questioning, egotistic, moralising +Hamlet—was, and to the end remained, a something alien to +bold, dramatic, creative freedom. He is great as an artist, +as a man bent on giving to all that he did the best and most +distinguished form possible, but not great as a free creator of +dramatic power. “Mother,” he said as a mere +child, “I’ve drawed a man. Now, will I draw his +soul?” He was to the end all too fond to essay a +picture of the soul, separate and peculiar. All the Jekyll +and Hyde and even Ballantrae conceptions came out of +that—and what is more, he always mixed his own soul with +the other soul, and could not help doing so.</p> +<p>4. When; therefore, I find Mr Pinero, in lecturing at +Edinburgh, deciding in favour of Stevenson as possessed of rare +dramatic power, and wondering why he did not more effectively +employ it, I can’t agree with him; and this because of the +presence of a certain atmosphere in the novels, alien to free +play of the individualities presented. Like +Hawthorne’s, like the works of our great symbolists, they +are restricted by a sense of some obtaining conception, some +weird metaphysical <i>weird</i> or preconception. This is +the ground “Ian MacLaren” has for saying that +“his kinship is not with Boccaccio and Rabelais, but with +Dante and Spenser”—the ground for many remarks by +critics to the effect that they still crave from him “less +symbol and more individuality”—the ground for the +Rev. W. J. Dawson’s remark that “he has a powerful +and persistent sense of the spiritual forces which move behind +the painted shows of life; that he writes not only as a realist +but as a prophet, his meanest stage being set with eternity as a +background.”</p> +<p>Such expressions are fullest justification for what we have +here said: it adds, and can only add, to our admiration of +Stevenson, as a thinker, seer, or mystic, but the asserting sense +of such power can only end in lessening the height to which he +could attain as a dramatic artist; and there is much indeed +against Mr Pinero’s own view that, in the dramas, he finds +that “fine speeches” are ruinous to them as acting +plays. In the strict sense overfine speeches are yet almost +everywhere. David Balfour could never have writ some +speeches attributed to him—they are just R. L. Stevenson +with a very superficial difference that, when once detected, +renders them curious and quaint and interesting, but not +dramatic.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIII—PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST</h2> +<p>In reality, Stevenson is always directly or indirectly +preaching a sermon—enforcing a moral—as though he +could not help it. “He would rise from the dead to +preach a sermon.” He wrote some first-rate fables, +and might indeed have figured to effect as a moralist-fabulist, +as truly he was from beginning to end. There was a bit of +Bunyan in him as well as of Æsop and Rousseau and +Thoreau—the mixture that found coherency in his most +peculiarly patient and forbearing temper is what gives at once +the quaintness, the freedom, and yet the odd didactic something +that is never wanting. I remember a fable about the Devil +that might well be brought in to illustrate this +here—careful readers who neglect nothing that Stevenson +wrote will remember it also and perhaps bear me out here.</p> +<p>But for the sake of the young folks who may yet have some +leeway to make up, I shall indulge myself a little by quoting it: +and, since I am on that tack, follow it by another which presents +Stevenson in his favourite guise of quizzing his own characters, +if not for his own advantage certainly for ours, if we would in +the least understand the fine moralist-casuistical qualities of +his mind and fancy:</p> +<blockquote><p>THE DEVIL AND THE INNKEEPER</p> +<p>Once upon a time the devil stayed at an inn, where no one knew +him, for they were people whose education had been +neglected. He was bent on mischief, and for a time kept +everybody by the ears. But at last the innkeeper set a +watch upon the devil and took him in the act.</p> +<p>The innkeeper got a rope’s end.</p> +<p>“Now I am going to thrash you,” said the +inn-keeper.</p> +<p>“You have no right to be angry with me,” said the +devil. “I am only the devil, and it is my nature to +do wrong.”</p> +<p>“Is that so?” asked the innkeeper.</p> +<p>“Fact, I assure you,” said the devil.</p> +<p>“You really cannot help doing ill?” asked the +innkeeper.</p> +<p>“Not in the smallest,” said the devil, “it +would be useless cruelty to thrash a thing like me.”</p> +<p>“It would indeed,” said the innkeeper.</p> +<p>And he made a noose and hanged the devil.</p> +<p>“There!” said the innkeeper.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The deeper Stevenson goes, the more happily is he +inspired. We could scarcely cite anything more +Stevensonian, alike in its humour and its philosophy, than the +dialogue between Captain Smollett and Long John Silver, entitled +<i>The Persons of the Tale</i>. After chapter xxxii. of +<i>Treasure Island</i>, these two puppets “strolled out to +have a pipe before business should begin again, and met in an +open space not far from the story.” After a few +preliminaries:</p> +<blockquote><p>“You’re a damned rogue, my man,” +said the Captain.</p> +<p>“Come, come, Cap’n, be just,” returned the +other. “There’s no call to be angry with me in +earnest. I’m on’y a character in a sea +story. I don’t really exist.”</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t really exist either,” says +the Captain, “which seems to meet that.”</p> +<p>“I wouldn’t set no limits to what a virtuous +character might consider argument,” responded Silver. +“But I’m the villain of the tale, I am; and speaking +as one seafaring man to another, what I want to know is, +what’s the odds?”</p> +<p>“Were you never taught your catechism?” said the +Captain. “Don’t you know there’s such a +thing as an Author?”</p> +<p>“Such a thing as a Author?” returned John, +derisively. “And who better’n me? And the +p’int is, if the Author made you, he made Long John, and he +made Hands, and Pew, and George Merry—not that George is up +to much, for he’s little more’n a name; and he made +Flint, what there is of him; and he made this here mutiny, you +keep such a work about; and he had Tom Redruth shot; +and—well, if that’s a Author, give me Pew!”</p> +<p>“Don’t you believe in a future state?” said +Smollett. “Do you think there’s nothing but the +present sorty-paper?”</p> +<p>“I don’t rightly know for that,” said +Silver, “and I don’t see what it’s got to do +with it, anyway. What I know is this: if there is sich a +thing as a Author, I’m his favourite chara’ter. +He does me fathoms better’n he does you—fathoms, he +does. And he likes doing me. He keeps me on deck +mostly all the time, crutch and all; and he leaves you measling +in the hold, where nobody can’t see you, nor wants to, and +you may lay to that! If there is a Author, by thunder, but +he’s on my side, and you may lay to it!”</p> +<p>“I see he’s giving you a long rope,” said +the Captain. . . .</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Stevenson’s stories—one and all—are too +closely the illustrations by characters of which his essays +furnish the texts. You shall not read the one wholly apart +from the other without losing something—without losing much +of the quaint, often childish, and always insinuating personality +of the writer. It is this if fully perceived which would +justify one writer, Mr Zangwill, if I don’t forget, in +saying, as he did say, that Stevenson would hold his place by his +essays and not by his novels. Hence there is a unity in +all, but a unity found in a root which is ultimately inimical to +what is strictly free dramatic creation—creation, broad, +natural and unmoral in the highest sense just as nature is, as it +is to us, for example, when we speak of Shakespeare, or even +Scott, or of Cervantes or Fielding. If Mr Henley in his +irruptive if not spiteful <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i> article had +made this clear from the high critical ground, then some of his +derogatory remarks would not have been quite so personal and +offensive as they are.</p> +<p>Stevenson’s bohemianism was always restrained and +coloured by this. He is a casuistic moralist, if not a +Shorter Catechist, as Mr Henley put it in his clever +sonnet. He is constantly asking himself about moral laws +and how they work themselves out in character, especially as +these suggest and involve the casuistries of human nature. +He is often a little like Nathaniel Hawthorne, but he hardly +follows them far enough and rests on his own preconceptions and +predilections, only he does not, like him, get into or remain +long in the cobwebby corners—his love of the open air and +exercise derived from generations of active lighthouse engineers, +out at all times on sea or land, or from Scottish ministers who +were fond of composing their sermons and reflecting on the +backwardness of human nature as they walked in their gardens or +along the hillsides even among mists and storms, did something to +save him here, reinforcing natural cheerfulness and the warm +desire to give pleasure. His excessive elaboration of +style, which grew upon him more and more, giving throughout often +a sense of extreme artificiality and of the self-consciousness +usually bred of it, is but another incidental proof of +this. And let no reader think that I wish here to decry R. +L. Stevenson. I only desire faithfully to try to understand +him, and to indicate the class or group to which his genius and +temperament really belong. He is from first to last the +idealistic dreamy or mystical romancer, and not the true idealist +or dealer direct with life or character for its own sake. +The very beauty and sweetness of his spirit in one way militated +against his dramatic success—he really did not believe in +villains, and always made them better than they should have been, +and that, too, on the very side where wickedness—their +natural wickedness—is most available—on the +stage. The dreamer of dreams and the Shorter Catechist, +strangely united together, were here directly at odds with the +creative power, and crossed and misdirected it, and the casuist +came in and manoeuvred the limelight—all too like the old +devil of the mediaeval drama, who was made only to be laughed at +and taken lightly, a buffoon and a laughing-stock indeed. +And while he could unveil villainy, as is the case pre-eminently +in Huish in the <i>Ebb-Tide</i>, he shrank from inflicting the +punishments for which untutored human nature looks, and thus he +lost one great aid to crude dramatic effect. As to his +poems, they are intimately personal in his happiest moments: he +deals with separate moods and sentiments, and scarcely ever +touches those of a type alien to his own. The defect of his +child poems is distinctly that he is everywhere strictly +recalling and reproducing his own quaint and wholly exceptional +childhood; and children, ordinary, normal, healthy children, will +not take to these poems (though grown-ups largely do so), as they +would to, say, the <i>Lilliput Levée</i> of my old friend, +W. B. Rands. Rands showed a great deal of true dramatic +play there within his own very narrow limits, as, at all events, +adults must conceive them.</p> +<p>Even in his greatest works, in <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i> +and <i>Weir of Hermiston</i>, the special power in Stevenson +really lies in subduing his characters at the most critical point +for action, to make them prove or sustain his thesis; and in this +way the rare effect that he might have secured +<i>dramatically</i> is largely lost and make-believe substituted, +as in the Treasure Search in the end of <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>. The powerful dramatic effect he might have +had in his <i>dénouement</i> is thus completely +sacrificed. The essence of the drama for the stage is that +the work is for this and this alone—dialogue and everything +being only worked rightly when it bears on, aids, and finally +secures this in happy completeness.</p> +<p>In a word, you always, in view of true dramatic effect, see +Stevenson himself too clearly behind his characters. The +“fine speeches” Mr Pinero referred to trace to the +intrusion behind the glass of a part-quicksilvered portion, which +cunningly shows, when the glass is moved about, Stevenson himself +behind the character, as we have said already. For long he +shied dealing with women, as though by a true instinct. +Unfortunately for him his image was as clear behind +<i>Catriona</i>, with the discerning, as anywhere else; and this, +alas! too far undid her as an independent, individual character, +though traits like those in her author were attractive. The +constant effort to relieve the sense of this affords him the most +admirable openings for the display of his exquisite style, of +which he seldom or never fails to make the very most in this +regard; but the necessity laid upon him to aim at securing a +sense of relief by this is precisely the same as led him to write +the overfine speeches in the plays, as Mr Pinero found and +pointed out at Edinburgh: both defeat the true end, but in the +written book mere art of style and a naïvete and a certain +sweetness of temper conceal the lack of nature and creative +spontaneity; while on the stage the descriptions, saving +reflections and fine asides, are ruthlessly cut away under sheer +stage necessities, or, if left, but hinder the action; and art of +this kind does not there suffice to conceal the lack of +nature.</p> +<p>More clearly to bring out my meaning here and draw aid from +comparative illustration, let me take my old friend of many +years, Charles Gibbon. Gibbon was poor, very poor, in +intellectual subtlety compared with Stevenson; he had none of his +sweet, quaint, original fancy; he was no casuist; he was utterly +void of power in the subdued humorous twinkle or genial by-play +in which Stevenson excelled. But he has more of dramatic +power, pure and simple, than Stevenson had—his +novels—the best of them—would far more easily yield +themselves to the ordinary purposes of the ordinary +playwright. Along with conscientiousness, perception, +penetration, with the dramatist must go a certain indescribable +common-sense commonplaceness—if I may name it +so—protection against vagary and that over-refined egotism +and self-confession which is inimical to the drama and in which +the Stevensonian type all too largely abounds for successful +dramatic production. Mr Henley perhaps put it too strongly +when he said that what was supremely of interest to R. L. +Stevenson was Stevenson himself; but he indicates the tendency, +and that tendency is inimical to strong, broad, effective and +varied dramatic presentation. Water cannot rise above its +own level; nor can minds of this type go freely out of themselves +in a grandly healthy, unconscious, and unaffected way, and this +is the secret of the dramatic spirit, if it be not, as Shelley +said, the secret of morals, which Stevenson, when he passed away, +was but on the way to attain. As we shall see, he had risen +so far above it, subdued it, triumphed over it, that we really +cannot guess what he might have attained had but more years been +given him. For the last attainment of the loftiest and +truest genius is precisely this—to gain such insight of the +real that all else becomes subsidiary. True simplicity and +the abiding relief and enduring power of true art with all +classes lies here and not elsewhere. Cleverness, +refinement, fancy, and invention, even sublety of intellect, are +practically nowhere in this sphere without this.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIV—STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST</h2> +<p>In opposition to Mr Pinero, therefore, I assert that +Stevenson’s defect in spontaneous dramatic presentation is +seen clearly in his novels as well as in his plays proper.</p> +<p>In writing to my good friend, Mr Thomas M’Kie, Advocate, +Edinburgh, telling him of my work on R. L. Stevenson and the +results, I thus gathered up in little the broad reflections on +this point, and I may perhaps be excused quoting the following +passages, as they reinforce by a new reference or illustration or +two what has just been said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Considering his great keenness and force on +some sides, I find R. L. Stevenson markedly deficient in grip on +other sides—common sides, after all, of human nature. +This was so far largely due to a dreamy, mystical, so far +perverted and, so to say, often even inverted casuistical, +fatalistic morality, which would not allow him scope in what +Carlyle would have called a healthy hatred of fools and +scoundrels; with both of which classes—vagabonds in +strictness—he had rather too much of a sneaking +sympathy. Mr Pinero was wrong—totally and +incomprehensibly wrong—when he told the good folks of +Edinburgh at the Philosophical Institution, and afterwards at the +London Birkbeck Institution, that it was lack of concentration +and care that made R. L. Stevenson a failure as a +dramatist. No: it was here and not elsewhere that the +failure lay. R. L. Stevenson was himself an unconscious +paradox—and sometimes he realised it—his great +weakness from this point of view being that he wished to show +strong and original by making the villain the hero of the piece +as well. Now, <i>that</i>, if it may, by clever +manipulation and dexterity, be made to do in a novel, most +certainly it will not do on the stage—more especially if it +is done consciously and, as it were, of <i>malice prepense</i>; +because, for one thing, there is in the theatre a very varied yet +united audience which has to give a simultaneous and immediate +verdict—an audience not inclined to some kinds of +overwrought subtleties and casuistries, however clever the +technique. If <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i> (which has +some highly dramatic scenes and situations, if it is not in +itself substantially a drama) were to be put on the stage, the +playwright, if wisely determined for success, would really +have—not in details, but in essential conception—to +kick R. L. Stevenson in his most personal aim out of it, and take +and present a more definite moral view of the two villain-heroes +(brothers, too); improve and elevate the one a bit if he lowered +the other, and not wobble in sympathy and try to make the +audience wobble in sympathy also, as R. L. Stevenson certainly +does. As for <i>Beau Austin</i>, it most emphatically, in +view of this, should be re-writ—re-writ especially towards +the ending—and the scandalous Beau tarred and feathered, +metaphorically speaking, instead of walking off at the end in a +sneaking, mincing sort of way, with no more than a little +momentary twinge of discomfort at the wreck and ruin he has +wrought, for having acted as a selfish, snivelling poltroon and +coward, though in fine clothes and with fine ways and fine +manners, which only, from our point of view, make matters +worse. It is, with variations I admit, much the same all +through: R. L. Stevenson felt it and confessed it about the +<i>Ebb-Tide</i>, and Huish, the cockney hero and villain; but the +sense of healthy disgust, even at the vile Huish, is not +emphasised in the book as it would have demanded to be for the +stage—the audience would not have stood it, and the more +mixed and varied, the less would it have stood it—not at +all; and his relief of style and fine or finished speeches would +not <i>there</i> in the least have told. This is demanded +of the drama—that at once it satisfies a certain crude +something subsisting under all outward glosses and veneers that +might be in some a lively sense of right and wrong—the +uprisal of a conscience, in fact, or in others a vague instinct +of proper reward or punishment, which will even cover and +sanction certain kinds of revenge or retaliation. The one +feeling will emerge most among the cultured, and the other among +the ruder and more ignorant; but both meet immediately on +beholding action and the limits of action on the demand for some +clear leading to what may be called Providential +equity—each man undoubtedly rewarded or punished, roughly, +according to his deserts, if not outwardly then certainly in the +inner torments that so often lead to confessions. There it +is—a radical fact of human nature—as radical as any +reading of trait or determination of character +presented—seen in the Greek drama as well as in Shakespeare +and the great Elizabethan dramatists, and in the +drama-transpontine and others of to-day. R. L. Stevenson +was all too casuistical (though not in the exclusively bad sense) +for this; and so he was not dramatic, though <i>Weir of +Hermiston</i> promised something like an advance to it, and <i>St +Ives</i> did, in my idea, yet more.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The one essential of a <i>dramatic</i> piece is that, by the +interaction of character and incident (one or other may be +preponderating, according to the type and intention of the +writer) all naturally leads up to a crisis in which the moral +motives, appealed to or awakened by the presentation of the play, +are justified. Where this is wanting the true leading and +the definite justification are wanting. Goethe failed in +this in his <i>Faust</i>, resourceful and far-seeing though he +was—he failed because a certain sympathy is awakened for +Mephistopheles in being, so to say, chivied out of his bargain, +when he had complied with the terms of the contract by Faust; and +Gounod in his opera does exactly for “immediate dramatic +effect,” what we hold it would be necessary to do for R. L. +Stevenson. Goethe, with his casuistries which led him to +allegory and all manner of overdone symbolisms and perversions in +the Second Part, is set aside and a true crisis and close is +found by Gounod through simply sending Marguerite above and Faust +below, as, indeed, Faust had agreed by solemn compact with +Mephistopheles that it should be. And to come to another +illustration from our own times, Mr Bernard Shaw’s very +clever and all too ingenious and over-subtle <i>Man and +Superman</i> would, in my idea, and for much the same reason, be +an utterly ineffective and weak piece on the stage, however +carefully handled and however clever the setting—the reason +lying in the egotistic upsetting of the “personal +equation” and the theory of life that lies behind +all—tinting it with strange and even <i>outré</i> +colours. Much the same has to be said of most of what are +problem-plays—several of Ibsen’s among the rest.</p> +<p>Those who remember the Fairy opera of <i>Hansel and Gretel</i> +on the stage in London, will not have forgotten in the witching +memory of all the charms of scenery and setting, how the scene +where the witch of the wood, who was planning out the baking of +the little hero and heroine in her oven, having +“fatted” them up well, to make sweet her eating of +them, was by the coolness and cleverness of the heroine locked in +her own oven and baked there, literally brought down the +house. She received exactly what she had planned to give +those children, whom their own cruel parents had unwittingly, by +losing the children in the wood, put into her hands. +Quaint, naïve, half-grotesque it was in conception, yet the +truth of all drama was there actively exhibited, and all +casuistic pleading of excuses of some sort, even of justification +for the witch (that it was her nature; heredity in her aworking, +etc., etc.) would have not only been out of place, but hotly +resented by that audience. Now, Stevenson, if he could have +made up his mind to have the witch locked in her own oven, would +most assuredly have tried some device to get her out by some +fairy witch-device or magic slide at the far end of it, and have +proceeded to paint for us the changed character that she was +after she had been so outwitted by a child, and her witchdom +proved after all of little effect. He would have put +probably some of the most effective moralities into her mouth if +indeed he would not after all have made the witch a triumph on +his early principle of bad-heartedness being strength. If +this is the sort of falsification which the play demands, and is +of all tastes the most ungrateful, then, it is clear, that for +full effect of the drama it is essential to it; but what is +primary in it is the direct answering to certain immediate and +instinctive demands in common human nature, the doing of which is +far more effective than no end of deep philosophy to show how +much better human nature would be if it were not just quite thus +constituted. “Concentration,” says Mr Pinero, +“is first, second, and last in it,” and he goes on +thus, as reported in the <i>Scotsman</i>, to show +Stevenson’s defect and mistake and, as is not, of course, +unnatural, to magnify the greatness and grandeur of the style of +work in which he has himself been so successful.</p> +<blockquote><p>“If Stevenson had ever mastered that +art—and I do not question that if he had properly conceived +it he had it in him to master it—he might have found the +stage a gold mine, but he would have found, too, that it is a +gold mine which cannot be worked in a smiling, sportive, +half-contemptuous spirit, but only in the sweat of the brain, and +with every mental nerve and sinew strained to its +uttermost. He would have known that no ingots are to be got +out of this mine, save after sleepless nights, days of gloom and +discouragement, and other days, again, of feverish toil, the +result of which proves in the end to be misapplied and has to be +thrown to the winds. . . . When you take up a play-book (if ever +you do take one up) it strikes you as being a very trifling +thing—a mere insubstantial pamphlet beside the imposing +bulk of the latest six-shilling novel. Little do you guess +that every page of the play has cost more care, severer mental +tension, if not more actual manual labour, than any chapter of a +novel, though it be fifty pages long. It is the height of +the author’s art, according to the old maxim, that the +ordinary spectator should never be clearly conscious of the skill +and travail that have gone to the making of the finished +product. But the artist who would achieve a like feat must +realise its difficulties, or what are his chances of +success?”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But what I should, in little, be inclined to say, in answer to +the “concentration” idea is that, unless you have +first some firm hold on the broad bed-rock facts of human nature +specially appealed to or called forth by the drama, you may +concentrate as much as you please, but you will not write a +successful acting drama, not to speak of a great one. Mr +Pinero’s magnifications of the immense effort demanded from +him must in the end come to mean that he himself does not +instinctively and with natural ease and spontaneity secure this, +but secures it only after great conscious effort; and hence, +perhaps, it is that he as well as so many other modern +playwrights fall so far behind alike in the amount turned out, +and also in its quality as compared with the products of many +playwrights in the past.</p> +<p>The problem drama, in every phase and turn of it, endeavours +to dispense with these fundamental demands implied in the common +and instinctive sense or consciousness of the mass of men and +women, and to substitute for that interest something which will +artificially supersede it, or, at any rate, take its place. +The interest is transferred from the crises necessarily worked up +to in the one case, with all of situation and dialogue directed +to it, and without which it would not be strictly explicable, to +something abnormal, odd, artificial or inverted, or exceptional +in the characters themselves. Having thus, instead of +natural process and sequence, if we may put it so, the problem +dramatist has a double task—he must gain what unity he can, +and reach such crises as he may by artificial aids and inventions +which the more he uses the more makes natural simplicity +unattainable; and next he must reduce and hide as far as he can +the abnormality he has, after all, in the long run, created and +presented. He cannot maintain it to the full, else his work +would become a mere medical or psychological treatise under the +poorest of disguises; and the very necessity for the action and +reaction of characters upon each other is a further element +against him. In a word no one character can stand alone, +and cannot escape influencing others, and also the action. +Thus it is that he cannot isolate as a doctor does his patient +for scientific examination. The healthy and normal must +come in to modify on all sides what is presented of unhealthy and +abnormal, and by its very presence expose the other, while at the +same time it, by its very presence, ministers improvement, +exactly as the sunlight disperses mist and all unhealthy vapours, +germs, and microbes.</p> +<p>The problem dramatist, in place of broad effect and truth to +nature, must find it in stress of invention and resource of that +kind. Thus care and concentration must be all in all with +him—he must never let himself go, or get so interested and +taken with his characters that <i>they</i>, in a sense, control +or direct him. He is all too conscious a +“maker” and must pay for his originality by what in +the end is really painful and overweighted work. This, I +take it, is the reason why so many of the modern dramatists find +their work so hard, and are, comparatively, so slow in the +production of it, while they would fain, by many devices, secure +the general impression or appeal made to all classes alike by the +natural or what we may call spontaneous drama, they are yet, by +the necessity of subject matter and methods of dealing with it, +limited to the real interest of a special class—to whom is +finally given up what was meant for mankind—and the +troublesome and trying task laid on them, to try as best they may +to reconcile two really conflicting tendencies which cannot even +by art be reconciled but really point different ways and tend to +different ends. As the impressionist and the +pre-Raphaelite, in the sister-art of painting cannot be combined +and reconciled in one painter—so it is here; by conception +and methods they go different ways, and if they <i>seek</i> the +same end, it is by opposing processes—the original +conception alike of nature and of art dictating the process.</p> +<p>As for Stevenson, it was no lack of care or concentration in +anything that he touched; these two were never lacking, but +because his subtlety, mystical bias and dreaminess, and +theorising on human nature made this to him impossible. He +might have concentrated as much as he pleased, concentrated as +much as even Mr Pinero desires, but he would not have made a +successful drama, because he was Robert Louis Stevenson, and not +Mr Pinero, and too long, as he himself confessed, had a tendency +to think bad-heartedness was strength; while the only true and +enduring joy attainable in this world—whether by deduction +from life itself, or from <i>impressions</i> of art or of the +drama, is simply the steady, unassailable, and triumphant +consciousness that it is not so, but the reverse, that goodness +and self-sacrifice and self-surrender are the only strength in +the universe. Just as Byron had it with +patriotism:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Freedom’s battle once begun,<br /> +Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son,<br /> +Tho’ baffled oft is ever won.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>To go consciously either in fiction or in the drama for +bad-heartedness as strength, is to court failure—the broad, +healthy, human heart, thank Heaven, is so made as to resent the +doctrine; and if a fiction or a play based on this idea for the +moment succeeds, it can only be because of strength in other +elements, or because of partial blindness and partially paralysed +moral sense in the case of those who accept it and joy in +it. If Mr Pinero directly disputes this, then he and I have +no common standing-ground, and I need not follow the matter any +further. Of course, the dramatist may, under mistaken +sympathy and in the midst of complex and bewildering +concatenations, give wrong readings to his audience, but he must +not be always doing even that, or doing it on principle or +system, else his work, however careful and concentrated, will +before long share the fate of the Stevenson-Henley dramas +confessedly wrought when the authors all too definitely held +bad-heartedness was strength.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XV—THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL</h2> +<p>We have not hitherto concerned ourselves, in any express +sense, with the ethical elements involved in the tendency now +dwelt on, though they are, of necessity, of a very vital +character. We have shown only as yet the effect of this +mood of mind on dramatic intention and effort. The position +is simply that there is, broadly speaking, the endeavour to +eliminate an element which is essential to successful dramatic +presentation. That element is the eternal distinction, +speaking broadly, between good and evil—between right and +wrong—between the secret consciousness of having done +right, and the consciousness of mere strength and force in +certain other ways.</p> +<p>Nothing else will make up for vagueness and cloudiness +here—no technical skill, no apt dialogue nor concentration, +any more than “fine speeches,” as Mr Pinero calls +them. Now the dramatic demand and the ethical demand here +meet and take each other’s hands, and will not be +separated. This is why Mr Stevenson and Mr +Henley—young men of great talent, failed—utterly +failed—they thought they could make a hero out of a shady +and dare-devil yet really cowardly villain generally—and +failed.</p> +<p>The spirit of this is of the clever youth type—all too +ready to forego the moral for the sake of the fun any day of the +week, and the unthinking selfishness and self-enjoyment of +youth—whose tender mercies are often cruel, are +transcendent in it. As Stevenson himself said, they were +young men then and fancied bad-heartedness was strength. +Perhaps it was a sense of this that made R. L. Stevenson speak as +he did of the <i>Ebb-Tide</i> with Huish the cockney in it, after +he was powerless to recall it; which made him say, as we have +seen, that the closing chapters of <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i> “<i>shame</i>, <i>and perhaps degrade</i>, +<i>the beginning</i>.” He himself came to see then +the great error; but, alas! it was too late to remedy it—he +could but go forward to essay new tales, not backward to put +right errors in what was done.</p> +<p>Did Mr William Archer have anything of this in his mind and +the far-reaching effects on this side, when he wrote the +following:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Let me add that the omission with which, in +1885, I mildly reproached him—the omission to tell what he +knew to be an essential part of the truth about life—was +abundantly made good in his later writings. It is true that +even in his final philosophy he still seems to me to underrate, +or rather to shirk, the significance of that most compendious +parable which he thus relates in a letter to Mr Henry +James:—‘Do you know the story of the man who found a +button in his hash, and called the waiter? “What do +you call that?” says he. “Well,” said the +waiter, “what d’you expect? Expect to find a +gold watch and chain?” Heavenly apologue, is it +not?’ Heavenly, by all means; but I think Stevenson +relished the humour of it so much that he ‘smiling passed +the moral by.’ In his enjoyment of the waiter’s +effrontery, he forgot to sympathise with the man (even though it +was himself) who had broken his teeth upon the harmful, +unnecessary button. He forgot that all the apologetics in +the world are based upon just this audacious +paralogism.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Many writers have done the same—and not a few critics +have hinted at this: I do not think any writer has got at the +radical truth of it more directly, decisively, and clearly than +“J. F. M.,” in a monthly magazine, about the time of +Stevenson’s death; and the whole is so good and clear that +I must quote it—the writer was not thinking of the drama +specially; only of prose fiction, and this but makes the passage +the more effective and apt to my point.</p> +<blockquote><p>“In the outburst of regret which followed +the death of Robert Louis Stevenson, one leading journal dwelt on +his too early removal in middle life ‘with only half his +message delivered.’ Such a phrase may have been used +in the mere cant of modern journalism. Still it set one +questioning what was Stevenson’s message, or at least that +part of it which we had time given us to hear.</p> +<p>“Wonderful as was the popularity of the dead author, we +are inclined to doubt whether the right appreciation of him was +half as wide. To a certain section of the public he seemed +a successful writer of boys’ books, which yet held captive +older people. Now, undoubtedly there was an element (not +the highest) in his work which fascinated boys. It +gratified their yearning for adventure. To too large a +number of his readers, we suspect, this remains Stevenson’s +chief charm; though even of those there were many able to +recognise and be thankful for the literary power and grace which +could serve up their sanguinary diet so daintily.</p> +<p>“Most of Stevenson’s titles, too, like <i>Treasure +Island</i>, <i>Kidnapped</i>, and<i> The Master of +Ballantrae</i>, tended to foster delusion in this +direction. The books were largely bought for gifts by +maiden aunts, and bestowed as school prizes, when it might not +have been so had their titles given more indication of their real +scope and tendency.</p> +<p>“All this, it seems to us, has somewhat obscured +Stevenson’s true power, which is surely that of an +arch-delineator of ‘human nature’ and of the devious +ways of men. As we read him we feel that we have our finger +on the pulse of the cruel politics of the world. He has the +Shakespearean gift which makes us recognise that his pirates and +his statesmen, with their violence and their murders and their +perversions of justice, are swayed by the same interests and are +pulling the same strings and playing on the same passions which +are at work in quieter methods around ourselves. The vast +crimes and the reckless bloodshed are nothing more nor less than +stage effects used to accentuate for the common eye what the seer +can detect without them.</p> +<p>“And reading him from this standpoint, Stevenson’s +‘message’ (so far as it was delivered) appears to be +that of utter gloom—the creed that good is always overcome +by evil. We do not mean in the sense that good always +suffers through evil and is frequently crucified by evil. +That is only the sowing of the martyr’s blood, which is, we +know, the seed of the Church. We should not have marvelled +in the least that a genius like Stevenson should rebel against +mere external ‘happy endings,’ which, being in flat +contradiction to the ordinary ways of Providence, are little +short of thoughtless blasphemy against Providence. But the +terrible thing about the Stevenson philosophy of life is that it +seems to make evil overcome good in the sense of absorbing it, or +perverting it, or at best lowering it. When good and evil +come in conflict in one person, Dr Jekyll vanishes into Mr +Hyde. The awful Master of Ballantrae drags down his +brother, though he seems to fight for his soul at every +step. The sequel to <i>Kidnapped</i> shows David Balfour +ready at last to be hail-fellow-well-met with the supple +Prestongrange and the other intriguers, even though they had +forcibly made him a partner to their shedding of innocent +blood.</p> +<p>“Is it possible that this was what Stevenson’s +experience of real life had brought him? Fortunate himself +in so many respects, he was yet one of those who turn aside from +the smooth and sunny paths of life, to enter into brotherly +sympathy and fellowship with the disinherited. Is this, +then, what he found on those darker levels? Did he discover +that triumphant hypocrisy treads down souls as well as lives?</p> +<p>“We cannot doubt that it often does so; and it is well +that we should see this sometimes, to make us strong to contend +with evil before it works out this, its worst mischief, and to +rouse us from the easy optimist laziness which sits idle while +others are being wronged, and bids them believe ‘that all +will come right in the end,’ when it is our direct duty to +do our utmost to make it ‘come right’ to-day.</p> +<p>“But to show us nothing but the gloomy side, nothing but +the weakness of good, nothing but the strength of evil, does not +inspire us to contend for the right, does not inform us of the +powers and weapons with which we might so contend. To gaze +at unqualified and inevitable moral defeat will but leave us to +the still worse laziness of pessimism, uttering its discouraging +and blasphemous cry, ‘It does not matter; nothing will ever +come right!’</p> +<p>“Shakespeare has shown us—and never so nobly as in +his last great creation of <i>The Tempest</i>—that a man +has one stronghold which none but himself can deliver over to the +enemy—that citadel of his own conduct and character, from +which he can smile supreme upon the foe, who may have conquered +all down the line, but must finally make pause there.</p> +<p>“We must remember that <i>The Tempest</i> was +Shakespeare’s last work. The genuine consciousness of +the possible triumph of the moral nature against every assault is +probably reserved for the later years of life, when, somewhat +withdrawn from the passions of its struggle, we become those +lookers-on who see most of the game. Strange fate is it +that so much of our genius vanishes into the great silence before +those later years are reached!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Stevenson was too late in awakening fully to the tragic error +to which short-sighted youth is apt to wander that +“bad-heartedness is strength.” And so, from +this point of view, to our sorrow, he too much verified +Goethe’s saw that “simplicity (not artifice) and +repose are the acme of art, and therefore no youth can be a +master.” In fact, he might very well from another +side, have taken one of Goethe’s fine sayings as a motto +for himself:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Greatest saints were ever most +kindly-hearted to sinners;<br /> +Here I’m a saint with the best; sinners I never could +hate.” <a name="citation7"></a><a href="#footnote7" +class="citation">[7]</a></p> +</blockquote> +<p>Stevenson’s own verdict on <i>Deacon Brodie</i> given to +a <i>New York Herald</i> reporter on the author’s arrival +in New York in September 1887, on the <i>Ludgate Hill</i>, is +thus very near the precise truth: “The piece has been all +overhauled, and though I have no idea whether it will please an +audience, I don’t think either Mr Henley or I are ashamed +of it. <i>But we were both young men when we did that</i>, +<i>and I think we had an idea that bad-heartedness was +strength</i>.”</p> +<p>If Mr Henley in any way confirmed R. L. Stevenson in this +perversion, as I much fear he did, no true admirer of Stevenson +has much to thank him for, whatever claims he may have fancied he +had to Stevenson’s eternal gratitude. He did +Stevenson about the very worst turn he could have done, and aided +and abetted in robbing us and the world of yet greater works than +we have had from his hands. He was but condemning himself +when he wrote some of the detractory things he did in the <i>Pall +Mall Magazine</i> about the <i>Edinburgh Edition</i>, etc. +Men are mirrors in which they see each other: Henley, after all, +painted himself much more effectively in that now notorious +<i>Pall Mall Magazine</i> article than he did R. L. +Stevenson. Such is the penalty men too often pay for +wreaking paltry revenges—writing under morbid memories and +narrow and petty grievances—they not only fail in truth and +impartiality, but inscribe a kind of grotesque parody of +themselves in their effort to make their subject ridiculous, as +he did, for example, about the name Lewis=Louis, and various +other things.</p> +<p>R. L. Stevenson’s fate was to be a casuistic and mystic +moralist at bottom, and could not help it; while, owing to some +kink or twist, due, perhaps, mainly to his earlier sufferings, +and the teachings he then received, he could not help giving it +always a turn to what he himself called +“tail-foremost” or inverted morality; and it was not +till near the close that he fully awakened to the fact that here +he was false to the truest canons at once of morality and life +and art, and that if he pursued this course his doom was, and +would be, to make his endings “disgrace, or perhaps, +degrade his beginnings,” and that no true and effective +dramatic unity and effect and climax was to be gained. Pity +that he did so much on this perverted view of life and world and +art: and well it is that he came to perceive it, even though +almost too late:—certainly too late for that full +presentment of that awful yet gladdening presence of a +God’s power and equity in this seeming tangled web of a +world, the idea which inspired Robert Browning as well as +Wordsworth, when he wrote, and gathered it up into a few lines in +<i>Pippa Passes</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The year’s at the spring,<br /> +And day’s at the morn;<br /> +Morning’s at seven;<br /> +The hillsides dew-pearled;</p> +<p>The lark’s on the wing;<br /> +The snail’s on the thorn:<br /> +God’s in His heaven,<br /> +All’s right with the world.</p> +<p>. . . . . . . . . . . .</p> +<p>“All service ranks the same with God,<br /> +If now, as formerly he trod<br /> +Paradise, His presence fills<br /> +Our earth, each only as God wills<br /> +Can work—God’s puppets best and worst,<br /> +Are we; there is no last or first.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It shows what he might have accomplished, had longer life been +but allowed him.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVI—STEVENSON’S GLOOM</h2> +<p>The problem of Stevenson’s gloom cannot be solved by any +commonplace cut-and-dried process. It will remain a problem +only unless (1) his original dreamy tendency crossed, if not +warped, by the fatalistic Calvinism which was drummed into him by +father, mother, and nurse in his tender years, is taken fully +into account; then (2) the peculiar action on such a nature of +the unsatisfying and, on the whole, distracting effect of the +bohemian and hail-fellow-well-met sort of ideal to which he +yielded, and which has to be charged with much; and (3) the +conflict in him of a keenly social animus with a very strong +egotistical effusiveness, fed by fancy, and nourished by the +enforced solitariness inevitable in the case of one who, from +early years up, suffered from painful, and even crushing, +disease.</p> +<p>His text and his sermon—which may be shortly summed in +the following sentence—be kind, for in kindness to others +lies the only true pleasure to be gained in life; be cheerful, +even to the point of egotistic self-satisfaction, for through +cheerfulness only is the flow of this incessant kindliness of +thought and service possible. He was not in harmony with +the actual effect of much of his creative work, though he +illustrated this in his life, as few men have done. He +regarded it as the highest duty of life to give pleasure to +others; his art in his own idea thus became in an unostentatious +way consecrated, and while he would not have claimed to be a +seer, any more than he would have claimed to be a saint, as he +would have held in contempt a mere sybarite, most certainly a +vein of unblamable hedonism pervaded his whole philosophy of +life. Suffering constantly, he still was always +kindly. He encouraged, as Mr Gosse has said, this +philosophy by every resource open to him. In practical +life, all who knew him declared that he was brightness, +naïve fancy, and sunshine personified, and yet he could not +help always, somehow, infusing into his fiction a pronounced, and +sometimes almost fatal, element of gloom. Even in his own +case they were not pleasure-giving and failed thus in +essence. Some wise critic has said that no man can ever +write well creatively of that in which in his early youth he had +no knowledge. Always behind Stevenson’s latest +exercises lies the shadow of this as an unshifting background, +which by art may be relieved, but never refined away +wholly. He cannot escape from it if he would. Here, +too, as George MacDonald has neatly and nicely said: We are the +victims of our own past, and often a hand is put forth upon us +from behind and draws us into life backward. Here was +Stevenson, with his half-hedonistic theories of life, the duty of +giving pleasure, of making eyes brighter, and casting sunshine +around one wherever one went, yet the creator of gloom for us, +when all the world was before him where to choose. This +fateful shadow pursued him to the end, often giving us, as it +were, the very justificative ground for his own father’s +despondency and gloom, which the son rather too decisively +reproved, while he might have sympathised with it in a stranger, +and in that most characteristic letter to his mother, which we +have quoted, said that it made his father often seem, to him, to +be ungrateful—“<i>Has the man no +gratitude</i>?” Two selves thus persistently and +constantly struggled in Stevenson. He was from this point +of view, indeed, his own Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, the buoyant, +self-enjoying, because pleasure-conferring, man, and at the same +time the helpless yet fascinating “dark interpreter” +of the gloomy and gloom-inspiring side of life, viewed from the +point of view of dominating character and inherited +influence. When he reached out his hand with desire of +pleasure-conferring, lo and behold, as he wrote, a hand from his +forefathers was stretched out, and he was pulled backward; so +that, as he has confessed, his endings were apt to shame, perhaps +to degrade, the beginnings. Here is something pointing to +the hidden and secret springs that feed the deeper will and bend +it to their service. Individuality itself is but a mirror, +which by its inequalities transforms things to odd shapes. +Hawthorne confessed to something of this sort. He, like +Stevenson, suffered much in youth, if not from disease then +through accident, which kept him long from youthful +company. At a time when he should have been running free +with other boys, he had to be lonely, reading what books he could +lay his hands on, mostly mournful and puritanic, by the borders +of lone Sebago Lake. He that hath once in youth been +touched by this Marah-rod of bitterness will not easily escape +from it, when he essays in later years to paint life and the +world as he sees them; nay, the hand, when he deems himself +freest, will be laid upon him from behind, if not to pull him, as +MacDonald has said, into life backward, then to make him a +mournful witness of having once been touched by the Marah-rod, +whose bitterness again declares itself and wells out its +bitterness when set even in the rising and the stirring of the +waters.</p> +<p>Such is our view of the “gloom” of +Stevenson—a gloom which well might have justified something +of his father’s despondency. He struggles in vain to +escape from it—it narrows, it fatefully hampers and limits +the free field of his art, lays upon it a strange atmosphere, +fascinating, but not favourable to true dramatic breadth and +force, and spontaneous natural simplicity, invariably lending a +certain touch of weakness, inconsistency, and inconclusiveness to +his endings; so that he himself could too often speak of them +afterwards as apt to “shame, perhaps to degrade, the +beginnings.” This is what true dramatic art should +never do. In the ending all that may raise legitimate +question in the process—all that is confusing, perplexing +in the separate parts—is met, solved, reconciled, at least +in a way satisfactory to the general, or ordinary mind; and thus +such unity is by it so gained and sealed, that in no case can the +true artist, whatever faults may lie in portions of the +process-work, say of his endings that “they shame, perhaps +degrade, the beginning.” Wherever this is the case +there will be “gloom,” and there will also be a sad, +tormenting sense of something wanting. “The evening +brings a ‘hame’;” so should it be +here—should it especially be in a dramatic work. If +not, “We start; for soul is wanting there;” or, if +not soul, then the last halo of the soul’s serene +triumph. From this side, too, there is another cause for +the undramatic character, in the stricter sense of +Stevenson’s work generally: it is, after all, distressful, +unsatisfying, egotistic, for fancy is led at the beck of some +pre-established disharmony which throws back an abiding and +irremovable gloom on all that went before; and the free +spontaneous grace of natural creation which ensures natural +simplicity is, as said already, not quite attained.</p> +<p>It was well pointed out in <i>Hammerton</i>, by an unanonymous +author there quoted (pp. 22, 23), that while in the story, Hyde, +the worse one, wins, in Stevenson himself—in his real +life—Jekyll won, and not Mr Hyde. This writer, too, +might have added that the Master of Ballantrae also wins as well +as Beau Austin and Deacon Brodie. R. L. Stevenson’s +dramatic art and a good deal of his fiction, then, was untrue to +his life, and on one side was a lie—it was not in +consonance with his own practice or his belief as expressed in +life.</p> +<p>In some other matters the test laid down here is not difficult +of application. Stevenson, at the time he wrote <i>The +Foreigner at Home</i>, had seen a good deal; he had been abroad; +he had already had experiences; he had had differences with his +father about Calvinism and some other things; and yet just see +how he applies the standard of his earlier knowledge and +observation to England—and by doing so, cannot help +exaggerating the outstanding differences, always with an almost +provincial accent of unwavering conviction due to his early +associations and knowledge. He cannot help paying an +excessive tribute to the Calvinism he had formally rejected, in +so far as, according to him, it goes to form character—even +national character, at all events, in its production of types; +and he never in any really effective way glances at what Mr +Matthew Arnold called “Scottish manners, Scottish +drink” as elements in any way radically qualifying. +It is not, of course, that I, as a Scotsman, well acquainted with +rural life in some parts of England, as with rural life in many +parts of Scotland in my youth, do not heartily agree with +him—the point is that, when he comes to this sort of +comparison and contrast, he writes exactly as his father would or +might have done, with a full consciousness, after all, of the +tribute he was paying to the practical outcome on character of +the Calvinism in which he so thoroughly believed. It is, in +its way, a very peculiar thing—and had I space, and did I +believe it would prove interesting to readers in general, I might +write an essay on it, with instances—in which case the +Address to the Scottish Clergy would come in for more notice, +citation and application than it has yet received. But +meanwhile just take this little snippet—very characteristic +and very suggestive in its own way—and tell me whether it +does not justify and bear out fully what I have now said as +illustrating a certain side and a strange uncertain limitation in +Stevenson:</p> +<blockquote><p>“But it is not alone in scenery and +architecture that we count England foreign. The +constitution of society, the very pillars of the empire, surprise +and even pain us. The dull neglected peasant, sunk in +matter, insolent, gross and servile, makes a startling contrast +to our own long-legged, long-headed, thoughtful, Bible-loving +ploughman. A week or two in such a place as Suffolk leaves +the Scotsman gasping. It seems impossible that within the +boundaries of his own island a class should have been thus +forgotten. Even the educated and intelligent who hold our +own opinions and speak in our own words, yet seem to hold them +with a difference or from another reason, and to speak on all +things with less interest and conviction. The first shock +of English society is like a cold plunge.” <a +name="citation8"></a><a href="#footnote8" +class="citation">[8]</a></p> +</blockquote> +<p>As there was a great deal of the “John Bull +element” <a name="citation9"></a><a href="#footnote9" +class="citation">[9]</a> in the little dreamer De Quincey, so +there was a great deal, after all, of the rather conceited +Calvinistic Scot in R. L. Stevenson, and it is to be traced as +clearly in certain of his fictions as anywhere, though he himself +would not perhaps have seen it and acknowledged it, as I am here +forced now to see it, and to acknowledge it for him.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVII—PROOFS OF GROWTH</h2> +<p>Once again I quote Goethe:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Natural simplicity and repose are the acme +of art, and hence it follows no youth can be a master.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It has to be confessed that seldom, if ever, does Stevenson +naturally and by sheer enthusiasm for subject and characters +attain this natural simplicity, if he often attained the +counterfeit presentment—artistic and graceful euphony, and +new, subtle, and often unexpected concatenations of phrase. +Style is much; but it is not everything. We often love +Scott the more that he shows loosenesses and lapses here, for, in +spite of them, he gains natural simplicity, while not seldom +Stevenson, with all his art and fine sense of verbal music, +rather misses it. <i>The Sedulous Ape</i> sometimes +disenchants as well as charms; for occasionally a word, a touch, +a turn, sends us off too directly in search of the model; and +this operates against the interest as introducing a new and alien +series of associations, where, for full effect, it should not be +so. And this distraction will be the more insistent, the +more knowledge the reader has and the more he remembers; and +since Stevenson’s first appeal, both by his spirit and his +methods, is to the cultured and well read, rather than to the +great mass, his “sedulous apehood” only the more +directly wars against him as regards deep, continuous, and +lasting impression; where he should be most simple, natural and +spontaneous; he also is most artificial and involved. If +the story-writer is not so much in earnest, not so possessed by +his matter that this is allowed to him, how is it to be hoped +that we shall be possessed in the reading of it? More than +once in <i>Catriona</i> we must own we had this experience, +directly warring against full possession by the story, and +certain passages about Simon Lovat were especially marked by +this; if even the first introduction to Catriona herself was not +so. As for Miss Barbara Grant, of whom so much has been +made by many admirers, she is decidedly clever, indeed too clever +by half, and yet her doom is to be a mere <i>deus ex +machinâ</i>, and never do more than just pay a little +tribute to Stevenson’s own power of <i>persiflage</i>, or, +if you like, to pay a penalty, poor lass, for the too perfect +doing of hat, and really, really, I could not help saying this +much, though, I do believe that she deserved just a wee bit +better fate than that.</p> +<p>But we have proofs of great growth, and nowhere are they +greater than at the very close. Stevenson died young: in +some phases he was but a youth to the last. To a true +critic then, the problem is, having already attained so +much—a grand style, grasp of a limited group of characters, +with fancy, sincerity, and imagination,—what would +Stevenson have attained in another ten years had such been but +allotted him? It has over and over again been said that, +for long he <i>shied</i> presenting women altogether. This +is not quite true: <i>Thrawn Janet</i> was an earlier effort; and +if there the problem is persistent, the woman is real. Here +also he was on the right road—the advance road. The +sex-question was coming forward as inevitably a part of life, and +could not be left out in any broad and true picture. This +element was effectively revived in <i>Weir of Hermiston</i>, and +“Weir” has been well said to be sadder, if it does +not go deeper than <i>Denis Duval</i> or <i>Edwin +Drood</i>. We know what Dickens and Thackeray could do +there; we can but guess now what Stevenson would have done. +“Weir” is but a fragment; but, to a wisely critical +and unprejudiced mind, it suffices to show not only what the +complete work would have been, but what would have inevitably +followed it. It shows the turning-point, and the way that +was to be followed at the cross-roads—the way into a +bigger, realer, grander world, where realism, freed from the +dream, and fancy, and prejudice of youth, would glory in +achieving the more enduring romance of manhood, maturity and +humanity.</p> +<p>Yes; there was growth—undoubted growth. The +questioning and severely moral element mainly due to the Shorter +Catechism—the tendency to casuistry, and to problems, and +wistful introspection—which had so coloured +Stevenson’s art up to the date of <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>, and made him a great essayist, was passing in the +satisfaction of assured insight into life itself. The art +would gradually have been transformed also. The problem, +pure and simple, would have been subdued in face of the great +facts of life; if not lost, swallowed up in the grandeur, pathos, +and awe of the tragedy clearly realised and presented.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVIII—EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS</h2> +<p>Stevenson’s earlier determination was so distinctly to +the symbolic, the parabolic, allegoric, dreamy and +mystical—to treatment of the world as an array of weird or +half-fanciful existences, witnessing only to certain dim +spiritual facts or abstract moralities, occasionally inverted +moralities—“tail foremost moralities” as later +he himself named them—that a strong Celtic strain in him +had been detected and dwelt on by acute critics long before any +attention had been given to his genealogy on both sides of the +house. The strong Celtic strain is now amply attested by +many researches. Such phantasies as <i>The House of +Eld</i>, <i>The Touchstone</i>, <i>The Poor Thing</i>, and <i>The +Song of the Morrow</i>, published along with some fables at the +end of an edition of <i>Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i>, by +Longman’s, I think, in 1896, tell to the initiated as +forcibly as anything could tell of the presence of this element, +as though moonshine, disguising and transfiguring, was laid over +all real things and the secret of the world and life was in its +glamour: the shimmering and soft shading rendering all outlines +indeterminate, though a great idea is felt to be present in the +mind of the author, for which he works. The man who would +say there is no feeling for symbol—no phantasy or Celtic +glamour in these weird, puzzling, and yet on all sides suggestive +tales would thereby be declared inept, inefficient—blind to +certain qualities that lie near to grandeur in fanciful +literature, or the literature of phantasy, more properly.</p> +<p>This power in weird and playful phantasy is accompanied with +the gift of impersonating or embodying mere abstract qualities or +tendencies in characters. The little early sketch written +in June 1875, titled <i>Good Content</i>, well illustrates +this:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Pleasure goes by piping: Hope unfurls his +purple flag; and meek Content follows them on a snow-white +ass. Here, the broad sunlight falls on open ways and goodly +countries; here, stage by stage, pleasant old towns and hamlets +border the road, now with high sign-poles, now with high minster +spires; the lanes go burrowing under blossomed banks, green +meadows, and deep woods encompass them about; from wood to wood +flock the glad birds; the vane turns in the variable wind; and as +I journey with Hope and Pleasure, and quite a company of jolly +personifications, who but the lady I love is by my side, and +walks with her slim hand upon my arm?</p> +<p>“Suddenly, at a corner, something beckons; a phantom +finger-post, a will o’ the wisp, a foolish challenge writ +in big letters on a brand. And twisting his red moustaches, +braggadocio Virtue takes the perilous way where dim rain falls +ever, and sad winds sigh. And after him, on his white ass, +follows simpering Content.</p> +<p>“Ever since I walk behind these two in the rain. +Virtue is all a-cold; limp are his curling feather and fierce +moustache. Sore besmirched, on his jackass, follows +Content.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The record, entitled <i>Sunday Thoughts</i>, which is dated +some five days earlier is naïve and most characteristic, +touched with the phantastic moralities and suggestions already +indicated in every sentence; and rises to the fine climax in this +respect at the close.</p> +<blockquote><p>“A plague o’ these Sundays! How +the church bells ring up the sleeping past! I cannot go in +to sermon: memories ache too hard; and so I hide out under the +blue heavens, beside the small kirk whelmed in leaves. +Tittering country girls see me as I go past from where they sit +in the pews, and through the open door comes the loud psalm and +the fervent solitary voice of the preacher. To and fro I +wander among the graves, and now look over one side of the +platform and see the sunlit meadow where the grown lambs go +bleating and the ewes lie in the shadow under their heaped +fleeces; and now over the other, where the rhododendrons flower +fair among the chestnut boles, and far overhead the chestnut +lifts its thick leaves and spiry blossom into the dark-blue +air. Oh, the height and depth and thickness of the chestnut +foliage! Oh, to have wings like a dove, and dwell in the +tree’s green heart!</p> +<p>. . . . . . . .</p> +<p>“A plague o’ these Sundays! How the Church +bells ring up the sleeping past! Here has a maddening +memory broken into my brain. To the door, to the door, with +the naked lunatic thought! Once it is forth we may talk of +what we dare not entertain; once the intriguing thought has been +put to the door I can watch it out of the loophole where, with +its fellows, it raves and threatens in dumb show. Years ago +when that thought was young, it was dearer to me than all others, +and I would speak with it always when I had an hour alone. +These rags that so dismally trick forth its madness were once the +splendid livery my favour wrought for it on my bed at +night. Can you see the device on the badge? I dare +not read it there myself, yet have a guess—‘<i>bad +ware nicht</i>’—is not that the humour of it?</p> +<p>. . . . . . . . .</p> +<p>“A plague o’ these Sundays! How the Church +bells ring up the sleeping past! If I were a dove and dwelt +in the monstrous chestnuts, where the bees murmur all day about +the flowers; if I were a sheep and lay on the field there under +my comely fleece; if I were one of the quiet dead in the +kirkyard—some homespun farmer dead for a long age, some +dull hind who followed the plough and handled the sickle for +threescore years and ten in the distant past; if I were anything +but what I am out here, under the sultry noon, between the deep +chestnuts, among the graves, where the fervent voice of the +preacher comes to me, thin and solitary, through the open +windows; <i>if I were what I was yesterday</i>, <i>and what</i>, +<i>before God</i>, <i>I shall be again to-morrow</i>, <i>how +should I outface these brazen memories</i>, <i>how live down this +unclean resurrection of dead hopes</i>!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Close associated with this always is the moralising faculty, +which is assertive. Take here the cunning sentences on +<i>Selfishness and Egotism</i>, very Hawthornian yet quite +original:</p> +<blockquote><p>“An unconscious, easy, selfish person shocks +less, and is more easily loved, than one who is laboriously and +egotistically unselfish. There is at least no fuss about +the first; but the other parades his sacrifices, and so sells his +favours too dear. Selfishness is calm, a force of nature; +you might say the trees were selfish. But egotism is a +piece of vanity; it must always take you into its confidence; it +is uneasy, troublesome, seeking; it can do good, but not +handsomely; it is uglier, because less dignified, than +selfishness itself.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If Mr Henley had but had this clear in his mind he might well +have quoted it in one connection against Stevenson himself in the +<i>Pall Mall Magazine</i> article. He could hardly have +quoted anything more apparently apt to the purpose.</p> +<p>In the sphere of minor morals there is no more important +topic. Unselfishness is too often only the most +exasperating form of selfishness. Here is another very +characteristic bit:</p> +<blockquote><p>“You will always do wrong: you must try to +get used to that, my son. It is a small matter to make a +work about, when all the world is in the same case. I meant +when I was a young man to write a great poem; and now I am +cobbling little prose articles and in excellent good +spirits. I thank you. . . . Our business in life is not to +succeed, but to continue to fail, in good spirits.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Again:</p> +<blockquote><p>“It is the mark of good action that it +appears inevitable in the retrospect. We should have been +cut-throats to do otherwise. And there’s an +end. We ought to know distinctly that we are damned for +what we do wrong; but when we have done right, we have only been +gentlemen, after all. There is nothing to make a work +about.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The moral to <i>The House of Eld</i> is incisive writ out of +true experience—phantasy there becomes solemn, if not, for +the nonce, tragic:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Old is the tree and the fruit good,<br /> +Very old and thick the wood.<br /> +Woodman, is your courage stout?<br /> +Beware! the root is wrapped about<br /> +Your mother’s heart, your father’s bones;<br /> +And, like the mandrake, comes with groans.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The phantastic moralist is supreme, jauntily serious, +facetiously earnest, most gravely funny in the whole series of +<i>Moral Emblems</i>.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Reader, your soul upraise to see,<br /> +In yon fair cut designed by me,<br /> +The pauper by the highwayside<br /> +Vainly soliciting from pride.<br /> +Mark how the Beau with easy air<br /> +Contemns the anxious rustic’s prayer<br /> +And casting a disdainful eye<br /> +Goes gaily gallivanting by.<br /> +He from the poor averts his head . . .<br /> +He will regret it when he’s dead.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Now, the man who would trace out step by step and point by +point, clearly and faithfully, the process by which Stevenson +worked himself so far free of this his besetting tendency to +moralised symbolism or allegory into the freer air of life and +real character, would do more to throw light on Stevenson’s +genius, and the obstacles he had had to contend with in becoming +a novelist eager to interpret definite times and character, than +has yet been done or even faithfully attempted. This would +show at once Stevenson’s wonderful growth and the saving +grace and elasticity of his temperament and genius. Few men +who have by force of native genius gone into allegory or +moralised phantasy ever depart out of that fateful and enchanted +region. They are as it were at once lost and imprisoned in +it and kept there as by a spell—the more they struggle for +freedom the more surely is the bewitching charm laid upon +them—they are but like the fly in amber. It was so +with Ludwig Tieck; it was so with Nathaniel Hawthorne; it was so +with our own George MacDonald, whose professedly real pictures of +life are all informed of this phantasy, which spoils them for +what they profess to be, and yet to the discerning cannot +disguise what they really are—the attempts of a mystic poet +and phantasy writer and allegoristic moralist to walk in the ways +of Anthony Trollope or of Mrs Oliphant, and, like a stranger in a +new land always looking back (at least by a side-glance, an +averted or half-averted face which keeps him from seeing steadily +and seeing whole the real world with which now he is fain to +deal), to the country from which he came.</p> +<p>Stevenson did largely free himself, that is his great +achievement—had he lived, we verily believe, so marked was +his progress, he would have been a great and true realist, a +profound interpreter of human life and its tragic laws and +wondrous compensations—he would have shown how to make the +full retreat from fairyland without penalty of too early an +escape from it, as was the case with Thomas the Rymer of +Ercildoune, and with one other told of by him, and proved that to +have been a dreamer need not absolutely close the door to insight +into the real world and to art. This side of the subject, +never even glanced at by Mr Henley or Mr Zangwill or their +<i>confrères</i>, yet demands, and will well reward the +closest and most careful attention and thought that can be given +to it.</p> +<p>The parabolic element, with the whimsical humour and turn for +paradoxical inversion, comes out fully in such a work as <i>Dr +Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i>. There his humour gives body to his +fancy, and reality to the half-whimsical forms in which he +embodies the results of deep and earnest speculations on human +nature and motive. But even when he is professedly +concerned with incident and adventure merely, he manages to +communicate to his pages some touch of universality, as of +unconscious parable or allegory, so that the reader feels now and +then as though some thought, or motive, or aspiration, or +weakness of his own were being there cunningly unveiled or +presented; and not seldom you feel he has also unveiled and +presented some of yours, secret and unacknowledged too.</p> +<p>Hence the interest which young and old alike have felt in +<i>Treasure Island</i>, <i>Kidnapped</i>, and <i>The +Wrecker</i>—a something which suffices decisively to mark +off these books from the mass with which superficially they might +be classed.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIX—EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN’S +ESTIMATE</h2> +<p>It should be clearly remembered that Stevenson died at a +little over forty—the age at which severity and simplicity +and breadth in art but begin to be attained. If Scott had +died at the age when Stevenson was taken from us, the world would +have lacked the <i>Waverley Novels</i>; if a like fate had +overtaken Dickens, we should not have had <i>A Tale of Two +Cities</i>; and under a similar stroke, Goldsmith could not have +written <i>Retaliation</i>, or tasted the bitter-sweet first +night of <i>She Stoops to Conquer</i>. At the age of +forty-four Mr Thomas Hardy had probably not dreamt of <i>Tess of +the D’Urbervilles</i>. But what a man has already +done at forty years is likely, I am afraid, to be a gauge as well +as a promise of what he will do in the future; and from Stevenson +we were entitled to expect perfect form and continued variety of +subject, rather than a measurable dynamic gain.</p> +<p>This is the point of view which my friend and correspondent of +years ago, Mr Edmund Clarence Stedman, of New York, set out by +emphasising in his address, as President of the meeting under the +auspices of the Uncut Leaves Society in New York, in the +beginning of 1895, on the death of Stevenson, and to honour the +memory of the great romancer, as reported in the <i>New York +Tribune</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“We are brought together by tidings, almost +from the Antipodes, of the death of a beloved writer in his early +prime. The work of a romancer and poet, of a man of insight +and feeling, which may be said to have begun but fifteen years +ago, has ended, through fortune’s sternest cynicism, just +as it seemed entering upon even more splendid achievement. +A star surely rising, as we thought, has suddenly gone out. +A radiant invention shines no more; the voice is hushed of a +creative mind, expressing its fine imagining in this, our +peerless English tongue. His expression was so original and +fresh from Nature’s treasure-house, so prodigal and +various, its too brief flow so consummate through an inborn gift +made perfect by unsparing toil, that mastery of the art by which +Robert Louis Stevenson conveyed those imaginings to us so +picturesque, yet wisely ordered, his own romantic life—and +now, at last, so pathetic a loss which renews</p> +<p>“‘The Virgilian cry,<br /> +The sense of tears in mortal things,’</p> +<p>that this assemblage has gathered at the first summons, in +tribute to a beautiful genius, and to avow that with the putting +out of that bright intelligence the reading world experiences a +more than wonted grief.</p> +<p>“Judged by the sum of his interrupted work, Stevenson +had his limitations. But the work was adjusted to the scale +of a possibly long career. As it was, the good fairies +brought all gifts, save that of health, to his cradle, and the +gift-spoiler wrapped them in a shroud. Thinking of what his +art seemed leading to—for things that would be the crowning +efforts of other men seemed prentice-work in his case—it +was not safe to bound his limitations. And now it is as if +Sir Walter, for example, had died at forty-four, with the +<i>Waverley Novels</i> just begun! In originality, in the +conception of action and situation, which, however phantastic, +are seemingly within reason, once we breathe the air of his +Fancyland; in the union of bracing and heroic character and +adventure; in all that belongs to tale-writing pure and simple, +his gift was exhaustless. No other such charmer, in this +wise, has appeared in his generation. We thought the +stories, the fairy tales, had all been told, but ‘Once upon +a time’ meant for him our own time, and the grave and gay +magic of Prince Florizel in dingy London or sunny France. +All this is but one of his provinces, however distinctive. +Besides, how he buttressed his romance with apparent truth! +Since Defoe, none had a better right to say: ‘There was one +thing I determined to do when I began this long story, and that +was to tell out everything as it befell.’</p> +<p>“I remember delighting in two fascinating stories of +Paris in the time of François Villon, anonymously +reprinted by a New York paper from a London magazine. They +had all the quality, all the distinction, of which I speak. +Shortly afterward I met Mr Stevenson, then in his twenty-ninth +year, at a London club, where we chanced to be the only loungers +in an upper room. To my surprise he opened a +conversation—you know there could be nothing more +unexpected than that in London—and thereby I guessed that +he was as much, if not as far, away from home as I was. He +asked many questions concerning ‘the States’; in +fact, this was but a few months before he took his steerage +passage for our shores. I was drawn to the young Scotsman +at once. He seemed more like a New-Englander of +Holmes’s Brahmin caste, who might have come from Harvard or +Yale. But as he grew animated I thought, as others have +thought, and as one would suspect from his name, that he must +have Scandinavian blood in his veins—that he was of the +heroic, restless, strong and tender Viking strain, and certainly +from that day his works and wanderings have not belied the +surmise. He told me that he was the author of that charming +book of gipsying in the Cevennes which just then had gained for +him some attentions from the literary set. But if I had +known that he had written those two stories of sixteenth-century +Paris—as I learned afterwards when they reappeared in the +<i>New Arabian Nights</i>—I would not have bidden him +good-bye as to an ‘unfledged comrade,’ but would have +wished indeed to ‘grapple him to my soul with hooks of +steel.’</p> +<p>“Another point is made clear as crystal by his life +itself. He had the instinct, and he had the courage, to +make it the servant, and not the master, of the faculty within +him. I say he had the courage, but so potent was his +birth-spell that doubtless he could not otherwise. Nothing +commonplace sufficed him. A regulation stay-at-home life +would have been fatal to his art. The ancient mandate, +‘Follow thy Genius,’ was well obeyed. +Unshackled freedom of person and habit was a prerequisite; as an +imaginary artist he felt—nature keeps her poets and +story-tellers children to the last—he felt, if he ever +reasoned it out, that he must gang his own gait, whether it +seemed promising, or the reverse, to kith, kin, or alien. +So his wanderings were not only in the most natural but in the +wisest consonance with his creative dreams. Wherever he +went, he found something essential for his use, breathed upon it, +and returned it fourfold in beauty and worth. The longing +of the Norseman for the tropic, of the pine for the palm, took +him to the South Seas. There, too, strange secrets were at +once revealed to him, and every island became an ‘Isle of +Voices.’ Yes, an additional proof of +Stevenson’s artistic mission lay in his careless, careful, +liberty of life; in that he was an artist no less than in his +work. He trusted to the impulse which possessed +him—that which so many of us have conscientiously disobeyed +and too late have found ourselves in reputable bondage to +circumstances.</p> +<p>“But those whom you are waiting to hear will speak more +fully of all this—some of them with the interest of their +personal remembrance—with the strength of their affection +for the man beloved by young and old. In the strange and +sudden intimacy with an author’s record which death makes +sure, we realise how notable the list of Stevenson’s works +produced since 1878; more than a score of books—not fiction +alone, but also essays, criticism, biography, drama, even +history, and, as I need not remind you, that spontaneous poetry +which comes only from a true poet. None can have failed to +observe that, having recreated the story of adventure, he seemed +in his later fiction to interfuse a subtler purpose—the +search for character, the analysis of mind and soul. Just +here his summons came. Between the sunrise of one day and +the sunset of the next he exchanged the forest study for the +mountain grave. There, as he had sung his own wish, he lies +‘under the wide and starry sky.’ If there was +something of his own romance, so exquisitely capricious, in the +life of Robert Louis Stevenson, so, also, the poetic conditions +are satisfied in his death, and in the choice of his burial-place +upon the top of Pala. As for the splendour of that maturity +upon which we counted, now never to be fulfilled on sea or land, +I say—as once before, when the great New-England romancer +passed in the stillness of the night:</p> +<p>“‘What though his work unfinished lies? Half +bent<br /> +The rainbow’s arch fades out in upper air,<br /> + The shining cataract half-way down the height<br /> +Breaks into mist; the haunting strain, that fell<br /> + On listeners unaware,<br /> + Ends incomplete, but through the starry night<br /> +The ear still waits for what it did not tell.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Dr Edward Eggleston finely sounded the personal note, and told +of having met Stevenson at a hotel in New York. Stevenson +was ill when the landlord came to Dr Eggleston and asked him if +he should like to meet him. Continuing, he said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“He was flat on his back when I entered, but +I think I never saw anybody grow well in so short a time. +It was a soul rather than a body that lay there, ablaze with +spiritual fire, good will shining through everywhere. He +did not pay me any compliment about my work, and I didn’t +pay him any about his. We did not burn any of the incense +before each other which authors so often think it necessary to +do, but we were friends instantly. I am not given to speedy +intimacies, but I could not help my heart going out to him. +It was a wonderfully invested soul, no hedges or fences across +his fields, no concealment. He was a romanticist; I +was—well, I don’t know exactly what. But he let +me into the springs of his romanticism then and there.</p> +<p>“‘You go in your boat every day?’ he +asked. ‘You sail? Oh! to write a novel a man +must take his life in his hands. He must not live in the +town.’ And so he spoke, in his broad way, of course, +according to the enthusiasm of the moment.</p> +<p>“I can’t sound any note of pathos here +to-night. Some lives are so brave and sweet and joyous and +well-rounded, with such a completeness about them that death does +not leave imperfection. He never had the air of sitting up +with his own reputation. He let his books toss in the waves +of criticism and make their ports if they deserve to. He +had no claptrap, no great cause, none of the disease of pruriency +which came into fashion with Flaubert and Guy de +Maupassant. He simply told his story, with no +condescension, taking the readers into his heart and his +confidence.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XX—EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS</h2> +<p>From these sources now traced out by us—his youthfulness +of spirit, his mystical bias, and tendency to +dream—symbolisms leading to disregard of common +feelings—flows too often the indeterminateness of +Stevenson’s work, at the very points where for direct +interest there should be decision. In <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i> this leads him to try to bring the balances even +as regards our interest in the two brothers, in so far justifying +from one point of view what Mr Zangwill said in the quotation we +have given, or, as Sir Leslie Stephen had it in his second series +of the <i>Studies of a Biographer</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The younger brother in <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>, who is black-mailed by the utterly reprobate +master, ought surely to be interesting instead of being simply +sullen and dogged. In the later adventures, we are invited +to forgive him on the ground that his brain has been affected: +but the impression upon me is that he is sacrificed throughout to +the interests of the story [or more strictly for the working out +of the problem as originally conceived by the author]. The +curious exclusion of women is natural in the purely boyish +stories, since to a boy woman is simply an incumbrance upon +reasonable modes of life. When in <i>Catriona</i> Stevenson +introduces a love story, it is still unsatisfactory, because +David Balfour is so much the undeveloped animal that his passion +is clumsy, and his charm for the girl unintelligible. I +cannot feel, to say the truth, that in any of these stories I am +really among living human beings with whom, apart from their +adventures, I can feel any very lively affection or +antipathy.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In the <i>Ebb-Tide</i> it is, in this respect, yet worse: the +three heroes choke each other off all too literally.</p> +<p>In his excess of impartiality he tones down the points and +lines that would give the attraction of true individuality to his +characters, and instead, would fain have us contented with his +liberal, and even over-sympathetic views of them and allowances +for them. But instead of thus furthering his object, he +sacrifices the whole—and his story becomes, instead of a +broad and faithful human record, really a curiosity of +autobiographic perversion, and of overweening, if not extravagant +egotism of the more refined, but yet over-obtrusive kind.</p> +<p>Mr Baildon thus hits the subjective tendency, out of which +mainly this defect—a serious defect in view of +interest—arises.</p> +<blockquote><p>“That we can none of us be sure to what +crime we might not descend, if only our temptation were +sufficiently acute, lies at the root of his fondness and +toleration for wrong-doers (p. 74).</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Thus he practically declines to do for us what we are +unwilling or unable to do for ourselves. Interest in two +characters in fiction can never, in this artificial way, and if +they are real characters truly conceived, be made equal, nor can +one element of claim be balanced against another, even at the +beck of the greatest artist. The common sentiment, as we +have seen, resents it even as it resents lack of guidance +elsewhere. After all, the novelist is bound to give +guidance: he is an authority in his own world, where he is an +autocrat indeed; and can work out issues as he pleases, even as +the Pope is an authority in the Roman Catholic world: he +abdicates his functions when he declines to lead: we depend on +him from the human point of view to guide us right, according to +the heart, if not according to any conventional notion or +opinion. Stevenson’s pause in individual presentation +in the desire now to raise our sympathy for the one, and then for +the other in <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i>, admits us too far +into Stevenson’s secret or trick of affected +self-withdrawal in order to work his problem and to signify his +theories, to the loss and utter confusion of his aims from the +point of common dramatic and human interest. It is the same +in <i>Catriona</i> in much of the treatment of James Mohr or +More; it is still more so in not a little of the treatment of +<i>Weir of Hermiston</i> and his son, though there, happily for +him and for us, there were the direct restrictions of known fact +and history, and clearly an attempt at a truer and broader human +conception unburdened by theory or egotistic conception.</p> +<p>Everywhere the problem due to the desire to be overjust, so to +say, emerges; and exactly in the measure it does so the source of +true dramatic directness and variety is lost. It is just as +though Shakespeare were to invent a chorus to cry out at +intervals about Iago—“a villain, bad lot, you see, +still there’s a great deal to be said for him—victim +of inheritance, this, that and the other; and considering +everything how could you really expect anything else +now.” Thackeray was often weak from this same +tendency—he meant Becky Sharp to be largely excused by the +reader on these grounds, as he tries to excuse several others of +his characters; but his endeavours in this way to gloss over +“wickedness” in a way, do not succeed—the +reader does not carry clear in mind as he goes along, the +suggestions Thackeray has ineffectually set out and the +“healthy hatred of scoundrels” Carlyle talked about +has its full play in spite of Thackeray’s suggested excuses +and palliations, and all in his own favour, too, as a +story-wright.</p> +<p>Stevenson’s constant habit of putting himself in the +place of another, and asking himself how would I have borne +myself here or there, thus limited his field of dramatic +interest, where the subject should have been made pre-eminently +in aid of this effect. Even in Long John Silver we see it, +as in various others of his characters, though there, owing to +the demand for adventure, and action contributory to it, the +defect is not so emphasised. The sense as of a projection +of certain features of the writer into all and sundry of his +important characters, thus imparts, if not an air of egotism, +then most certainly a somewhat constrained, if not somewhat +artificial, autobiographical air—in the very midst of +action, questions of ethical or casuistical character arise, all +contributing to submerging individual character and its dramatic +interests under a wave of but half-disguised autobiography. +Let Stevenson do his very best—let him adopt all the +artificial disguises he may, as writing narrative in the first +person, etc., as in <i>Kidnapped</i> and <i>Catriona</i>, +nevertheless, the attentive reader’s mind is constantly +called off to the man who is actually writing the story. It +is as though, after all, all the artistic or artificial disguises +were a mere mask, as more than once Thackeray represented +himself, the mask partially moved aside, just enough to show a +chubby, childish kind of transformed Thackeray face below. +This belongs, after all, to the order of self-revelation though +under many disguises: it is creation only in its manner of work, +not in its essential being—the spirit does not so to us go +clean forth of itself, it stops at home, and, as if from a remote +and shadowy cave or recess, projects its own colour on all on +which it looks.</p> +<p>This is essentially the character of the <i>mystic</i>; and +hence the justification for this word as applied expressly to +Stevenson by Mr Chesterton and others.</p> +<blockquote><p>“The inner life like rings of light<br /> +Goes forth of us, transfiguring all we see.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The effect of these early days, with the peculiar tint due to +the questionings raised by religious stress and strain, persists +with Stevenson; he grows, but he never escapes from that peculiar +something which tells of childish influences—of boyish +perversions and troubled self-examinations due to Shorter +Catechism—any one who would view Stevenson without thought +of this, would view him only from the outside—see him +merely in dress and outer oddities. Here I see definite and +clear heredity. Much as he differed from his worthy father +in many things, he was like him in this—the old man like +the son, bore on him the marks of early excesses of wistful +self-questionings and painful wrestlings with religious problems, +that perpetuated themselves in a quaint kind of self-revelation +often masked by an assumed self-withdrawal or indifference which +to the keen eye only the more revealed the real case. +Stevenson never, any more than his father, ceased to be +interested in the religious questions for which Scotland has +always had a <i>penchant</i>—and so much is this the case +that I could wish Professor Sidney Colvin would even yet attempt +to show the bearing of certain things in that <i>Address to the +Scottish Clergy</i> written when Stevenson was yet but a young +man, on all that he afterwards said and did. It starts in +the <i>Edinburgh Edition</i> without any note, comment, or +explanation whatever, but in that respect the <i>Edinburgh +Edition</i> is not quite so complete as it might have been +made. In view of the point now before us, it is far more +important than many of the other trifles there given, and wants +explanation and its relation to much in the novels brought out +and illustrated. Were this adequately done, only new ground +would be got for holding that Stevenson, instead of, as has been +said, “seeing only the visible world,” was, in truth, +a mystical moralist, once and always, whose thoughts ran all too +easily into parable and fable, and who, indeed, never escaped +wholly from that atmosphere, even when writing of things and +characters that seemed of themselves to be wholly outside that +sphere. This was the tendency, indeed, that militated +against the complete detachment in his case from moral problems +and mystical thought, so as to enable him to paint, as it were, +with a free hand exactly as he saw; and most certainly not that +he saw only the visible world. The mystical element is not +directly favourable to creative art. You see in Tolstoy how +it arrests and perplexes—how it lays a disturbing check on +real presentation—hindering the action, and is not +favourable to the loving and faithful representation, which, as +Goethe said, all true and high art should be. To some +extent you see exactly the same thing in Nathaniel Hawthorne as +in Tolstoy. Hawthorne’s preoccupations in this way +militated against his character-power; his healthy characters who +would never have been influenced as he describes by morbid ones +yet are not only influenced according to him, but suffer +sadly. Phoebe Pyncheon in <i>The House of the Seven +Gables</i>, gives sunshine to poor Hepzibah Clifford, but is +herself never merry again, though joyousness was her natural +element. So, doubtless, it would have been with Pansie in +<i>Doctor Dolliver</i>, as indeed it was with Zenobia and with +the hero in the <i>Marble Faun</i>. “We all go +wrong,” said Hawthorne, “by a too strenuous +resolution to go right.” Lady Byron was to him an +intolerably irreproachable person, just as Stevenson felt a +little of the same towards Thoreau; notwithstanding that he was +the “sunnily-ascetic,” the asceticism and its +corollary, as he puts it: the passion for individual +self-improvement was alien in a way to Stevenson. This is +the position of the casuistic mystic moralist and not of the man +who sees only the visible world.</p> +<p>Mr Baildon says:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Stevenson has many of the things that are +wanting or defective in Scott. He has his philosophy of +life; he is beyond remedy a moralist, even when his morality is +of the kind which he happily calls ‘tail foremost,’ +or as we may say, inverted morality. Stevenson is, in fact, +much more of a thinker than Scott, and he is also much more of +the conscious artist, questionable advantage as that sometimes +is. He has also a much cleverer, acuter mind than Scott, +also a questionable advantage, as genius has no greater enemy +than cleverness, and there is really no greater descent than to +fall from the style of genius to that of cleverness. But +Stevenson was too critical and alive to misuse his cleverness, +and it is generally employed with great effect as in the +diabolical ingenuities of a John Silver, or a Master of +Ballantrae. In one sense Stevenson does not even belong to +the school of Scott, but rather to that of Poe, Hawthorne, and +the Brontës, in that he aims more at concentration and +intensity, than at the easy, quiet breadth of Scott.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If, indeed, it should not here have been added that +Stevenson’s theory of life and conduct was not seldom too +insistent for free creativeness, for dramatic freedom, breadth +and reality.</p> +<p>Now here I humbly think Mr Baldion errs about the cleverness +when he criticises Stevenson for the <i>faux pas</i> artistically +of resorting to the piratic filibustering and the +treasure-seeking at the close of <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i>, +he only tells and tells plainly how cleverness took the place of +genius there; as indeed it did in not a few cases—certainly +in some points in the Dutch escapade in <i>Catriona</i> and in +not a few in <i>Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i>. The fault of +that last story is simply that we seem to hear Stevenson +chuckling to himself, “Ah, now, won’t they all say at +last how clever I am.” That too mars the <i>Merry +Men</i>, whoever wrote them or part wrote them, and <i>Prince +Otto</i> would have been irretrievably spoiled by this +self-conscious sense of cleverness had it not been for style and +artifice. In this incessant “see how clever I +am,” we have another proof of the abounding youthfulness of +R. L. Stevenson. If, as Mr Baildon says (p. 30), he had +true child’s horror of being put in fine clothes in which +one must sit still and be good, <i>Prince Otto</i> remains +attractive in spite of some things and because of his fine +clothes. Neither Poe nor Hawthorne could have fallen to the +piracy, and treasure-hunting of <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>.</p> +<p>“Far behind Scott in the power of instinctive, +irreflective, spontaneous creation of character, Stevenson tells +his story with more art and with a firmer grip on his +reader.” And that is exactly what I, wishing to do +all I dutifully can for Stevenson, cannot see. His genius +is in nearly all cases pulled up or spoiled by his all too +conscious cleverness, and at last we say, “Oh Heavens! if +he could and would but let himself go or forget himself what he +might achieve.” But he doesn’t—never +does, and therefore remains but a second-rate creator though more +and more the stylist and the artist. This is more +especially the case at the very points where writers like Scott +would have risen and roused all the readers’ +interest. When Stevenson reaches such points, he is always +as though saying “See now how cleverly I’ll clear +that old and stereotyped style of thing and do something +<i>new</i>.” But there are things in life and human +nature, which though they are old are yet ever new, and the true +greatness of a writer can never come from evading or looking +askance at them or trying to make them out something else than +what they really are. No artistic aim or ambition can +suffice to stand instead of them or to refine them away. +That way lies only cold artifice and frigid lacework, and +sometimes Stevenson did go a little too much on this line.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXI—UNITY IN STEVENSON’S STORIES</h2> +<p>The unity in Stevenson’s stories is generally a unity of +subjective impression and reminiscence due, in the first place, +to his quick, almost abnormal boyish reverence for mere animal +courage, audacity, and doggedness, and, in the second place, to +his theory of life, his philosophy, his moral view. He +produces an artificial atmosphere. Everything then has to +be worked up to this—kept really in accordance with it, and +he shows great art in the doing of this. Hence, though, a +quaint sense of sameness, of artificial atmosphere—at once +really a lack of spontaneity and of freedom. He is freest +when he pretends to nothing but adventure—when he aims +professedly at nothing save to let his characters develop +themselves by action. In this respect the most successful +of his stories is yet <i>Treasure Island</i>, and the least +successful perhaps <i>Catriona</i>, when just as the ambitious +aim compels him to pause in incident, the first-person form +creates a cold stiffness and artificiality alien to the full +impression he would produce upon the reader. The two +stories he left unfinished promised far greater things in this +respect than he ever accomplished. For it is an +indisputable fact, and indeed very remarkable, that the ordinary +types of men and women have little or no attraction for +Stevenson, nor their commonplace passions either. Yet +precisely what his art wanted was due infusion of this very +interest. Nothing else will supply the place. The +ordinary passion of love to the end he <i>shies</i>, and must +invent no end of expedients to supply the want. The +devotion of the ordinary type, as Thomas Hardy has over and over +exhibited it, is precisely what Stevenson wants, to impart to his +novels the full sense of reality. The secret of morals, +says Shelley, is a going out of self. Stevenson was only on +the way to secure this grand and all-sufficing motive. His +characters, in a way, are all already like himself, romantic, but +the highest is when the ordinary and commonplace is so +apprehended that it becomes romantic, and may even, through the +artist’s deeper perception and unconscious grasp and +vision, take the hand of tragedy, and lose nothing. The +very atmosphere Stevenson so loved to create was in itself alien +to this; and, so far as he went, his most successful revelations +were but records of his own limitations. It is something +that he was to the end so much the youth, with fine impulses, if +sometimes with sympathies misdirected, and that, too, in such a +way as to render his work cold and artificial, else he might have +turned out more of the Swift than of the Sterne or +Fielding. Prince Otto and Seraphina are from this cause +mainly complete failures, alike from the point of view of nature +and of art, and the Countess von Rosen is not a complete failure, +and would perhaps have been a bit of a success, if only she had +made Prince Otto come nearer to losing his virtue. The most +perfect in style, perhaps, of all Stevenson’s efforts it is +yet most out of nature and truth,—a farce, felt to be +disguised only when read in a certain mood; and this all the more +for its perfections, just as Stevenson would have said it of a +human being too icily perfect whom he had met.</p> +<p>On this subject, Mr Baildon has some words so decisive, true, +and final, that I cannot refrain from here quoting them:</p> +<blockquote><p>“From sheer incapacity to retain it, Prince +Otto loses the regard, affection, and esteem of his wife. +He goes eavesdropping among the peasantry, and has to sit silent +while his wife’s honour is coarsely impugned. After +that I hold it is impossible for Stevenson to rehabilitate his +hero, and, with all his brilliant effects, he fails. . . . I +cannot help feeling a regret that such fine work is thrown away +on what I must honestly hold to be an unworthy subject. The +music of the spheres is rather too sublime an accompaniment for +this genteel comedy Princess. A touch of Offenbach would +seem more appropriate. Then even in comedy the hero must +not be the butt.” And it must reluctantly be +confessed that in Prince Otto you see in excess that to which +there is a tendency in almost all the rest—it is to make up +for lack of hold on human nature itself, by resources of style +and mere external technical art.</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XXII—PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED +GLOOM</h2> +<p>Now, it is in its own way surely a very remarkable thing that +Stevenson, who, like a youth, was all for <i>Heiterkeit</i>, +cheerfulness, taking and giving of pleasure, for relief, change, +variety, new impressions, new sensations, should, at the time he +did, have conceived and written a story like <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>—all in a grave, grey, sombre tone, not +aiming even generally at what at least indirectly all art is +conceived to aim at—the giving of pleasure: he himself +decisively said that it “lacked all pleasurableness, and +hence was imperfect in essence.” A very strange +utterance in face of the oft-repeated doctrine of the essays that +the one aim of art, as of true life, is to communicate pleasure, +to cheer and to elevate and improve, and in face of two of his +doctrines that life itself is a monitor to cheerfulness and +mirth. This is true: and it is only explainable on the +ground that it is youth alone which can exult in its power of +accumulating shadows and dwelling on the dark side—it is +youth that revels in the possible as a set-off to its brightness +and irresponsibility: it is youth that can delight in its own +excess of shade, and can even dispense with +sunshine—hugging to its heart the memory of its own often +self-created distresses and conjuring up and, with +self-satisfaction, brooding over the pain and imagined horrors of +a lifetime. Maturity and age kindly bring their own +relief—rendering this kind of ministry to itself no longer +desirable, even were it possible. <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i> indeed marks the crisis. It shows, and +effectively shows, the other side of the adventure +passion—the desire of escape from its own sombre +introspections, which yet, in all its “go” and glow +and glitter, tells by its very excess of their tendency to pass +into this other and apparently opposite. But here, too, +there is nothing single or separate. The device of piracy, +etc., at close of <i>Ballantrae</i>, is one of the poorest +expedients for relief in all fiction.</p> +<p>Will in <i>Will o’ the Mill</i> presents another. +When at the last moment he decides that it is not worth while to +get married, the author’s then rather incontinent +philosophy—which, by-the-bye, he did not himself act +on—spoils his story as it did so much else. Such an +ending to such a romance is worse even than any blundering such +as the commonplace inventor could be guilty of, for he would be +in a low sense natural if he were but commonplace. We need +not therefore be surprised to find Mr Gwynn thus writing:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The love scenes in <i>Weir of Hermiston</i> +are almost unsurpassable; but the central interest of the story +lies elsewhere—in the relations between father and +son. Whatever the cause, the fact is clear that in the last +years of his life Stevenson recognised in himself an ability to +treat subjects which he had hitherto avoided, and was thus no +longer under the necessity of detaching fragments from +life. Before this, he had largely confined himself to the +adventures of roving men where women had made no entrance; or, if +he treated of a settled family group, the result was what we see +in <i>The Master of Ballantrae</i>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In a word, between this work and <i>Weir of Hermiston</i> we +have the passage from mere youth to manhood, with its wider, +calmer views, and its patience, inclusiveness, and mild, genial +acceptance of types that before did not come, and could not by +any effort of will be brought, within range or made to adhere +consistently with what was already accepted and workable. +He was less the egotist now and more the realist. He was +not so prone to the high lights in which all seems overwrought, +exaggerated; concerned really with effects of a more subdued +order, if still the theme was a wee out of ordinary nature. +Enough is left to prove that Stevenson’s life-long devotion +to his art anyway was on the point of being rewarded by such a +success as he had always dreamt of: that in the man’s +nature there was power to conceive scenes of a tragic beauty and +intensity unsurpassed in our prose literature, and to create +characters not unworthy of his greatest predecessors. The +blind stroke of fate had nothing to say to the lesson of his +life, and though we deplore that he never completed his +masterpieces, we may at least be thankful that time enough was +given him to prove to his fellow-craftsmen, that such labour for +the sake of art is not without art’s peculiar +reward—the triumph of successful execution.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIII—EDINBURGH REVIEWERS’ DICTA +INAPPLICABLE TO LATER WORK</h2> +<p>From many different points of view discerning critics have +celebrated the autobiographic vein—the self-revealing turn, +the self-portraiture, the quaint, genial, yet really child-like +egotistic and even dreamy element that lies like an amalgam, +behind all Stevenson’s work. Some have even said, +that because of this, he will finally live by his essays and not +by his stories. That is extreme, and is not critically +based or justified, because, however true it may be up to a +certain point, it is not true of Stevenson’s quite latest +fictions where we see a decided breaking through of the old +limits, and an advance upon a new and a fresher and broader +sphere of interest and character altogether. But these +ideas set down truly enough at a certain date, or prior to a +certain date, are wrong and falsely directed in view of +Stevenson’s latest work and what it promised. For +instance, what a discerning and able writer in the <i>Edinburgh +Review</i> of July 1895 said truly then was in great part utterly +inapplicable to the whole of the work of the last years, for in +it there was grasp, wide and deep, of new +possibilities—promise of clear insight, discrimination, and +contrast of character, as well as firm hold of new and great +human interest under which the egotistic or autobiographic vein +was submerged or weakened. The <i>Edinburgh Reviewer</i> +wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“There was irresistible fascination in what +it would be unfair to characterise as egotism, for it came +natural to him to talk frankly and easily of himself. . . . He +could never have dreamed, like Pepys, of locking up his +confidence in a diary. From first to last, in inconsecutive +essays, in the records of sentimental touring, in fiction and in +verse, he has embodied the outer and the inner +autobiography. He discourses—he prattles—he +almost babbles about himself. He seems to have taken minute +and habitual introspection for the chief study in his analysis of +human nature, as a subject which was immediately in his reach, +and would most surely serve his purpose. We suspect much of +the success of his novels was due to the fact that as he seized +for a substructure on the scenery and situations which had +impressed him forcibly, so in the characters of the most +different types, there was always more or less of +self-portraiture. The subtle touch, eminently and +unmistakably realistic, gave life to what might otherwise have +seemed a lay-figure. . . . He hesitated again and again as to his +destination; and under mistakes, advice of friends, doubted his +chances, as a story-writer, even after <i>Treasure Island</i> had +enjoyed its special success. . . . We venture to think that, with +his love of intellectual self-indulgence, had he found +novel-writing really enjoyable, he would never have doubted at +all. But there comes in the difference between him and +Scott, whom he condemns for the slovenliness of hasty +workmanship. Scott, in his best days, sat down to his desk +and let the swift pen take its course in inspiration that seemed +to come without an effort. Even when racked with pains, and +groaning in agony, the intellectual machinery was still driven at +a high pressure by something that resembled an irrepressible +instinct. Stevenson can have had little or nothing of that +inspiriting afflatus. He did his painstaking work +conscientiously, thoughtfully; he erased, he revised, and he was +hard to satisfy. In short, it was his weird—and he +could not resist it—to set style and form before fire and +spirit.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIV—MR HENLEY’S SPITEFUL +PERVERSIONS</h2> +<p>More unfortunate still, as disturbing and prejudicing a sane +and true and disinterested view of Stevenson’s claims, was +that article of his erewhile “friend,” Mr W. E. +Henley, published on the appearance of the <i>Memoir</i> by Mr +Graham Balfour, in the <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i>. It was +well that Mr Henley there acknowledged frankly that he wrote +under a keen sense of “grievance”—a most +dangerous mood for the most soberly critical and self-restrained +of men to write in, and that most certainly Mr W. E. Henley was +not—and that he owned to having lost contact with, and +recognition of the R. L. Stevenson who went to America in 1887, +as he says, and never came back again. To do bare justice +to Stevenson it is clear that knowledge of that later Stevenson +was essential—essential whether it was calculated to deepen +sympathy or the reverse. It goes without saying that the +Louis he knew and hobnobbed with, and nursed near by the Old +Bristo Port in Edinburgh could not be the same exactly as the +Louis of Samoa and later years—to suppose so, or to expect +so, would simply be to deny all room for growth and +expansion. It is clear that the W. E. Henley of those days +was not the same as the W. E. Henley who indited that article, +and if growth and further insight are to be allowed to Mr Henley +and be pleaded as his justification <i>cum</i> spite born of +sense of grievance for such an onslaught, then clearly some +allowance in the same direction must be made for Stevenson. +One can hardly think that in his case old affection and +friendship had been so completely submerged, under feelings of +grievance and paltry pique, almost always bred of grievances +dwelt on and nursed, which it is especially bad for men of genius +to acknowledge, and to make a basis, as it were, for clearer +knowledge, insight, and judgment. In other cases the +pleading would simply amount to an immediate and complete arrest +of judgment. Mr Henley throughout writes as though whilst +he had changed, and changed in points most essential, his +erewhile friend remained exactly where he was as to literary +position and product—the Louis who went away in 1887 and +never returned, had, as Mr W. E. Henley, most unfortunately for +himself, would imply, retained the mastery, and the Louis who +never came back had made no progress, had not added an inch, not +to say a cubit, to his statue, while Mr Henley remained <i>in +statu quo</i>, and was so only to be judged. It is an +instance of the imperfect sympathy which Charles Lamb finely +celebrated—only here it is acknowledged, and the +“imperfect sympathy” pled as a ground for claiming +the full insight which only sympathy can secure. If Mr +Henley was fair to the Louis he knew and loved, it is clear that +he was and could only be unjust to the Louis who went away in +1887 and never came back.</p> +<blockquote><p>“At bottom Stevenson was an excellent +fellow. But he was of his essence what the French call +<i>personnel</i>. He was, that is, incessantly and +passionately interested in Stevenson. He could not be in +the same room with a mirror but he must invite its confidences +every time he passed it; to him there was nothing obvious in time +and eternity, and the smallest of his discoveries, his most +trivial apprehensions, were all by way of being revelations, and +as revelations must be thrust upon the world; he was never so +much in earnest, never so well pleased (this were he happy or +wretched), never so irresistible as when he wrote about +himself. <i>Withal</i>, <i>if he wanted a thing</i>, <i>he +went after it with an entire contempt of consequences</i>. +<i>For these</i>, <i>indeed</i>, <i>the Shorter Catechism was +ever prepared to answer</i>; <i>so that whether he did well or +ill</i>, <i>he was safe to come out unabashed and +cheerful</i>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Notice here, how undiscerning the mentor becomes. The +words put in “italics,” unqualified as they are, +would fit and admirably cover the character of the greatest +criminal. They would do as they stand, for Wainwright, for +Dr Dodd, for Deeming, for Neil Cream, for Canham Read, or for +Dougal of Moat Farm fame. And then the touch that, in the +Shorter Catechism, Stevenson would have found a cover or +justification for it somehow! This comes of writing under a +keen sense of grievance; and how could this be truly said of one +who was “at bottom an excellent fellow.” W. +Henley’s ethics are about as clear-obscure as is his +reading of character. Listen to him once again—more +directly on the literary point.</p> +<blockquote><p>“To tell the truth, his books are none of +mine; I mean that if I wanted reading, I do not go for it to the +<i>Edinburgh Edition</i>. I am not interested in remarks +about morals; in and out of letters. <i>I have lived a full +and varied life</i>, and my opinions are my own. <i>So</i>, +<i>if I crave the enchantment of romance</i>, <i>I ask it of +bigger men than he</i>, <i>and of bigger books than his</i>: of +<i>Esmond</i> (say) and <i>Great Expectations</i>, of +<i>Redgauntlet</i> and <i>Old Mortality</i>, <i>of La Reine +Margot</i> and <i>Bragelonne</i>, of <i>David Copperfield</i> and +<i>A Tale of Two Cities</i>; while if good writing and some other +things be in my appetite, are there not always Hazlitt and +Lamb—to say nothing of that globe of miraculous continents; +which is known to us as Shakespeare? There is his style, +you will say, and it is a fact that it is rare, and <i>in the +last</i> times better, because much simpler than in the +first. But, after all, his style is so perfectly achieved +that the achievement gets obvious: and when achievement gets +obvious, is it not by way of becoming uninteresting? And is +there not something to be said for the person who wrote that +Stevenson always reminded him of a young man dressed the best he +ever saw for the Burlington Arcade? <a name="citation10"></a><a +href="#footnote10" class="citation">[10]</a> +Stevenson’s work in letters does not now take me much, and +I decline to enter on the question of his immortality; since +that, despite what any can say, will get itself settled soon or +late, for all time. No—when I care to think of +Stevenson it is not of R. L. Stevenson—R. L. Stevenson, the +renowned, the accomplished—executing his difficult solo, +but of the Lewis that I knew and loved, and wrought for, and +worked with for so long. The successful man of letters does +not greatly interest me. I read his careful prayers and +pass on, with the certainty that, well as they read, they were +not written for print. I learn of his nameless +prodigalities, and recall some instances of conduct in another +vein. I remember, rather, the unmarried and irresponsible +Lewis; the friend, the comrade, the <i>charmeur</i>. Truly, +that last word, French as it is, is the only one that is worthy +of him. I shall ever remember him as that. The +impression of his writings disappears; the impression of himself +and his talk is ever a possession. . . . Forasmuch as he was +primarily a talker, his printed works, like these of others after +his kind, are but a sop for posterity. A last dying speech +and confession (as it were) to show that not for nothing were +they held rare fellows in their day.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Just a month or two before Mr Henley’s self-revealing +article appeared in the <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i>, Mr Chesterton, +in the <i>Daily News</i>, with almost prophetic forecast, had +said:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Mr Henley might write an excellent study of +Stevenson, but it would only be of the Henleyish part of +Stevenson, and it would show a distinct divergence from the +finished portrait of Stevenson, which would be given by Professor +Colvin.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And it were indeed hard to reconcile some things here with +what Mr Henley set down of individual works many times in the +<i>Scots and National Observer</i>, and elsewhere, and in +literary judgments as in some other things there should, at +least, be general consistency, else the search for an honest man +in the late years would be yet harder than it was when Diogenes +looked out from his tub!</p> +<p>Mr James Douglas, in the <i>Star</i>, in his half-playful and +suggestive way, chose to put it as though he regarded the article +in the <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i> as a hoax, perpetrated by some +clever, unscrupulous writer, intent on provoking both Mr Henley +and his friends, and Stevenson’s friends and +admirers. This called forth a letter from one signing +himself “A Lover of R. L. Stevenson,” which is so +good that we must give it here.</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center">A LITERARY HOAX.<br /> +TO THE EDITOR OF THE <i>STAR</i>.</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Sir</span>—I fear that, despite the +charitable scepticism of Mr Douglas, there is no doubt that Mr +Henley is the perpetrator of the saddening Depreciation of +Stevenson which has been published over his name.</p> +<p>What openings there are for reprisals let Mr Henley’s +conscience tell him; but permit me to remind him of two or three +things which R. L. Stevenson has written concerning W. E. +Henley.</p> +<p>First this scene in the infirmary at Edinburgh:</p> +<p>“(Leslie) Stephen and I sat on a couple of chairs, and +the poor fellow (Henley) sat up in his bed with his hair and +beard all tangled, and talked as cheerfully as if he had been in +a king’s palace, or the great King’s palace of the +blue air. He has taught himself two languages since he has +been lying there. <i>I shall try to be of use to +him</i>.”</p> +<p>Secondly, this passage from Stevenson’s dedication of +<i>Virginibus Puerisque</i> to “My dear William Ernest +Henley”:</p> +<p>“These papers are like milestones on the wayside of my +life; and as I look back in memory, there is hardly a stage of +that distance but I see you present with advice, reproof, or +praise. Meanwhile, many things have changed, you and I +among the rest; but I hope that our sympathy, founded on the love +of our art, and nourished by mutual assistance, shall survive +these little revolutions, undiminished, and, with God’s +help, unite us to the end.”</p> +<p>Thirdly, two scraps from letters from Stevenson to Henley, to +show that the latter was not always a depreciator of R. L. +Stevenson’s work:</p> +<p>“1. I’m glad to think I owe you the review that +pleased me best of all the reviews I ever had. . . . To live +reading such reviews and die eating ortolans—sich is my +aspiration.</p> +<p>“2. Dear lad,—If there was any more praise in what +you wrote, I think—(the editor who had pruned down Mr +Henley’s review of Stevenson’s <i>Prince Otto</i>) +has done us both a service; some of it stops my throat. . . . +Whether (considering our intimate relations) you would not do +better to refrain from reviewing me, I will leave to +yourself.”</p> +<p>And, lastly, this extract from the very last of +Stevenson’s letters to Henley, published in the two volumes +of <i>Letters</i>:</p> +<p>“It is impossible to let your new volume pass in +silence. I have not received the same thrill of poetry +since G. M.’s <i>Joy of Earth</i> volume, and <i>Love in a +Valley</i>; and I do not know that even that was so intimate and +deep. . . . I thank you for the joy you have given me, and remain +your old friend and present huge admirer, R. L. S.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It is difficult to decide on which side in this literary +friendship lies the true modesty and magnanimity? I had +rather be the author of the last message of R. L. Stevenson to W. +E. Henley, than of the last words of W. E. Henley concerning R. +L. Stevenson.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXV—MR CHRISTIE MURRAY’S IMPRESSIONS</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Mr Christie Murray</span>, writing as +“Merlin” in our handbook in the <i>Referee</i> at the +time, thus disposed of some of the points just dealt with by +us:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Here is libel on a large scale, and I have +purposely refrained from approaching it until I could show my +readers something of the spirit in which the whole attack is +conceived. ‘If he wanted a thing he went after it +with an entire contempt for consequences. For these, +indeed, the Shorter Catechist was ever prepared to answer; so +that whether he did well or ill, he was safe to come out +unabashed and cheerful.’ Now if Mr Henley does not +mean that for the very express picture of a rascal without a +conscience he has been most strangely infelicitous in his choice +of terms, and he is one of those who make so strong a profession +of duty towards mere vocables that we are obliged to take him +<i>au pied de la lettre</i>. A man who goes after whatever +he wants with an entire contempt of consequences is a scoundrel, +and the man who emerges from such an enterprise unabashed and +cheerful, whatever his conduct may have been, and justifies +himself on the principles of the Shorter Catechism, is a +hypocrite to boot. This is not the report we have of Robert +Louis Stevenson from most of those who knew him. It is a +most grave and dreadful accusation, and it is not minimised by Mr +Henley’s acknowledgment that Stevenson was a good +fellow. We all know the air of false candour which lends a +disputant so much advantage in debate. In Victor +Hugo’s tremendous indictment of Napoléon le Petit we +remember the telling allowance for fine horsemanship. It +spreads an air of impartiality over the most mordant of +Hugo’s pages. It is meant to do that. An +insignificant praise is meant to show how a whole Niagara of +blame is poured on the victim of invective in all sincerity, and +even with a touch of reluctance.</p> +<p>“Mr Henley, despite his absurdities of +‘’Tis’ and ‘it were,’ is a fairly +competent literary craftsman, and he is quite gifted enough to +make a plain man’s plain meaning an evident thing if he +chose to do it. But if for the friend for whom ‘first +and last he did share’ he can only show us the figure of +one ‘who was at bottom an excellent fellow,’ and who +had ‘an entire contempt’ for the consequences of his +own acts, he presents a picture which can only purposely be +obscured. . . .</p> +<p>“All I know of Robert Louis Stevenson I have learned +from his books, and from one unexpected impromptu letter which he +wrote to me years ago in friendly recognition of my own +work. I add the testimonies of friends who may have been of +less actual service to him than Mr Henley, but who surely loved +him better and more lastingly. These do not represent him +as the victim of an overweening personal vanity, nor as a person +reckless of the consequences of his own acts, nor as a Pecksniff +who consoled himself for moral failure out of the Shorter +Catechism. The books and the friends amongst them show me +an erratic yet lovable personality, a man of devotion and +courage, a loyal, charming, and rather irresponsible person whose +very slight faults were counter-balanced many times over by very +solid virtues. . . .</p> +<p>“To put the thing flatly, it is not a heroism to cling +to mere existence. The basest of us can do that. But +it is a heroism to maintain an equable and unbroken cheerfulness +in the face of death. For my own part, I never bowed at the +literary shrine Mr Henley and his friends were at so great pains +to rear. I am not disposed to think more loftily than I +ever thought of their idol. But the Man—the Man was +made of enduring valour and childlike charm, and these will keep +him alive when his detractors are dead and buried.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>As to the Christian name, it is notorious that he was +christened Robert Lewis—the Lewis being after his maternal +grandfather—Dr Lewis Balfour. Some attempt has been +made to show that the Louis was adopted because so many cousins +and relatives had also been so christened; but the most likely +explanation I have ever heard was that his father changed the +name to Louis, that there might be no chance through it of any +notion of association with a very prominent noisy person of the +name of Lewis, in Edinburgh, towards whom Thomas Stevenson felt +dislike, if not positive animosity. Anyhow, it is clear +from the entries in the register of pupils at the Edinburgh +Academy, in the two years when Stevenson was there, that in early +youth he was called Robert only; for in the school list for 1862 +the name appears as Robert Stevenson, without the Lewis, while in +the 1883 list it is given as Lewis Robert Stevenson. +Clearly if in earlier years Stevenson was, in his family and +elsewhere, called <i>Robert</i>, there could have then arisen no +risk of confusion with any of his relatives who bore the name of +Lewis; and all this goes to support the view which I have given +above. Anyhow he ceased to be called Robert at home, and +ceased in 1863 to be Robert on the Edinburgh Academy list, and +became Lewis Robert. Whether my view is right or not, he +was thenceforward called Louis in his family, and the name +uniformly spelt Louis. What blame on Stevenson’s part +could be attached to this family determination it is hard to +see—people are absolutely free to spell their names as they +please, and the matter would not be worth a moment’s +attention, or the waste of one drop of ink, had not Mr Henley +chosen to be very nasty about the name, and in the <i>Pall Mall +Magazine</i> article persisted in printing it Lewis as though +that were worthy of him and of it. That was not quite the +unkindest cut of all, but it was as unkind as it was +trumpery. Mr Christie Murray neatly set off the trumpery +spite of this in the following passage:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Stevenson, it appears, according to his +friend’s judgment, was ‘incessantly and passionately +interested in Stevenson,’ but most of us are incessantly +and passionately interested in ourselves. ‘He could +not be in the same room with a mirror but he must invite its +confidences every time he passed it.’ I remember that +George Sala, who was certainly under no illusion as to his own +personal aspect, made public confession of an identical +foible. Mr Henley may not have an equal affection for the +looking-glass, but he is a very poor and unimaginative reader who +does not see him gloating over the god-like proportions of the +shadow he sends sprawling over his own page. I make free to +say that a more self-conscious person than Mr Henley does not +live. ‘The best and most interesting part of +Stevenson’s life will never get written—even by +me,’ says Mr Henley.</p> +<p>“There is one curious little mark of animus, or one +equally curious affectation—I do not profess to know which, +and it is most probably a compound of the two—in Mr +Henley’s guardedly spiteful essay which asks for +notice. The dead novelist signed his second name on his +title-pages and his private correspondence +‘Louis.’ Mr Henley spells it +‘Lewis.’ Is this intended to say that Stevenson +took an ornamenting liberty with his own baptismal +appellation? If so, why not say the thing and have done +with it? Or is it one of Mr Henley’s wilful +ridiculosities? It seems to stand for some sort of meaning, +and to me, at least, it offers a jarring hint of small +spitefulness which might go for nothing if it were not so well +borne out by the general tone of Mr Henley’s article. +It is a small matter enough, God knows, but it is precisely +because it is so very small that it irritates.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVI—HERO-VILLAINS</h2> +<p>In truth, it must indeed be here repeated that Stevenson for +the reason he himself gave about <i>Deacon Brodie</i> utterly +fails in that healthy hatred of “fools and +scoundrels” on which Carlyle somewhat incontinently +dilated. Nor does he, as we have seen, draw the line +between hero and villain of the piece, as he ought to have done; +and, even for his own artistic purposes, has it too much all on +one side, to express it simply. Art demands relief from any +one phase of human nature, more especially of that phase, and +even from what is morbid or exceptional. Admitting that +such natures, say as Huish, the cockney, in the <i>Ebb-Tide</i> +on the one side, and Prince Otto on the other are possible, it is +yet absolutely demanded that they should not stand <i>alone</i>, +but have their due complement and balance present in the piece +also to deter and finally to tell on them in the action. If +“a knave or villain,” as George Eliot aptly said, is +but a fool with a circumbendibus, this not only wants to be +shown, but to have that definite human counterpart and +corrective; and this not in any indirect and perfunctory way, but +in a direct and effective sense. It is here that Stevenson +fails—fails absolutely in most of his work, save the very +latest—fails, as has been shown, in <i>The Master of +Ballantrae</i>, as it were almost of perverse and set purpose, in +lack of what one might call ethical decision which causes him to +waver or seem to waver and wobble in his judgment of his +characters or in his sympathy with them or for them. Thus +he fails to give his readers the proper cue which was his duty +both as man and artist to have given. The highest art and +the lowest are indeed here at one in demanding moral poise, if we +may call it so, that however crudely in the low, and however +artistically and refinedly in the high, vice should not only not +be set forth as absolutely triumphing, nor virtue as being +absolutely, outwardly, and inwardly defeated. It is here +the same in the melodrama of the transpontine theatre as in the +tragedies of the Greek dramatists and Shakespeare. +“The evening brings a’ ‘hame’” and +the end ought to show something to satisfy the innate craving +(for it is innate, thank Heaven! and low and high alike in +moments of <i>elevated impression</i>, acknowledge it and bow to +it) else there can scarce be true <i>dénouement</i> and +the sense of any moral rectitude or law remain as felt or +acknowledged in human nature or in the Universe itself.</p> +<p>Stevenson’s toleration and constant sermonising in the +essays—his desire to make us yield allowances all round is +so far, it may be, there in place; but it will not work out in +story or play, and declares the need for correction and +limitation the moment that he essays artistic +presentation—from the point of view of art he lacks at once +artistic clearness and decision, and from the point of view of +morality seems utterly loose and confusing. His artistic +quality here rests wholly in his style—mere style, and he +is, alas! a castaway as regards discernment and reading of human +nature in its deepest demands and laws. Herein lies the +false strain that has spoiled much of his earlier work, which +renders really superficial and confusing and undramatic his +professedly dramatic work—which never will and never can +commend the hearty suffrages of a mixed and various theatrical +audience in violating the very first rule of the theatre, and of +dramatic creation.</p> +<p>From another point of view this is my answer to Mr Pinero in +regard to the failure of Stevenson to command theatrical +success. He confuses and so far misdirects the sympathies +in issues which strictly are at once moral and dramatic.</p> +<p>I am absolutely at one with Mr Baildon, though I reach my +results from somewhat different grounds from what he does, when +he says this about <i>Beau Austin</i>, and the reason of its +failure—complete failure—on the stage:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I confess I should have liked immensely to +have seen [? to see] this piece on the boards; for only then +could one be quite sure whether it could be made convincing to an +audience and carry their sympathies in the way the author +intended. Yet the fact that <i>Beau Austin</i>, in spite of +being ‘put on’ by so eminent an actor-manager as Mr +Beerbohm Tree, was no great success on the stage, is a fair proof +that the piece lacked some of the essentials, good or bad, of +dramatic success. Now a drama, like a picture or a musical +composition, must have a certain unity of key and tone. You +can, indeed, mingle comedy with tragedy as an interlude or relief +from the strain and stress of the serious interest of the +piece. But you cannot reverse the process and mingle +tragedy with comedy. Once touch the fine spun-silk of the +pretty fire-balloon of comedy with the tragic dagger, and it +falls to earth a shrivelled nothing. And the reason that no +melodrama can be great art is just that it is a compromise +between tragedy and comedy, a mixture of tragedy with comedy and +not comedy with tragedy. So in drama, the middle course, +proverbially the safest, is in reality the most dangerous. +Now I maintain that in <i>Beau Austin</i> we have an element of +tragedy. The betrayal of a beautiful, pure and noble-minded +woman is surely at once the basest act a man can be capable of, +and a more tragic event than death itself to the woman. +Richardson, in <i>Clarissa Harlowe</i>, is well aware of this, +and is perfectly right in making his <i>dénouement</i> +tragic. Stevenson, on the other hand, patches up the matter +into a rather tame comedy. It is even much tamer than it +would have been in the case of Lovelace and Clarissa Harlowe; for +Lovelace is a strong character, a man who could have been put +through some crucial atonement, and come out purged and +ennobled. But Beau Austin we feel is but a frip. He +endures a few minutes of sharp humiliation, it is true, but to +the spectator this cannot but seem a very insufficient expiation, +not only of the wrong he had done one woman, but of the +indefinite number of wrongs he had done others. He is at +once the villain and the hero of the piece, and in the narrow +limits of a brief comedy this transformation cannot be +convincingly effected. Wrongly or rightly, a theatrical +audience, like the spectators of a trial, demand a definite +verdict and sentence, and no play can satisfy which does not +reasonably meet this demand. And this arises not from any +merely Christian prudery or Puritanism, for it is as true for +Greek tragedy and other high forms of dramatic art.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The transformation of villain into hero, if possible at all, +could only be convincingly effected in a piece of wide scope, +where there was room for working out the effect of some great +shock, upheaval of the nature, change due to deep and +unprecedented experiences—religious conversion, witnessing +of sudden death, providential rescue from great peril of death, +or circumstance of that kind; but to be effective and convincing +it needs to be marked and <i>fully justified</i> in some such +way; and no cleverness in the writer will absolve him from +deference to this great law in serious work for presentation on +the stage; if mere farces or little comedies may seem sometimes +to contravene it, yet this—even this—is only in +appearance.</p> +<p>True, it is not the dramatists part <i>of himself</i> to +condemn, or to approve, or praise: he has to present, and to +present various characters faithfully in their relation to each +other, and their effect upon each other. But the moral +element cannot be expunged or set lightly aside because it is +closely involved in the very working out and presentation of +these relations, and the effect upon each other. Character +is vital. And character, if it tells in life, in influence +and affection, must be made to tell directly also in the +drama. There is no escape from this—none; the +dramatist is lopsided if he tries to ignore it; he is a monster +if he is wholly blind to it—like the poet in <i>In +Memoriam</i>, “Without a conscience or an aim.” +Mr Henley, in his notorious, all too confessional, and yet rather +affected article on Stevenson in the <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i>, +has a remark which I confess astonished me—a remark I could +never forget as coming from him. He said that he “had +lived a very full and varied life, and had no interest in remarks +about morals.” “Remarks about morals” +are, nevertheless, in essence, the pith of all the books to which +he referred, as those to which he turned in preference to the +<i>Edinburgh Edition</i> of R. L. Stevenson’s works. +The moral element is implicit in the drama, and it is implicit +there because it is implicit in life itself, or so the great +common-sense conceives it and demands it. What we might +call the asides proper of the drama, are “remarks about +morals,” nothing else—the chorus in the Greek tragedy +gathered up “remarks about morals” as near as might +be to the “remarks about morals” in the streets of +that day, only shaped to a certain artistic consistency. +Shakespeare is rich in “remarks about morals,” often +coming near, indeed, to personal utterance, and this not only +when Polonius addresses his son before his going forth on his +travels. Mr Henley here only too plainly confessed, indeed, +to lack of that conviction and insight which, had he but +possessed them, might have done a little to relieve <i>Beau +Austin</i> and the other plays in which he collaborated with R. +L. Stevenson, from their besetting and fatal weakness. The +two youths, alas! thought they could be grandly original by +despising, or worse, contemning “remarks about +morals” in the loftier as in the lower sense. To +“live a full and varied life,” if the experience +derived from it is to have expression in the drama, is only to +have the richer resource in “remarks about +morals.” If this is perverted under any +self-conscious notion of doing something spick-and-span new in +the way of character and plot, alien to all the old conceptions, +then we know our writers set themselves boldly at loggerheads +with certain old-fashioned and yet older new-fashioned laws, +which forbid the violation of certain common demands of the +ordinary nature and common-sense; and for the lack of this, as +said already, no cleverness, no resource, no style or graft, will +any way make up. So long as this is tried, with whatever +concentration of mind and purpose, failure is yet inevitable, and +the more inevitable the more concentration and less of humorous +by-play, because genius itself, if it despises the general moral +sentiment and instinct for moral proportion—an ethnic +reward and punishment, so to say—is all astray, working +outside the line; and this, if Mr Pinero will kindly excuse me, +is the secret of the failure of these plays, and not want of +concentration, etc., in the sense he meant, or as he has put +it.</p> +<p>Stevenson rather affected what he called “tail-foremost +morality,” a kind of inversion in the field of morals, as +De Quincey mixed it up with tail-foremost humour in <i>Murder as +a Fine Art</i>, etc., etc., but for all such perversions as these +the stage is a grand test and corrector, and such perversions, +and not “remarks about morals,” are most strictly +prohibited there. Perverted subtleties of the sort +Stevenson in earlier times especially much affected are not only +amiss but ruinous on the stage; and what genius itself would +maybe sanction, common-sense must reject and rigidly cut +away. Final success and triumph come largely by <i>this</i> +kind of condensation and concentration, and the stern and severe +lopping off of the indulgence of the <i>egotistical</i> genius, +which is human discipline, and the best exponent of the doctrine +of unity also. This is the straight and the narrow way +along which genius, if it walk but faithfully, sows as it goes in +the dramatic pathway all the flowers of human passion, hope, +love, terror, and triumph.</p> +<p>I find it advisable, if not needful, here to reinforce my own +impressions, at some points, by another quotation from Mr +Baildon, if he will allow me, in which Stevenson’s +dependence in certain respects on the dream-faculty is +emphasised, and to it is traced a certain tendency to a moral +callousness or indifference which is one of the things in which +the waking Stevenson transparently suffered now and then +invasions from the dream-Stevenson—the result, a kind of +spot, as we may call it, on the eye of the moral sense; it is a +small spot; but we know how a very small object held close before +the eye will wholly shut out the most lovely natural prospects, +interposing distressful phantasmagoria, due to the strained and, +for the time, morbid condition of the organ itself. So, it +must be confessed, it is to a great extent here.</p> +<p>But listen to Mr Baildon:</p> +<p>“In <i>A Chapter on Dreams</i>, Stevenson confesses his +indebtedness to this still mysterious agency. From a child +he had been a great and vivid dreamer, his dreams often taking +such frightful shape that he used to awake ‘clinging in +terror to the bedpost.’ Later in life his dreams +continued to be frequent and vivid, but less terrifying in +character and more continuous and systematic. ‘The +Brownies,’ as he picturesquely names that +‘sub-conscious imagination,’ as the scientist would +call it, that works with such surprising freedom and ingenuity in +our dreams, became, as it were, <i>collaborateurs</i> in his work +of authorship. He declares that they invented plots and +even elaborated whole novels, and that, not in a single night or +single dream, but continuously, and from one night to another, +like a story in serial parts. Long before this essay was +written or published, I had been struck by this phantasmal +dream-like quality in some of Stevenson’s works, which I +was puzzled to account for, until I read this extraordinary +explanation, for explanation it undoubtedly affords. +Anything imagined in a dream would have a tendency, when retold, +to retain something of its dream-like character, and I have on +doubt one could trace in many instances and distinguish the +dreaming and the waking Stevenson, though in others they may be +blended beyond recognition. The trouble with the Brownies +or the dream-Stevenson <i>was his or their want of moral +sense</i>, so that they sometimes presented the waking author +with plots which he could not make use of. Of this +Stevenson gives an instance in which a complete story of marked +ingenuity is vetoed through the moral impossibility of its +presentment by a writer so scrupulous (and in some directions he +is extremely scrupulous) as Stevenson was. But Stevenson +admits that his most famous story, <i>The Strange Case of Dr +Jekyll and Mr Hyde</i>, was not only suggested by a dream, but +that some of the most important and most criticised points, such +as the matter of the powder, were taken direct from the +dream. It had been extremely instructive and interesting +had he gone more into detail and mentioned some of the other +stories into which the dream-element entered largely and pointed +out its influence, and would have given us a better clue than we +have or now ever can have.</p> +<p>“Even in <i>The Suicide Club</i> and the +<i>Rajah’s Diamond</i>, I seem to feel strongly the +presence of the dream-Stevenson. . . . <i>At certain points one +feels conscious of a certain moral callousness</i>, <i>such as +marks the dream state</i>, <i>as in the murder of Colonel +Geraldine’s brother</i>, <i>the horror of which never seems +to come fully home to us</i>. But let no one suppose these +stories are lacking in vividness and in strangely realistic +detail; for this is of the very nature of dreaming at its height. +. . . While the <i>dramatis personæ</i> play their parts +with the utmost spirit while the story proceeds, they do not, as +the past creations do, seem to survive this first contact and +live in our minds. This is particularly true of the +women. They are well drawn, and play the assigned parts +well enough, but they do not, as a rule, make a place for +themselves either in our hearts or memories. If there is an +exception it is Elvira, in <i>Providence and the Guitar</i>; but +we remember her chiefly by the one picture of her falling asleep, +after the misadventures of the night, at the supper-table, with +her head on her husband’s shoulder, and her hand locked in +his with instinctive, almost unconscious tenderness.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVII—MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON AND +OTHERS</h2> +<p>From our point of view it will therefore be seen that we could +not have read Mr George Moore’s wonderfully uncritical and +misdirected diatribe against Stevenson in <i>The Daily +Chronicle</i> of 24th April 1897, without amusement, if not +without laughter—indeed, we confess we may here quote +Shakespeare’s words, we “laughed so consumedly” +that, unless for Mr Moore’s high position and his assured +self-confidence, we should not trust ourselves to refer to it, +not to speak of writing about it. It was a review of <i>The +Secret Rose</i> by W. B. Yeats, but it passed after one single +touch to belittling abuse of Stevenson—an abuse that was +justified the more, in Mr Moore’s idea, because Stevenson +was dead. Had he been alive he might have had something to +say to it, in the way, at least, of fable and moral. And +when towards the close Mr Moore again quotes from Mr Yeats, it is +still “harping on my daughter” to undo Stevenson, as +though a rat was behind the arras, as in <i>Hamlet</i>. +“Stevenson,” says he, “is the leader of these +countless writers who perceive nothing but the visible +world,” and these are antagonistic to the great literature, +of which Mr Yeats’s <i>Secret Rose</i> is a survival or a +renaissance, a literature whose watchword should be Mr +Yeats’s significant phrase, “When one looks into the +darkness there is always something there.” No doubt +Mr Yeats’s product all along the line ranks with the great +literature—unlike Homer, according to Mr Moore, he never +nods, though in the light of great literature, poor Stevenson is +always at his noddings, and more than that, in the words of +Leland’s Hans Breitmann, he has “nodings +on.” He is poor, naked, miserable—a mere +pretender—and has no share in the makings of great +literature. Mr Moore has stripped him to the skin, and +leaves him to the mercy of rain and storm, like Lear, though Lear +had a solid ground to go on in self-aid, which Stevenson had not; +he had daughters, and one of them was Cordelia, after all. +This comes of painting all boldly in black and white: Mr Yeats is +white, R. L. Stevenson is black, and I am sure neither one nor +other, because simply of their self-devotion to their art, could +have subscribed heartily to Mr Moore’s black art and white +art theory. Mr Yeats is hardly the truest modern Celtic +artist I take him for, if he can fully subscribe to all this.</p> +<p>Mr Marriott Watson has a little unadvisedly, in my view, too +like ambition, fallen on ’tother side, and celebrated +Stevenson as the master of the horrifying. <a +name="citation11"></a><a href="#footnote11" +class="citation">[11]</a> He even finds the +<i>Ebb-Tide</i>, and Huish, the cockney, in it richly +illustrative and grand. “There never was a more +magnificent cad in literature, and never a more foul-hearted +little ruffian. His picture glitters (!) with life, and +when he curls up on the island beach with the bullet in his body, +amid the flames of the vitriol he had intended for another, the +reader’s shudder conveys something also, even (!) of +regret.”</p> +<p>And well it may! Individual taste and opinion are but +individual taste and opinion, but the <i>Ebb-Tide</i> and the +cockney I should be inclined to cite as a specimen of +Stevenson’s all too facile make-believe, in which there is +too definite a machinery set agoing for horrors for the horrors +to be quite genuine. The process is often too forced with +Stevenson, and the incidents too much of the manufactured order, +for the triumph of that simplicity which is of inspiration and +unassailable. Here Stevenson, alas! all too often, +<i>pace</i> Mr Marriott Watson, treads on the skirts of E. A. +Poe, and that in his least composed and elevated artistic +moments. And though, it is true, that “genius will +not follow rules laid down by desultory critics,” yet when +it is averred that “this piece of work fulfils +Aristotle’s definition of true tragedy, in accomplishing +upon the reader a certain purification of the emotions by means +of terror and pity,” expectations will be raised in many of +the new generation, doomed in the cases of the more sensitive and +discerning, at all events, not to be gratified. There is a +distinction, very bold and very essential, between melodrama, +however carefully worked and staged, and that tragedy to which +Aristotle was there referring. Stevenson’s +“horrifying,” to my mind, too often touches the +trying borders of melodrama, and nowhere more so than in the very +forced and unequal <i>Ebb-Tide</i>, which, with its rather +doubtful moral and forced incident when it is good, seems merely +to borrow from what had gone before, if not a very little even +from some of what came after. No service is done to an +author like Stevenson by fatefully praising him for precisely the +wrong thing.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Romance attracted Stevenson, at least +during the earlier part of his life, as a lodestone attracts the +magnet. To romance he brought the highest gifts, and he has +left us not only essays of delicate humour” (should this +not be “essays <i>full of</i>” <i>or</i> +“characterised by”?) “and sensitive +imagination, but stories also which thrill with the realities of +life, which are faithful pictures of the times and tempers he +dealt with, and which, I firmly believe, will live so” +(should it not be “as”?) “long as our noble +English language.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Marriott Watson sees very clearly in some things; but +occasionally he misses the point. The problem is here +raised how two honest, far-seeing critics could see so very +differently on so simple a subject.</p> +<p>Mr Baildon says about the <i>Ebb-Tide</i>:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I can compare his next book, the +<i>Ebb-Tide</i> (in collaboration with Osbourne) to little better +than a mud-bath, for we find ourselves, as it were, unrelieved by +dredging among the scum and dregs of humanity, the ‘white +trash’ of the Pacific. Here we have Stevenson’s +masterly but utterly revolting incarnation of the lowest, vilest, +vulgarest villainy in the cockney, Huish. Stevenson’s +other villains shock us by their cruel and wicked conduct; but +there is a kind of fallen satanic glory about them, some shining +threads of possible virtue. They might have been good, even +great in goodness, but for the malady of not wanting. But +Huish is a creature hatched in slime, his soul has no true +humanity: it is squat and toad-like, and can only spit venom. . . +. He himself felt a sort of revulsive after-sickness for the +story, and calls it in one passage of his <i>Vailima Letters</i> +‘the ever-to-be-execrated <i>Ebb-Tide</i>’ (pp. +178 and 184). . . . He repented of it like a debauch, and, as +with some men after a debauch, felt cleared and strengthened +instead of wrecked. So, after what in one sense was his +lowest plunge, Stevenson rose to the greatest height. That +is the tribute to his virtue and strength indeed, but it does not +change the character of the <i>Ebb-Tide</i> as ‘the +ever-to-be-execrated.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Baildon truly says (p. 49):</p> +<blockquote><p>“The curious point is that Stevenson’s +own great fault, that tendency to what has been called the +‘Twopence-coloured’ style, is always at its worst in +books over which he collaborated.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Verax,” in one of his “Occasional +Papers” in the <i>Daily News</i> on “The Average +Reader” has this passage:</p> +<blockquote><p>“We should not object to a writer who could +repeat Barrie in <i>A Window in Thrums</i>, nor to one who would +paint a scene as Louis Stevenson paints Attwater alone on his +South Sea island, the approach of the pirates to the harbour, and +their subsequent reception and fate. All these are surely +specimens of brilliant writing, and they are brilliant because, +in the first place, they give truth. The events described +must, in the supposed circumstances, and with the given +characters, have happened in the way stated. Only in none +of the specimens have we a mere photograph of the outside of what +took place. We have great pictures by genius of +the—to the prosaic eye—invisible realities, as well +as of the outward form of the actions. We behold and are +made to feel the solemnity, the wildness, the pathos, the +earnestness, the agony, the pity, the moral squalor, the +grotesque fun, the delicate and minute beauty, the natural +loveliness and loneliness, the quiet desperate bravery, or +whatever else any of these wonderful pictures disclose to our +view. Had we been lookers-on, we, the average readers, +could not have seen these qualities for ourselves. But they +are there, and genius enables us to see them. Genius makes +truth shine.</p> +<p>“Is it not, therefore, probable that the brilliancy +which we average readers do not want, and only laugh at when we +get it, is something altogether different? I think I know +what it is. It is an attempt to describe with words without +thoughts, an effort to make readers see something the writer has +never seen himself in his mind’s eye. He has no +revelation, no vision, nothing to disclose, and to produce an +impression uses words, words, words, makes daub, daub, daub, +without any definite purpose, and certainly without any real, or +artistic, or definite effect. To describe, one must first +of all see, and if we see anything the description of it will, as +far as it is in us, come as effortless and natural as the leaves +on trees, or as ‘the tender greening of April +meadows.’ I, therefore, more than suspect that the +brilliancy which the average reader laughs at is not +brilliancy. A pot of flaming red paint thrown at a canvas +does not make a picture.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Now there is vision for outward picture or separate incident, +which may exist quite apart from what may be called moral, +spiritual, or even loftily imaginative conception, at once +commanding unity and commanding it. There can be no doubt +of Stevenson’s power in the former line—the earliest +as the latest of his works are witnesses to it. <i>The +Master of Ballantrae</i> abounds in picture and incident and +dramatic situations and touches; but it lacks true unity, and the +reason simply is given by Stevenson himself—that the +“ending shames, perhaps degrades, the beginning,” as +it is in the <i>Ebb-Tide</i>, with the cockney Huish, +“execrable.” “We have great pictures by +genius of the—to the prosaic eye—invisible realities, +as well as the outward form of the action.” True, but +the “invisible realities” form that from which true +unity is derived, else their partial presence but makes the whole +the more incomplete and lop-sided, if not indeed, top-heavy, from +light weight beneath; and it is in the unity derived from this +higher pervading, yet not too assertive “invisible +reality,” that Stevenson most often fails, and is, in his +own words, “execrable”; the ending shaming, if not +degrading, the beginning—“and without the true sense +of pleasurableness; and therefore really imperfect <i>in +essence</i>.” Ah, it is to be feared that Stevenson, +viewing it in retrospect, was a far truer critic of his own work, +than many or most of his all too effusive and admiring +critics—from Lord Rosebery to Mr Marriott Watson.</p> +<p>Amid the too extreme deliverances of detractors and especially +of erewhile friends, become detractors or panegyrists, who +disturb judgment by overzeal, which is often but half-blindness, +it is pleasant to come on one who bears the balances in his hand, +and will report faithfully as he has seen and felt, neither more +nor less than what he holds is true. Mr Andrew Lang wrote +an article in the <i>Morning Post</i> of 16th December 1901, +under the title “Literary Quarrels,” in which, as I +think, he fulfilled his part in midst of the talk about Mr +Henley’s regrettable attack on Stevenson.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Without defending the character of a friend +whom even now I almost daily miss, as that character was +displayed in circumstances unknown to me, I think that I ought to +speak of him as I found him. Perhaps our sympathy was +mainly intellectual. Constantly do those who knew him +desire to turn to him, to communicate with him, to share with him +the pleasure of some idea, some little discovery about men or +things in which he would have taken pleasure, increasing our own +by the gaiety of his enjoyment, the brilliance of his +appreciation. We may say, as Scott said at the grave of +John Ballantyne, that he has taken with him half the sunlight out +of our lives. That he was sympathetic and interested in the +work of others (which I understand has been denied) I have reason +to know. His work and mine lay far apart: mine, I think, we +never discussed, I did not expect it to interest him. But +in a fragmentary manuscript of his after his death I found the +unlooked for and touching evidence of his kindness. Again, +he once wrote to me from Samoa about the work of a friend of mine +whom he had never met. His remarks were ideally judicious, +a model of serviceable criticism. I found him chivalrous as +an honest boy; brave, with an indomitable gaiety of courage; on +the point of honour, a Sydney or a Bayard (so he seemed to me); +that he was open-handed I have reason to believe; he took life +‘with a frolic welcome.’ That he was +self-conscious, and saw himself as it were, from without; that he +was fond of attitude (like his own brave admirals) he himself +knew well, and I doubt not that he would laugh at himself and his +habit of ‘playing at’ things after the fashion of +childhood. Genius is the survival into maturity of the +inspiration of childhood, and Stevenson is not the only genius +who has retained from childhood something more than its +inspiration. Other examples readily occur to the +memory—in one way Byron, in another Tennyson. None of +us is perfect: I do not want to erect an immaculate clay-cold +image of a man, in marble or in sugar-candy. But I will say +that I do not remember ever to have heard Mr Stevenson utter a +word against any mortal, friend or foe. Even in a case +where he had, or believed himself to have, received some wrong, +his comment was merely humorous. Especially when very +young, his dislike of respectability and of the <i>bourgeois</i> +(a literary tradition) led him to show a kind of contempt for +virtues which, though certainly respectable, are no less +certainly virtuous. He was then more or less seduced by the +Bohemian legend, but he was intolerant of the fudge about the +rights and privileges of genius. A man’s first +business, he thought, was ‘keep his end up’ by his +work. If, what he reckoned his inspired work would not +serve, then by something else. Of many virtues he was an +ensample and an inspiring force. One foible I admit: the +tendency to inopportune benevolence. Mr Graham Balfour says +that if he fell into ill terms with a man he would try to do him +good by stealth. Though he had seen much of the world and +of men, this practice showed an invincible ignorance of +mankind. It is improbable, on the doctrine of chances, that +he was always in the wrong; and it is probable, as he was human, +that he always thought himself in the right. But as the +other party to the misunderstanding, being also human, would +necessarily think himself in the right, such secret benefits +would be, as Sophocles says, ‘the gifts of foeman and +unprofitable.’ The secret would leak out, the +benefits would be rejected, the misunderstanding would be +embittered. This reminds me of an anecdote which is not +given in Mr Graham Balfour’s biography. As a little +delicate, lonely boy in Edinburgh, Mr Stevenson read a book +called <i>Ministering Children</i>. I have a faint +recollection of this work concerning a small Lord and Lady +Bountiful. Children, we know, like to ‘play at’ +the events and characters they have read about, and the boy +wanted to play at being a ministering child. He +‘scanned his whole horizon’ for somebody to play +with, and thought he had found his playmate. From the +window he observed street boys (in Scots ‘keelies’) +enjoying themselves. But one child was out of the sports, a +little lame fellow, the son of a baker. Here was a +chance! After some misgivings Louis hardened his heart, put +on his cap, walked out—a refined little +figure—approached the object of his sympathy, and said, +‘Will you let me play with you?’ ‘Go to +hell!’ said the democratic offspring of the baker. +This lesson against doing good by stealth to persons of unknown +or hostile disposition was, it seems, thrown away. Such +endeavours are apt to be misconstrued.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII—UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS</h2> +<p>The complete artist should not be mystical-moralist any more +than the man who “perceives only the visible +world”—he should not engage himself with problems in +the direct sense any more than he should blind himself to their +effect upon others, whom he should study, and under certain +conditions represent, though he should not commit himself to any +form of zealot faith, yet should he not be, as Lord Tennyson puts +it in the Palace of Art:</p> +<blockquote><p>“As God holding no form of creed,<br /> +But contemplating all,”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>because his power lies in the broadness of his humanity +touched to fine issues whenever there is the seal at once of +truth, reality, and passion, and the tragedy bred of their +contact and conflict.</p> +<p>All these things are to him real and clamant in the measure +that they aid appeal to heart and emotion—in the measure +that they may, in his hands, be made to tell for sympathy and +general effect. He creates an atmosphere in which each and +all may be seen the more effectively, but never seen alone or +separate, but only in strict relation to each other that they may +heighten the sense of some supreme controlling power in the +destinies of men, which with the ancients was figured as Fate, +and for which the moderns have hardly yet found an enduring and +exhaustive name. Character revealed in reference to that, +is the ideal and the aim of all high creative art. +Stevenson’s narrowness, allied to a quaint and occasionally +just a wee pedantic finickiness, as we may call it—an +over-elaborate, almost tricky play with mere words and phrases, +was in so far alien to the very highest—he was too often +like a man magnetised and moving at the dictates of some outside +influence rather than according to his own freewill and as he +would.</p> +<p>Action in creative literary art is a <i>sine quâ +non</i>; keeping all the characters and parts in unison, that a +true <i>dénouement</i>, determined by their own tendencies +and temperaments, may appear; dialogue and all asides, if we may +call them so, being supererogatory and weak really unless they +aid this and are constantly contributory to it. Egotistical +predeterminations, however artfully intruded, are, alien to the +full result, the unity which is finally craved: Stevenson fails, +when he does fail, distinctly from excess of egotistic regards; +he is, as Henley has said, in the French sense, too +<i>personnel</i>, and cannot escape from it. And though +these personal regards are exceedingly interesting and indeed +fascinating from the point of view of autobiographical study, +they are, and cannot but be, a drawback on fiction or the +disinterested revelation of life and reality. Instead, +therefore, of “the visible world,” as the only thing +seen, Stevenson’s defect is, that between it and him lies a +cloud strictly self-projected, like breath on a mirror, which +dims the lines of reality and confuses the character marks, in +fact melting them into each other; and in his sympathetic +regards, causing them all to become too much alike. Scott +had more of the power of healthy self-withdrawal, creating more +of a free atmosphere, in which his characters could freely +move—though in this, it must be confessed, he failed far +more with women than with men. The very defects poor +Carlyle found in Scott, and for which he dealt so severely with +him, as sounding no depth, are really the basis of his strength, +precisely as the absence of them were the defects of Goethe, who +invariably ran his characters finally into the mere moods of his +own mind and the mould of his errant philosophy, so that they +became merely erratic symbols without hold in the common +sympathy. Whether <i>Walverwandschaften</i>, <i>Wilhelm +Meister</i>, or <i>Faust</i>, it is still the same—the +company before all is done are translated into misty shapes that +he actually needs to label for our identification and for his +own. Even Mr G. H. Lewes saw this and could not help +declaring his own lack of interest in the latter parts of +Goethe’s greatest efforts. Stevenson, too, tends to +run his characters into symbols—his moralist-fabulist +determinations are too much for him—he would translate them +into a kind of chessmen, moved or moving on a board. The +essence of romance strictly is, that as the characters will not +submit themselves to the check of reality, the romancer may +consciously, if it suits him, touch them at any point with the +magic wand of symbol, and if he finds a consistency in mere +fanciful invention it is enough. Tieck’s +<i>Phantasus</i> and George MacDonald’s <i>Phantastes</i> +are ready instances illustrative of this. But it is very +different with the story of real life, where there is a definite +check in the common-sense and knowledge of the reader, and where +the highest victory always lies in drawing from the reader the +admission—“that is life—life exactly as I have +seen and known it. Though I could never have put it so, +still it only realises my own conception and observation. +That is something lovingly remembered and re-presented, and this +master makes me lovingly remember too, though ’twas his to +represent and reproduce with such vigor, vividness and truth that +he carried me with him, exactly as though I had been looking on +real men and women playing their part or their game in the great +world.”</p> +<p>Mr Zangwill, in his own style, wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“He seeks to combine the novel of character +with the novel of adventure; to develop character through +romantic action, and to bring out your hero at the end of the +episode, not the fixed character he was at the beginning, as is +the way of adventure books, but a modified creature. . . . It is +his essays and his personality, rather than his novels, that will +count with posterity. On the whole, a great provincial +writer. Whether he has that inherent grip which makes a +man’s provinciality the very source of his strength . . . +only the centuries can show.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The romanticist to the end pursued Stevenson—he could +not, wholly or at once, shake off the bonds in which he had bound +himself to his first love, and it was the romanticist crossed by +the casuist, and the mystic—Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Markheim +and Will of the Mill, insisted on his acknowledging them in his +work up to the end. <i>The modified creature</i> at the end +of Mr Zangwill was modified too directly by the egotistic element +as well as through the romantic action, and this point missed the +great defect was missed, and Mr Zangwill spoke only in +generals.</p> +<p>M. Schwob, after having related how unreal a real +sheep’s heart looked when introduced on the end of +Giovanni’s dagger in a French performance of John +Ford’s <i>Annabella and Giovanni</i>, and how at the next +performance the audience was duly thrilled when Annabella’s +bleeding heart, made of a bit of red flannel, was borne upon the +stage, goes on to say significantly:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Il me semble que les personnages de +Stevenson ont justement cette espèce de réalisme +irréal. La large figure luisante de Long John, la +couleur blême du crâne de Thevenin Pensete +s’attachent à la mémoire de nos yeux en +vertue de leur irréalité même. Ce sont +des fantômes de la vérité, hallucinants comme +de vrais fantômes. Notez en passant que les traits de +John Silver hallucinent Jim Hawkins, et que François +Villon est hanté par l’aspect de Thevenin +Pensete.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Perhaps the most notable fact arising here, and one that well +deserves celebration, is this, that Stevenson’s development +towards a broader and more natural creation was coincident with a +definite return on the religious views which had so powerfully +prevailed with his father—a circumstance which it is to be +feared did not, any more than some other changes in him, at all +commend itself to Mr Henley, though he had deliberately dubbed +him even in the times of nursing nigh to the Old Bristo Port in +Edinburgh—something of “Shorter Catechist.” +Anyway Miss Simpson deliberately wrote:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Mr Henley takes exception to +Stevenson’s later phase in life—what he calls his +‘Shorter Catechism phase.’ It should be +remembered that Mr Henley is not a Scotsman, and in some things +has little sympathy with Scotch characteristics. Stevenson, +in his Samoan days, harked back to the teaching of his youth; the +tenets of the Shorter Catechism, which his mother and nurse had +dinned into his head, were not forgotten. Mr Henley knew +him best, as Stevenson says in the preface to <i>Virginibus +Puerisque</i> dedicated to Henley, ‘when he lived his life +at twenty-five.’ In these days he had [in some +degree] forgotten about the Shorter Catechism, but the +‘solemn pause’ between Saturday and Monday came back +in full force to R. L. Stevenson in Samoa.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Now to me that is a most suggestive and significant +fact. It will be the business of future critics to show in +how far such falling back would of necessity modify what Mr +Baildon has set down as his corner-stone of morality, and how far +it was bound to modify the atmosphere—the purely egotistic, +hedonistic, and artistic atmosphere, in which, in his earlier +life as a novelist, at all events, he had been, on the whole, for +long whiles content to work.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIX—LOVE OF VAGABONDS</h2> +<p>What is very remarkable in Stevenson is that a man who was so +much the dreamer of dreams—the mystic moralist, the +constant questioner and speculator on human destiny and human +perversity, and the riddles that arise on the search for the +threads of motive and incentives to human action—moreover, +a man, who constantly suffered from one of the most trying and +weakening forms of ill-health—should have been so +full-blooded, as it were, so keen for contact with all forms of +human life and character, what is called the rougher and coarser +being by no means excluded. Not only this: he was himself a +rover—seeking daily adventure and contact with men and +women of alien habit and taste and liking. His patience is +supported by his humour. He was a bit of a vagabond in the +good sense of the word, and always going round in search of +“honest men,” like Diogenes, and with no tub to +retire into or the desire for it. He thus on this side +touches the Chaucers and their kindred, as well as the Spensers +and Dantes and their often illusive +<i>confrères</i>. His voyage as a steerage passenger +across the Atlantic is only one out of a whole chapter of such +episodes, and is more significant and characteristic even than +the <i>Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes</i> or the <i>Inland +Voyage</i>. These might be ranked with the +“Sentimental Journeys” that have sometimes been the +fashion—that was truly of a prosaic and risky order. +The appeal thus made to an element deep in the English nature +will do much to keep his memory green in the hearts that could +not rise to appreciation of his style and literary gifts at +all. He loves the roadways and the by-ways, and those to be +met with there—like him in this, though unlike him in most +else. The love of the roadsides and the greenwood—and +the queer miscellany of life there unfolded and ever +changing—a kind of gipsy-like longing for the tent and +familiar contact with nature and rude human-nature in the open +dates from beyond Chaucer, and remains and will have +gratification—the longing for novelty and all the +accidents, as it were, of pilgrimage and rude social +travel. You see it bubble up, like a true and new +nature-spring, through all the surface coatings of culture and +artificiality, in Stevenson. He anew, without pretence, +enlivens it—makes it first a part of himself, and then a +part of literature once more. Listen to him, as he +sincerely sings this passion for the pilgrimage—or the +modern phase of it—innocent vagabond roving:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Give to me the life I love,<br /> + Let the lave go by me;<br /> +Give the jolly heaven above,<br /> + And the by-way nigh me:<br /> +Bed in the bush, with stars to see;<br /> + Bread I dip in the river—<br /> +Here’s the life for a man like me,<br /> + Here’s the life for ever. . . .</p> +<p>“Let the blow fall soon or late;<br /> + Let what will be o’er me;<br /> +Give the face of earth around<br /> + And the road before me.<br /> +Health I ask not, hope nor love,<br /> + Nor a friend to know me:<br /> +All I ask the heaven above,<br /> + And the road below me.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>True; this is put in the mouth of another, but Stevenson could +not have so voiced it, had he not been the born rover that he +was, with longing for the roadside, the high hills, and forests +and newcomers and varied miscellaneous company. Here he +does more directly speak in his own person and quite to the same +effect:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I will make you brooches and toys for your +delight<br /> +Of bird song at morning, and star shine at night,<br /> +I will make a palace fit for you and me,<br /> +Of green days in forests and blue days at sea.</p> +<p>“I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your +room,<br /> +Where white flows the river, and bright blows the broom,<br /> +And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white,<br /> +In rainfall at morning and dew-fall at night.</p> +<p>“And this shall be for music when no one else is +near,<br /> +The fine song for singing, the rare song to hear!<br /> +That only I remember, that only you admire,<br /> +Of the broad road that stretches, and the roadside +fire.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Here Stevenson, though original in his vein and way, but +follows a great and gracious company in which Fielding and Sterne +and so many others stand as pleasant proctors. Scott and +Dickens have each in their way essayed it, and made much of it +beyond what mere sentiment would have reached. +<i>Pickwick</i> itself—and we must always regard Dickens as +having himself gone already over every bit of road, described +every nook and corner, and tried every resource—is a +vagrant fellow, in a group of erratic and most quaint wanderers +or pilgrims. This is but a return phase of it; Vincent +Crummles and Mrs Crummles and the “Infant +Phenomenon,” yet another. The whole interest lies in +the roadways, and the little inns, and the odd and unexpected +<i>rencontres</i> with oddly-assorted fellows there experienced: +glimpses of grim or grimy, or forbidding, or happy, smiling +smirking vagrants, and out-at-elbows fellow-passengers and +guests, with jests and quips and cranks, and hanky-panky +even. On high roads and in inns, and alehouses, with +travelling players, rogues and tramps, Dickens was quite at home; +and what is yet more, he made us all quite at home with them: and +he did it as Chaucer did it by thorough good spirits and +“hail-fellow-well-met.” And, with all his +faults, he has this merit as well as some others, that he went +willingly on pilgrimage always, and took others, promoting always +love of comrades, fun, and humorous by-play. The latest +great romancer, too, took his side: like Dickens, he was here +full brother of Dan Chaucer, and followed him. How +characteristic it is when he tells Mr Trigg that he preferred +Samoa to Honolulu because it was more savage, and therefore +yielded more <i>fun</i>.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXX—LORD ROSEBERY’S CASE</h2> +<p>Immediately on reading Lord Rosebery’s address as +Chairman of the meeting in Edinburgh to promote the erection of a +monument to R. L. Stevenson, I wrote to him politely asking him +whether, since he quoted a passage from a somewhat early essay by +Stevenson naming the authors who had chiefly influenced him in +point of style, his Lordship should not, merely in justice and +for the sake of balance, have referred to Thoreau. I also +remarked that Stevenson’s later style sometimes showed too +much self-conscious conflict of his various models in his mind +while he was in the act of writing, and that this now and then +imparted too much an air of artifice to his later compositions, +and that those who knew most would be most troubled by it. +Of that letter, I much regret now that I did not keep any copy; +but I think I did incidentally refer to the friendship with which +Stevenson had for so many years honoured me. This is a copy +of the letter received in reply:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“38 <span +class="smcap">Berkeley Square</span>, W.,<br /> +17<i>th</i> <i>December</i> 1896.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,—I am much +obliged for your letter, and can only state that the name of +Thoreau was not mentioned by Stevenson himself, and therefore I +could not cite it in my quotation.</p> +<p>“With regard to the style of Stevenson’s later +works, I am inclined to agree with you.-Believe me, yours very +faithfully,</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><span +class="smcap">Rosebery</span>.</p> +<p>“Dr <span class="smcap">Alexander H. +Japp</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>This I at once replied to as follows:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“<span +class="smcap">National Liberal Club</span>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">Whitehall Place</span>, S.W.,<br /> +19<i>th</i> <i>December</i> 1896.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,—It is true R. +L. Stevenson did not refer to Thoreau in the passage to which you +allude, for the good reason that he could not, since he did not +know Thoreau till after it was written; but if you will oblige me +and be so good as to turn to p. xix. of Preface, <i>By Way of +Criticism</i>, to <i>Familiar Studies of Men and Books</i> you +will read:</p> +<p>“‘Upon me this pure, narrow, sunnily-ascetic +Thoreau had exercised a wondrous charm. <i>I have scarce +written ten sentences since I was introduced to him</i>, <i>but +his influence might be somewhere detected by a close +observer</i>.’</p> +<p>“It is very detectable in many passages of +nature-description and of reflection. I write, my Lord, +merely that, in case opportunity should arise, you might notice +this fact. I am sure R. L. Stevenson would have liked it +recognised.—I remain, my Lord, always yours faithfully, +etc.,</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Alexander H. Japp</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p262b.jpg"> +<img alt="Manuscript letter by R.L.S." src="images/p262s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p>In reply to this Lord Rosebery sent me only the most formal +acknowledgment, not in the least encouraging me in any way to +further aid him in the matter with regard to suggestions of any +kind; so that I was helpless to press on his lordship the need +for some corrections on other points which I would most willingly +have tendered to him had he shown himself inclined or ready to +receive them.</p> +<p>I might also have referred Lord Rosebery to the article in +<i>The British Weekly</i> (<i>1887</i>), “Books that have +Influenced Me,” where, after having spoken of Shakespeare, +the <i>Vicomte de Bragelonne</i>, Bunyan, Montaigne, Goethe, +Martial, Marcus Aurelius’s <i>Meditations</i>, and +Wordsworth, he proceeds:</p> +<blockquote><p>“I suppose, when I am done, I shall find +that I have forgotten much that is influential, as I see already +I have forgotten Thoreau.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I need but to add to what has been said already that, had Lord +Rosebery written and told me the result of his references and +encouraged me to such an exercise, I should by-and-by have been +very pleased to point out to him that he blundered, proving +himself no master in Burns’ literature, precisely as Mr +Henley blundered about Burns’ ancestry, when he gives +confirmation to the idea that Burns came of a race of peasants on +both sides, and was himself nothing but a peasant.</p> +<p>When the opportunity came to correct such blunders, +corrections which I had even implored him to make, Lord Rosebery +(who by several London papers had been spoken of as +“knowing more than all the experts about all his +themes”), that is, when his volume was being prepared for +press, did not act on my good advice given him +“<i>free</i>, <i>gratis</i>, <i>for nothing</i>”; no; +he contented himself with simply slicing out columns from the +<i>Times</i>, or allowing another man to do so for him, and +reprinting them <i>literatim et verbatim</i>, all imperfect and +misleading, as they stood. <i>Scripta manet</i> alas! only +too truly exemplified to his disadvantage. But with that +note of mine in his hand, protesting against an ominous and fatal +omission as regards the confessed influences that had operated on +Stevenson, he goes on, or allows Mr Geake to go on, quite as +though he had verified matters and found that I was wrong as +regards the facts on which I based my appeal to him for +recognition of Thoreau as having influenced Stevenson in +style. Had he attended to correcting his serious errors +about Stevenson, and some at least of those about Burns, thus +adding, say, a dozen or twenty pages to his book wholly fresh and +new and accurate, then the <i>Times</i> could not have got, even +if it had sought, an injunction against his publishers and him; +and there would have been no necessity that he should pad out +other and later speeches by just a little whining over what was +entirely due to his own disregard of good advice, his own +neglect—his own fault—a neglect and a fault showing +determination not to revise where revision in justice to his +subject’s own free and frank acknowledgments made it most +essential and necessary.</p> +<p>Mr Justice North gave his decision against Lord Rosebery and +his publishers, while the Lords of Appeal went in his favour; but +the House of Lords reaffirmed the decision of Mr Justice North +and granted a perpetual injunction against this book. The +copyright in his speech is Lord Rosebery’s, but the +copyright in the <i>Times</i>’ report is the +<i>Times</i>’. You see one of the ideas underlying +the law is that no manner of speech is quite perfect as the man +speaks it, or is beyond revision, improvement, or extension, and, +if there is but one <i>verbatim</i> report, as was the case of +some of these speeches and addresses, then it is incumbent on the +author, if he wishes to preserve his copyright, to revise and +correct his speeches and addresses, so as to make them at least +in details so far differ from the reported form. This thing +ought Lord Rosebery to have done, on ethical and literary +<i>grounds</i>, not to speak of legal and self-interested +grounds; and I, for one, who from the first held exactly the view +the House of Lords has affirmed, do confess that I have no +sympathy for Lord Rosebery, since he had before him the +suggestion and the materials for as substantial alterations and +additions from my own hands, with as much more for other portions +of his book, had he informed me of his appreciation, as would +have saved him and his book from such a sadly ironical fate as +has overtaken him and it.</p> +<p>From the whole business—since “free, gratis, for +nothing,” I offered him as good advice as any lawyer in the +three kingdoms could have done for large payment, and since he +never deemed it worth while, even to tell me the results of his +reference to <i>Familiar Studies</i>, I here and now say +deliberately that his conduct to me was scarcely so courteous and +grateful and graceful as it might have been. How +different—very different—the way in which the late R. +L. Stevenson rewarded me for a literary service no whit greater +or more essentially valuable to him than this service rendered to +Lord Rosebery might have been to him.</p> +<p>This chapter would most probably not have been printed, had +not Mr Coates re-issued the inadequate and most misleading +paragraph about Mr Stevenson and style in his Lord +Rosebery’s <i>Life and Speeches</i> exactly as it was +before, thus perpetuating at once the error and the wrong, in +spite of all my trouble, warnings, and protests. It is a +tragicomedy, if not a farce altogether, considering who are the +principal actors in it. And let those who have copies of +the queer prohibited book cherish them and thank me; for that I +do by this give a new interest and value to it as a curiosity, +law-inhibited, if not as high and conscientious +literature—which it is not.</p> +<p>I remember very well about the time Lord Rosebery spoke on +Burns, and Stevenson, and London, that certain London papers +spoke of his deliverances as indicating more +knowledge—fuller and exacter knowledge—of all these +subjects than the greatest professed experts possessed. +That is their extravagant and most reckless way, especially if +the person spoken about is a “great politician” or a +man of rank. They think they are safe with such +superlatives applied to a brilliant and clever peer (with large +estates and many interests), and an ex-Prime Minister! But +literature is a republic, and it must here be said, though all +unwillingly, that Lord Rosebery is but an amateur—a +superficial though a clever amateur after all, and their +extravagances do not change the fact. I declare him an +amateur in Burns’ literature and study because of what I +have said elsewhere, and there are many points to add to that if +need were. I have proved above from his own words that he +was crassly and unpardonably ignorant of some of the most +important points in R. L. Stevenson’s development when he +delivered that address in Edinburgh on Stevenson—a thing +very, very pardonable—seeing that he is run after to do +“speakings” of this sort; but to go on, in face of +such warning and protest, printing his most misleading errors is +not pardonable, and the legal recorded result is my justification +and his condemnation, the more surely that even that would not +awaken him so far as to cause him to restrain Mr Coates from +reproducing in his <i>Life and Speeches</i>, just as it was +originally, that peccant passage. I am fully ready to prove +also that, though Chairman of the London County Council for a +period, and though he made a very clever address at one of Sir W. +Besant’s lectures, there is much yet—very +much—he might learn from Sir W. Besant’s writings on +London. It isn’t so easy to outshine all the +experts—even for a clever peer who has been Prime Minister, +though it is very, very easy to flatter Lord Rosebery, with a +purpose or purposes, as did at least once also with rarest tact, +at Glasgow, indicating so many other things and possibilities, a +certain very courtly ex-Moderator of the Church of Scotland.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXI—MR GOSSE AND MS. OF <i>TREASURE +ISLAND</i></h2> +<p>Mr Edmund Gosse has been so good as to set down, with rather +an air of too much authority, that both R. L. Stevenson and I +deceived ourselves completely in the matter of my little share in +the <i>Treasure Island</i> business, and that too much credit was +sought by me or given to me, for the little service I rendered to +R. L. Stevenson, and to the world, say, in helping to secure for +it an element of pleasure through many generations. I have +not <i>sought</i> any recognition from the world in this matter, +and even the mention of it became so intolerable to me that I +eschewed all writing about it, in the face of the most stupid and +misleading statements, till Mr Sidney Colvin wrote and asked me +to set down my account of the matter in my own words. This +I did, as it would have been really rude to refuse a request so +graciously made, and the reader has it in the <i>Academy</i> of +10th March 1900. Nevertheless, Mr Gosse’s statements +were revived and quoted, and the thing seemed ever to revolve +again in a round of controversy.</p> +<p>Now, with regard to the reliability in this matter of Mr +Edmund Gosse, let me copy here a little note made at request some +time ago, dealing with two points. The first is this:</p> +<p>1. <i>Most assuredly</i> I carried away from Braemar in my +portmanteau, as R. L. Stevenson says in <i>Idler’s</i> +article and in chapter of <i>My First Book</i> reprinted in +<i>Edinburgh Edition</i>, several chapters of <i>Treasure +Island</i>. On that point R. L. Stevenson, myself, and Mr +James Henderson, to whom I took these, could not all be wrong and +co-operating to mislead the public. These chapters, at +least vii. or viii., as Mr Henderson remembers, would include the +<i>first three</i>, that is, <i>finally revised versions for +press</i>. Mr Gosse could not then <i>have heard R. L. +Stevenson read from these final versions but from first +draughts</i> <span class="smcap">only</span>, and I am positively +certain that with some of the later chapters R. L. Stevenson +wrote them off-hand, and with great ease, and did not revise them +to the extent of at all needing to re-write them, as I remember +he was proud to tell me, being then fully in the vein, as he put +it, and pleased to credit me with a share in this good result, +and saying “my enthusiasm over it had set him up +steep.” There was then, in my idea, a necessity that +Stevenson should fill up a gap by verbal summary to Mr Gosse +(which Mr Gosse has forgotten), bringing the incident up to a +further point than Mr Gosse now thinks. I am certain of my +facts under this head; and as Mr Gosse clearly fancies he heard +R. L. Stevenson read all from final versions and is +mistaken—<i>completely</i> mistaken there—he may be +just as wrong and the victim of error or bad memory elsewhere +after the lapse of more than twenty years.</p> +<p>2. I gave the pencilled outline of incident and plot to Mr +Henderson—a fact he distinctly remembers. This fact +completely meets and disposes of Mr Robert Leighton’s quite +imaginative <i>Billy Bo’sun</i> notion, and is absolute as +to R. L. Stevenson before he left Braemar on the 21st September +1881, or even before I left it on 26th August 1881, having clear +in his mind the whole scheme of the work, though we know very +well that the absolute re-writing out finally for press of the +concluding part of the book was done at Davos. Mr Henderson +has always made it the strictest rule in his editorship that the +complete outline of the plot and incident of the latter part of a +story must be supplied to him, if the whole story is not +submitted to him in MS.; and the agreement, if I am not much +mistaken, was entered into days before R. L. Stevenson left +Braemar, and when he came up to London some short time after to +go to Weybridge, the only arrangement then needed to be made was +about the forwarding of proofs to him.</p> +<p>The publication of <i>Treasure Island</i> in <i>Young +Folks</i> began on the 1st October 1881, No. 565 and ran on in +the following order:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: center"><i>October</i> 1, +1881.<br /> +THE PROLOGUE</p> +<p>No. 565.<br /> +I. The Old Sea Dog at the Admiral Benbow.<br /> +II. Black Dog Appears and Disappears.</p> +<p>No. 566.<br /> +Dated <i>October</i> 8, 1881.<br /> +III. The Black Spot.</p> +<p>No. 567.<br /> +Dated <i>October</i> 15, 1881.<br /> +IV. The Sea Chart.<br /> +V. The Last of the Blind Man.<br /> +VI. The Captain’s Papers.</p> +<p>No. 568.<br /> +Dated <i>October</i> 22, 1881.<br /> +THE STORY<br /> +I. I go to Bristol.<br /> +II. The Sea-Cook.<br /> +Ill. Powder and Arms.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Now, as the numbers of <i>Young Folks</i> were printed about a +fortnight in advance of the date they bear under the title, it is +clear that not only must the contract have been executed days +before the middle of September, but that a large proportion of +the <i>copy</i> must have been in Mr Henderson’s hands at +that date too, as he must have been entirely satisfied that the +story would go on and be finished in a definite time. On no +other terms would he have begun the publication of it. He +was not in the least likely to have accepted a story from a man +who, though known as an essayist, had not yet published anything +in the way of a long story, on the ground merely of three +chapters of prologue. Mr Gosse left Braemar on 5th +September, when he says nine chapters were written, and Mr +Henderson had offered terms for the story before the last of +these could have reached him. That is on seeing, say six +chapters of prologue. But when Mr Gosse speaks about three +chapters only written, does he mean three of the prologue or +three of the story, in addition to prologue, or what does he +mean? The facts are clear. I took away in my +portmanteau a large portion of the MS., together with a very full +outline of the rest of the story, so that Mr Stevenson was, +despite Mr Gosse’s cavillings, <i>substantially</i> right +when he wrote in <i>My First Book</i> in the <i>Idler</i>, etc., +that “when he (Dr Japp) left us he carried away the +manuscript in his portmanteau.” There was nothing of +the nature of an abandonment of the story at any point, nor any +difficulty whatever arose in this respect in regard to it.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXII—STEVENSON PORTRAITS</h2> +<p>Of the portraits of Stevenson a word or two may be said. +There is a very good early photograph of him, taken not very long +before the date of my visit to him at Braemar in 1881, and is an +admirable likeness—characteristic not only in expression, +but in pose and attitude, for it fixes him in a favourite +position of his; and is, at the same time, very easy and +natural. The velvet jacket, as I have remarked, was then +his habitual wear, and the thin fingers holding the constant +cigarette an inseparable associate and accompaniment.</p> +<p>He acknowledged himself that he was a difficult subject to +paint—not at all a good sitter—impatient and apt to +rebel at posing and time spent in arrangement of details—a +fact he has himself, as we shall see, set on record in his funny +verses to Count Nerli, who painted as successful a portrait as +any. The little miniature, full-length, by Mr J. S. +Sarjent, A.R.A., which was painted at Bournemouth in 1885, is +confessedly a mere sketch and much of a caricature: it is in +America. Sir W. B. Richmond has an unfinished portrait, +painted in 1885 or 1886—it has never passed out of the +hands of the artist,—a photogravure from it is our +frontispiece.</p> +<p>There is a medallion done by St Gauden’s, representing +Stevenson in bed propped up by pillows. It is thought to be +a pretty good likeness, and it is now in Mr Sidney Colvin’s +possession. Others, drawings, etc., are not of much +account.</p> +<p>And now we come to the Nerli portrait, of which so much has +been written. Stevenson himself regarded it as the best +portrait of him ever painted, and certainly it also is +characteristic and effective, and though not what may be called a +pleasant likeness, is probably a good representation of him in +the later years of his life. Count Nerli actually undertook +a voyage to Samoa in 1892, mainly with the idea of painting this +portrait. He and Stevenson became great friends, as +Stevenson naïvely tells in the verses we have already +referred to, but even this did not quite overcome +Stevenson’s restlessness. He avenged himself by +composing these verses as he sat:</p> +<blockquote><p>Did ever mortal man hear tell o’ sic a +ticklin’ ferlie<br /> +As the comin’ on to Apia here o’ the painter Mr +Nerli?<br /> +He cam’; and, O, for o’ human freen’s o’ +a’ he was the pearlie—<br /> +The pearl o’ a’ the painter folk was surely Mr +Nerli.<br /> +He took a thraw to paint mysel’; he painted late and +early;<br /> +O wow! the many a yawn I’ve yawned i’ the beard +o’ Mr Nerli.<br /> +Whiles I wad sleep and whiles wad wake, an’ whiles was mair +than surly;<br /> +I wondered sair as I sat there fornent the eyes o’ +Nerli.<br /> +O will he paint me the way I want, as bonnie as a girlie?<br /> +O will he paint me an ugly tyke?—and be d-d to Mr Nerli.<br +/> +But still an’ on whichever it be, he is a canty kerlie,<br +/> +The Lord protect the back an’ neck o’ honest Mr +Nerli.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Hammerton gives this account of the Nerli portrait:</p> +<blockquote><p>“The history of the Nerli portrait is +peculiar. After being exhibited for some time in New +Zealand it was bought, in the course of this year, by a lady who +was travelling there, for a hundred guineas. She then +offered it for that sum to the Scottish National Portrait +Gallery; but the Trustees of the Board of Manufactures—that +oddly named body to which is entrusted the fostering care of Art +in Scotland, and, in consequence, the superintendence of the +National Portrait Gallery—did not see their way to accept +the offer. Some surprise has been expressed at the action +of the Trustees in thus declining to avail themselves of the +opportunity of obtaining the portrait of one of the most +distinguished Scotsmen of recent times. It can hardly have +been for want of money, for though the funds at their disposal +for the purchase of ordinary works of art are but limited, no +longer ago than last year they were the recipients of a very +handsome legacy from the late Mr J. M. Gray, the accomplished and +much lamented Curator of the Scottish National Portrait +Gallery—a legacy left them for the express purpose of +acquiring portraits of distinguished Scotsmen, and the income of +which was amply sufficient to have enabled them to purchase this +portrait. One is therefore almost shut up to the conclusion +that the Trustees were influenced in their decision by one of the +two following reasons:</p> +<p>“1. That they did not consider Stevenson worthy of a +place in the gallery. This is a position so +incomprehensible and so utterly opposed to public sentiment that +one can hardly credit it having been the cause of this +refusal. Whatever may be the place which Stevenson may +ultimately take as an author, and however opinions may differ as +to the merits of his work, no one can deny that he was one of the +most popular writers of his day, and that as a mere master of +style, if for nothing else, his works will be read so long as +there are students of English Literature. Surely the +portrait of one for whom such a claim may legitimately be made +cannot be considered altogether unworthy of a place in the +National Collection, as one of Scotland’s most +distinguished sons.</p> +<p>“2. The only other reason which can be suggested as +having weighed with the Trustees in their decision is one which +in some cases might be held to be worthy of consideration. +It is conceivable that in the case of some men the Trustees might +be of opinion that there was plenty of time to consider the +matter, and that in the meantime there was always the chance of +some generous donor presenting them with a portrait. But, +as has been shown above, the portraits of Stevenson are +practically confined to two: one of these is in America, and +there is not the least chance of its ever coming here; and the +other they have refused. And, as it is understood that the +Trustees have a rule that they do not accept any portrait which +has not been painted from the life, they preclude themselves from +acquiring a copy of any existing picture or even a portrait done +from memory.</p> +<p>“It is rumoured that the Nerli portrait may ultimately +find a resting-place in the National Collection of Portraits in +London. If this should prove to be the case, what a +commentary on the old saying: ‘A prophet is not without +honour save in his own country.’”</p> +</blockquote> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIII—LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM</h2> +<p>Nothing could perhaps be more wearisome than to travel +o’er the wide sandy area of Stevenson criticism and +commentary, and expose the many and sad and grotesque errors that +meet one there. Mr Baildon’s slip is innocent, +compared with many when he says (p. 106) <i>Treasure Island</i> +appeared in <i>Young Folks</i> as <i>The Sea-Cook</i>. It +did nothing of the kind; it is on plain record in print, even in +the pages of the <i>Edinburgh Edition</i>, that Mr James +Henderson would not have the title <i>The Sea-Cook</i>, as he did +not like it, and insisted on its being <i>Treasure +Island</i>. To him, therefore, the vastly better title is +due. Mr Henley was in doubt if Mr Henderson was still alive +when he wrote the brilliant and elevated article on “Some +Novels” in the <i>North American</i>, and as a certain dark +bird killed Cock Robin, so he killed off Dr Japp, and not to be +outdone, got in an ideal “Colonel” <i>Jack</i>; so Mr +Baildon there follows Henley, unaware that Mr Henderson did not +like <i>The Sea-Cook</i>, and was still alive, and that a certain +Jack in the fatal <i>North American</i> has Japp’s +credit.</p> +<p>Mr Baildon’s words are:</p> +<blockquote><p>“This was the famous book of adventure, +<i>Treasure Island</i>, appearing first as <i>The Sea-Cook</i> in +a boy’s paper, where it made no great stir. But, on +its publication in volume form, with the vastly better title, the +book at once ‘boomed,’ as the phrase goes, to an +extent then, in 1882, almost unprecedented. The secret of +its immense success may almost be expressed in a phrase by saying +that it is a book like <i>Gulliver’s Travels</i>, <i>The +Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, and <i>Robinson Crusoe</i> itself +for all ages—boys, men, and women.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Which just shows how far lapse as to a fact may lead to +critical misreadings also.</p> +<p>Mr Hammerton sometimes lets good folks say in his pages, +without correction, what is certainly not correct. Thus at +one place we are told that Stevenson was only known as Louis in +print, whereas that was the only name by which he was known in +his own family. Then Mr Gosse, at p. 34, is allowed to +write:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Professor Blackie was among them on the +steamer from the Hebrides, a famous figure that calls for no +description, and a voluble shaggy man, clad in homespun, with +spectacles forward upon his nose, who it was whispered to us, was +Mr Sam Bough, the Scottish Academician, <i>a water-colour painter +of some repute</i>, who was to die in 1878.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Sam Bough <i>was</i> “a water-colour painter of some +repute,” but a painter in oils of yet greater +repute—a man of rare strength, resource, and +facility—never, perhaps, wholly escaping from some traces +of his early experiences in scene-painting, but a true genius in +his art. Ah, well I remember him, though an older man, yet +youthful in the band of young Scotch artists among whom as a +youngster I was privileged to move in Edinburgh—Pettie, +Chalmers, M’Whirter, Peter Graham, MacTaggart, MacDonald, +John Burr, and Bough. Bough could be voluble on art; and +many a talk I had with him as with the others named, especially +with John Burr. Bough and he both could talk as well as +paint, and talk right well. Bough had a slight cast in the +eye; when he got a <i>wee</i> excited on his subject he would +come close to you with head shaking, and spectacles displaced, +and forelock wagging, and the cast would seem to die away. +Was this a fact, or was it an illusion on my part? I have +often asked myself that question, and now I ask it of +others. Can any of my good friends in Edinburgh say; can Mr +Caw help me here, either to confirm or to correct me? I +venture to insert here an anecdote, with which my friend of old +days, Mr Wm. MacTaggart, R.S.A., in a letter kindly favours +me:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Sam Bough was a very sociable man; and, +when on a sketching tour, liked to have a young artist or two +with him. Jack Nisbett played the violin, and Sam the +’cello, etc. Jack was fond of telling that Sam used +to let them all choose the best views, and then he would take +what was left; and Jack, with mild astonishment, would say, that +‘it generally turned out to be the best—on the +canvas!’”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In Mr Hammerton’s copy of the verses in reply to Mr +Crockett’s dedication of <i>The Stickit Minister</i> to +Stevenson, in which occurred the fine phrase “The grey +Galloway lands, where about the graves of the martyrs the whaups +are crying, his heart remembers how”:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Blows the wind to-day and the sun and the +rain are flying:<br /> + Blows the wind on the moors to-day and now,<br /> +Where about the graves of the martyrs the whaups are crying,<br +/> + My heart remembers how.</p> +<p>“Grey recumbent tombs of the dead in desert places,<br +/> + Standing stones on the vacant wine-red moor,<br /> +Hills of sheep, and the <i>homes</i> of the silent vanished +races,<br /> + And winds austere and pure.</p> +<p>“Be it granted me to behold you again in dying,<br /> + Hills of home! and to hear again the call—<br +/> +Hear about the graves of the martyrs the pee-weet crying,<br /> + And hear no more at all.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mr Hammerton prints <i>howes</i> instead of <i>homes</i>, +which I have italicised above. And I may note, though it +does not affect the poetry, if it does a little affect the +natural history, that the <i>pee-weets</i> and the whaups are not +the same—the one is the curlew, and the other is the +lapwing—the one most frequenting wild, heathery or peaty +moorland, and the other pasture or even ploughed land—so +that it is a great pity for unity and simplicity alike that +Stevenson did not repeat the “whaup,” but wrote +rather as though pee-weet or pee-weets were the same as +whaups—the common call of the one is <i>Ker-lee</i>, +<i>ker-lee</i>, and of the other <i>pee-weet</i>, +<i>pee-weet</i>, hence its common name.</p> +<p>It is a pity, too, that Mr Hammerton has no records of some +portions of the life at Davos Platz. Not only was Stevenson +ill there in April 1892, but his wife collapsed, and the tender +concern for her made havoc with some details of his literary +work. It is good to know this. Such errata or +omissions throw a finer light on his character than controlling +perfection would do. Ah, I remember how my old friend W. B. +Rands (“Matthew Browne” and “Henry +Holbeach”) was wont to declare that were men perfect they +would be isolated, if not idiotic, that we are united to each +other by our defects—that even physical beauty would be +dead like later Greek statues, were these not departures from the +perfect lines. The letter given by me at p. 28 transfigures +in its light, some of his work at that time.</p> +<p>And then what an opportunity, we deeply regret to say, Mr +Hammerton wholly missed, when he passed over without due +explanation or commentary that most significant +pamphlet—the <i>Address to the Scottish Clergy</i>. +If Mr Hammerton had but duly and closely studied that and its +bearings and suggestions in many directions, then he would have +written such a chapter for true enlightenment and for interest as +exactly his book—attractive though it is in much—yet +specially lacks. It is to be hoped that Mr Sidney Colvin +will not once more miss the chance which is thus still left open +to him to perfect his <i>Life of Stevenson</i>, and make it more +interpretive than anything yet published. If he does this, +then, a dreadful <i>lacuna</i> in the <i>Edinburgh Edition</i> +will also be supplied.</p> +<p>Carefully reading over again Mr Arthur Symons’ +<i>Studies in Two Literatures</i>—published some years +ago—I have come across instances of apparent contradiction +which, so far as I can see, he does not critically altogether +reconcile, despite his ingenuity and great charm of style. +One relates to Thoreau, who, while still “sturdy” as +Emerson says, “and like an elm tree,” as his sister +Sophia says, showed exactly the same love of nature and power of +interpreting her as he did after in his later comparatively short +period of “invalidity,” while Mr Symons says his view +of Nature absolutely was that of the invalid, classing him +unqualifiedly with Jefferies and Stevenson, as invalid. +Thoreau’s mark even in the short later period of +“invalidity” was complete and robust independence and +triumph over it—a thing which I have no doubt wholly +captivated Stevenson, as scarce anything else would have done, as +a victory in the exact <i>rôle</i> he himself was most +ambitious to fill. For did not he too wrestle well with the +“wolverine” he carried on his back—in this like +Addington Symonds and Alexander Pope? Surely I cannot be +wrong here to reinforce my statement by a passage from a letter +written by Sophia Thoreau to her good friend Daniel Ricketson, +after her brother’s death, the more that R. L. Stevenson +would have greatly exulted too in its cheery and invincible +stoicism:</p> +<blockquote><p>“Profound joy mingles with my grief. I +feel as if something very beautiful had happened—not death; +although Henry is with us no longer, yet the memory of his sweet +and virtuous soul must ever cheer and comfort me. My heart +is filled with praise to God for the gift of such a brother, and +may I never distrust the love and wisdom of Him who made him and +who has now called him to labour in more glorious fields than +earth affords. You ask for some particulars relating to +Henry’s illness. I feel like saying that Henry was +never affected, never reached by it. I never before saw +such a manifestation of the power of spirit over matter. +Very often I heard him tell his visitors that he enjoyed +existence as well as ever. The thought of death, he said, +did not trouble him. His thoughts had entertained him all +his life and did still. . . . He considered occupation as +necessary for the sick as for those in health, and accomplished a +vast amount of labour in those last few months.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>A rare “invalidity” this—a little confusing +easy classifications. I think Stevenson would have felt and +said that brother and sister were well worthy of each other; and +that the sister was almost as grand and cheery a stoic, with no +literary profession of it, as was the brother.</p> +<p>The other thing relates to Stevenson’s <i>human +soul</i>. I find Mr Symons says, at p. 243, that Stevenson +“had something a trifle elfish and uncanny about him, as of +a bewitched being who was not actually human—had not +actually a human soul”—in which there may be a +glimmer of truth viewed from his revelation of artistic +curiosities in some aspects, but is hardly true of him otherwise; +and this Mr Symons himself seems to have felt, when, at p. 246, +he writes: “He is one of those writers who speak <i>to us +on easy terms</i>, with whom we <i>may exchange +affections</i>.” How “affections” could +be exchanged on easy terms between the normal human being and an +elfish creature actually <i>without a human soul</i> (seeing that +affections are, as Mr Matthew Arnold might have said, at least, +three-fourths of soul) is more, I confess, than I can quite see +at present; but in this rather <i>maladroit</i> contradiction Mr +Symons does point at one phase of the problem of +Stevenson—this, namely that to all the ordinary happy or +pleasure-endings he opposes, as it were of set purpose, gloom, as +though to certain things he was quite indifferent, and though, as +we have seen, his actual life and practice were quite opposed to +this.</p> +<p>I am sorry I <i>cannot</i> find the link in Mr Symons’ +essay, which would quite make these two statements consistently +coincide critically. As an enthusiastic, though I hope +still a discriminating, Stevensonian, I do wish Mr Symons would +help us to it somehow hereafter. It would be well worth his +doing, in my opinion.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIV—LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY</h2> +<p>Among many letters received by me in acknowledgment of, or in +commentary on, my little tributes to R. L. Stevenson, in various +journals and magazines, I find the following, which I give here +for reasons purely personal, and because my readers may with me, +join in admiration of the fancy, grace and beauty of the +poems. I must preface the first poem by a letter, which +explains the genesis of the poem, and relates a striking and very +touching incident:</p> +<blockquote><p style="text-align: right">“37 <span +class="smcap">St Donatt’s Road</span>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">Lewisham High Road</span>, S.E.,<br /> +1<i>st</i> <i>March</i> 1895.</p> +<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,—As you have +written so much about your friend, the late Robert Louis +Stevenson, and quoted many tributes to his genius from +contemporary writers, I take the liberty of sending you herewith +some verses of mine which appeared in <i>The Weekly Sun</i> of +November last. I sent a copy of these verses to Samoa, but +unfortunately the great novelist died before they reached +it. I have, however, this week, received a little note from +Mrs Strong, which runs as follows:</p> +<p>“‘Your poem of “Greeting” came too +late. I can only thank you by sending a little moss that I +plucked from a tree overhanging his grave on Vaea +Mountain.’</p> +<p>“I trust you will appreciate my motive in sending you +the poem. I do not wish to obtrude my claims as a +verse-writer upon your notice, but I thought the incident I have +recited would be interesting to one who is so devoted a collector +of Stevensoniana.—Respectfully yours,</p> +<p><span class="smcap">F. J. Cox</span>.”</p> +</blockquote> +<h3>GREETING</h3> +<p>(TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, IN SAMOA)</p> +<p>We, pent in cities, prisoned in the mart,<br /> +Can know you only as a man apart,<br /> +But ever-present through your matchless art.</p> +<p>You have exchanged the old, familiar ways<br /> +For isles, where, through the range of splendid days,<br /> +Her treasure Nature lavishly displays.</p> +<p>There, by the gracious sweep of ampler seas,<br /> +That swell responsive to the odorous breeze.<br /> +You have the wine of Life, and we the lees!</p> +<p>You mark, perchance, within your island bowers,<br /> +The slow departure of the languorous hours,<br /> +And breathe the sweetness of the strange wild-flowers.</p> +<p>And everything your soul and sense delights—<br /> +But in the solemn wonder of your nights,<br /> +When Peace her message on the landscape writes;</p> +<p>When Ocean scarcely flecks her marge with foam—<br /> +Your thoughts must sometimes from your island roam,<br /> +To centre on the sober face of Home.</p> +<p>Though many a league of water rolls between<br /> +The simple beauty of an English scene,<br /> +From all these wilder charms your love may wean.</p> +<p>Some kindly sprite may bring you as a boon<br /> +Sweets from the rose that crowns imperial June,<br /> +Or reminiscence of the throstle’s tune;</p> +<p>Yea, gladly grant you, with a generous hand,<br /> +Far glimpses of the winding, wind-swept strand,<br /> +The glens and mountains of your native land,</p> +<p>Until you hear the pipes upon the breeze—<br /> +But wake unto the wild realities<br /> +The tangled forests and the boundless seas!</p> +<p>For lo! the moonless night has passed away,<br /> +A sudden dawn dispels the shadows grey,<br /> +The glad sea moves and hails the quickening day.</p> +<p>New life within the arbours of your fief<br /> +Awakes the blossom, quivers in the leaf,<br /> +And splendour flames upon the coral reef.</p> +<p>If such a prospect stimulate your art,<br /> +More than our meadows where the shadows dart,<br /> +More than the life which throbs in London’s heart,</p> +<p>Then stay, encircled by your Southern bowers,<br /> +And weave, amid the incense of the flowers,<br /> +The skein of fair romance—the gain is ours!</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><span class="smcap">F. J. +Cox</span>.</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><i>Weekly Sun</i>, 11<i>th</i> +November 1904.</p> +<h3>R. L. S., IN MEMORIAM.</h3> +<p>An elfin wight as e’er from faeryland<br /> + Came to us straight with favour in his eyes,<br /> + Of wondrous seed that led him to the prize<br /> +Of fancy, with the magic rod in hand.<br /> +Ah, there in faeryland we saw him stand,<br /> + As for a while he walked with smiles and sighs,<br +/> + Amongst us, finding still the gem that buys<br /> +Delight and joy at genius’s command.</p> +<p>And now thy place is empty: fare thee well;<br /> + Thou livest still in hearts that owe thee more<br /> + Than gold can reckon; for thy richer store<br /> +Is of the good that with us aye most dwell.<br /> + Farewell; sleep sound on Vaea’s windy +shrine,<br /> + While round the songsters join their song to +thine.</p> +<p style="text-align: right">A. C. R.</p> +<h2>APPENDIX</h2> +<p>The following appeared some time ago in one of the London +evening papers, and I make bold, because of its truth and vigour, +to insert it here:</p> +<h3>THE LAND OF STEVENSON,<br /> +<i>ON AN AFTERNOON’S WALK</i></h3> +<p>Will there be a “Land of Stevenson,” as there is +already a “Land of Burns,” or a “Land of +Scott,” known to the tourist, bescribbled by the guide-book +maker? This the future must tell. Yet will it be easy +to mark out the bounds of “Robert Louis Stevenson’s +Country”; and, taking his native and well-loved city for a +starting-point, a stout walker may visit all its principal sites +in an afternoon. The house where he was born is within a +bowshot of the Water of Leith; some five miles to the south are +Caerketton and Allermuir, and other crests of the Pentlands, and +below them Swanston Farm, where year after year, in his +father’s time, he spent the summer days basking on the hill +slopes; two or three miles to the westward of Swanston is +Colinton, where his mother’s father, Dr Balfour, was +minister; and here again you are back to the Water of Leith, +which you can follow down to the New Town. In this +triangular space Stevenson’s memories and affections were +firmly rooted; the fibres could not be withdrawn from the soil, +and “the voice of the blood” and the longing for this +little piece of earth make themselves plaintively heard in his +last notes. By Lothian Road, after which Stevenson quaintly +thought of naming the new edition of his works, and past +Boroughmuirhead and the “Bore Stane,” where James +FitzJames set up his standard before Flodden, wends your +southward way to the hills. The builder of suburban villas +has pushed his handiwork far into the fields since Stevenson was +wont to tramp between the city and the Pentlands; and you may +look in vain for the flat stone whereon, as the marvelling child +was told, there once rose a “crow-haunted +gibbet.” Three-quarters of an hour of easy walking, +after you have cleared the last of the houses will bring you to +Swanston; and half an hour more will take the stiff climber, a +little breathless, to</p> +<h4>THE TOP OF CAERKETTON CRAGS.</h4> +<p>You may follow the high road—indeed there is a choice of +two, drawn at different levels—athwart the western skirts +of the Braid Hills, now tenanted, crown and sides of them, by +golf; then to the crossroads of Fairmilehead, whence the road +dips down, to rise again and circumvent the most easterly wing of +the Pentlands. You would like to pursue this route, were it +only to look down on Bow Bridge and recall how the last-century +gauger used to put together his flute and play “Over the +hills and far away” as a signal to his friend in the +distillery below, now converted into a dairy farm, to stow away +his barrels. Better it is, however, to climb the stile just +past the poor-house gate, and follow the footpath along the +smoothly scooped banks of the Braid Burn to +“Cockmylane” and to Comiston. The wind has been +busy all the morning spreading the snow over a glittering +world. The drifts are piled shoulder-high in the lane as it +approaches Comiston, and each old tree grouped around the +historic mansion is outlined in snow so virgin pure that were the +Ghost—“a lady in white, with the most beautiful clear +shoes on her feet”—to step out through the back gate, +she would be invisible, unless, indeed, she were between you and +the ivy-draped dovecot wall. Near by, at the corner of the +Dreghorn Woods, is the Hunters’ Tryst, on the roof of +which, when it was still a wayside inn, the Devil was wont to +dance on windy nights. In the field through which you +trudge knee-deep in drift rises the “Kay Stane,” +looking to-day like a tall monolith of whitest marble. +Stevenson was mistaken when he said that it was from its top a +neighbouring laird, on pain of losing his lands, had to +“wind a blast of bugle horn” each time the King</p> +<h4>VISITED HIS FOREST OF PENTLAND.</h4> +<p>That honour belongs to another on the adjacent farm of +Buckstane. The ancient monument carries you further back, +and there are Celtic authorities that translate its name the +“Stone of Victory.” The “Pechtland +Hills”—their elder name—were once a refuge for +the Picts; and Caerketton—probably Caer-etin, the +giant’s strong-hold—is one of them. Darkly its +cliffs frown down upon you, while all else is flashing white in +the winter sunlight. For once, in this last buttress thrown +out into the plain of Lothian towards the royal city, the outer +folds of the Pentlands loses its boldly-rounded curves, and drops +an almost sheer descent of black rock to the little glen +below. In a wrinkle of the foothills Swanston farm and +hamlet are snugly tucked away. The spirit that breathes +about it in summer time is gently pastoral. It is sheltered +from the rougher blasts; it is set about with trees and green +hills. It was with this aspect of the place that Stevenson, +coming hither on holiday, was best acquainted. The village +green, whereon the windows of the neat white cottages turn a +kindly gaze under low brows of thatch, is then a perfect place in +which to rest, and, watching the smoke rising and listening to +“the leaves ruffling in the breeze,” to muse on men +and things; especially on Sabbath mornings, when the ploughman or +shepherd, “perplext wi’ leisure,” it is time to +set forth on the three-mile walk along the hill-skirts to +Colinton kirk. But Swanston in winter time must also</p> +<h4>HAVE BEEN FAMILIAR TO STEVENSON.</h4> +<p>Snow-wreathed Pentlands, the ribbed and furrowed front of +Caerketton, the low sun striking athwart the sloping fields of +white, the shadows creeping out from the hills, and the frosty +yellow fog drawing in from the Firth—must often have +flashed back on the thoughts of the exile of Samoa. Against +this wintry background the white farmhouse, old and crow-stepped, +looks dingy enough; the garden is heaped with the fantastic +treasures of the snow; and when you toil heavily up the waterside +to the clump of pines and beeches you find yourself in a fairy +forest. One need not search to-day for the pool where the +lynx-eyed John Todd, “the oldest herd on the +Pentlands,” watched from behind the low scrag of wood the +stranger collie come furtively to wash away the tell-tale stains +of lamb’s blood. The effacing hand of the snow has +smothered it over. Higher you mount, mid leg-deep in drift, +up the steep and slippery hill-face, to the summit. +Edinburgh has been creeping nearer since Stevenson’s musing +fancy began to draw on the memories of the climbs up “steep +Caerketton.” But this light gives it a mystic +distance; and it is all glitter and shadow. Arthur Seat is +like some great sea monster stranded near a city of dreams; from +the fog-swathed Firth gleams the white walls of Inchkeith +lighthouse, a mark never missed by Stevenson’s +father’s son; above Fife rise the twin breasts of the +Lomonds. Or turn round and look across the Esk valley to +the Moorfoots; or more westerly, where the back range of the +Pentlands—Caernethy, the Scald, and the knife-edged +Kips—draw a sharp silhouette of Arctic peaks against the +sky. In the cloven hollow between is Glencarse Loch, an +ancient chapel and burying ground hidden under its waters; on the +slope above it, not a couple miles away, is Rullion Green, where, +as Stevenson told in <i>The Pentland Rising</i> (his first +printed work)</p> +<h4>THE WESTLAND WHIGS WERE SCATTERED</h4> +<p>as chaff on the hills. Were “topmost +Allermuir,” that rises close beside you, removed from his +place, we might see the gap in the range through which Tom +Dalyell and his troopers spurred from Currie to the fray. +The air on these heights is invigorating as wine; but it is also +keen as a razor. Without delaying long yon plunge down to +the “Windy Door Nick”; follow the “nameless +trickle that springs from the green bosom of Allermuir,” +past the rock and pool, where, on summer evenings, the poet +“loved to sit and make bad verses”; and cross +Halkerside and the Shearers’ Knowe, those “adjacent +cantons on a single shoulder of a hill,” sometimes +floundering to the neck in the loose snow of a drain, sometimes +scaring the sheep huddling in the wreaths, or putting up a covey +of moorfowl that circle back without a cry to cover in the +ling. In an hour you are at Colinton, whose dell has on one +side the manse garden, where a bright-eyed boy, who was to become +famous, spent so much of his time when he came thither on visits +to his stern Presbyterian grandfather; on the other the old +churchyard. The snow has drawn its cloak of ermine over the +sleepers, it has run its fingers over the worn lettering; and +records almost effaced start out from the stone. In vain +these “voices of generations dead” summon their +wandering child, though you might deem that his spirit would rest +more quietly where the cold breeze from Pentland shakes the +ghostly trees in Colinton Dell than “under the flailing +fans and shadows of the palm.”</p> +<h2>Footnotes:</h2> +<p><a name="footnote1"></a><a href="#citation1" +class="footnote">[1]</a> Professor Charles Warren Stoddard, +Professor of English Literature at the Catholic University of +Washington, in <i>Kate Field’s Washington</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote2"></a><a href="#citation2" +class="footnote">[2]</a> In his portrait-sketch of his +father, Stevenson speaks of him as a “man of somewhat +antique strain, and with a blended sternness and softness that +was wholly Scottish, and at first sight somewhat +bewildering,” as melancholy, and with a keen sense of his +unworthiness, yet humorous in company; shrewd and childish; a +capital adviser.</p> +<p><a name="footnote3"></a><a href="#citation3" +class="footnote">[3]</a> <i>Inferno</i>, Canto XV.</p> +<p><a name="footnote4"></a><a href="#citation4" +class="footnote">[4]</a> Alas, I never was told that +remark—when I saw my friend afterwards there was always too +much to talk of else, and I forgot to ask.</p> +<p><a name="footnote5"></a><a href="#citation5" +class="footnote">[5]</a> Quoted by Hammerton, pp. 2 and +3.</p> +<p><a name="footnote6"></a><a href="#citation6" +class="footnote">[6]</a> Tusitala, as the reader must know, +is the Samoan for Teller of Tales.</p> +<p><a name="footnote7"></a><a href="#citation7" +class="footnote">[7]</a> <i>Wisdom of Goethe</i>, p. +38.</p> +<p><a name="footnote8"></a><a href="#citation8" +class="footnote">[8]</a> <i>The Foreigner at Home</i>, in +<i>Memories and Portraits</i>.</p> +<p><a name="footnote9"></a><a href="#citation9" +class="footnote">[9]</a> A great deal has been made of the +“John Bull element” in De Quincey since his +<i>Memoir</i> was written by me (see <i>Masson’s +Condensation</i>, p. 95); so now perhaps a little more may be +made of the rather conceited Calvinistic Scot element in R. L. +Stevenson!</p> +<p><a name="footnote10"></a><a href="#citation10" +class="footnote">[10]</a> It was Mr George Moore who said +this.</p> +<p><a name="footnote11"></a><a href="#citation11" +class="footnote">[11]</a> <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, +October, 1903.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 590-h.htm or 590-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/5/9/590 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +</pre></body> +</html> diff --git a/590-h/images/p0b.jpg b/590-h/images/p0b.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4fe571e --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p0b.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p0s.jpg b/590-h/images/p0s.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a65d73e --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p0s.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p20b.jpg b/590-h/images/p20b.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..35e4345 --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p20b.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p20s.jpg b/590-h/images/p20s.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9ddfcec --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p20s.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p262b.jpg b/590-h/images/p262b.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..191aacb --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p262b.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p262s.jpg b/590-h/images/p262s.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a087016 --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p262s.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p6b.jpg b/590-h/images/p6b.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..b261a39 --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p6b.jpg diff --git a/590-h/images/p6s.jpg b/590-h/images/p6s.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9e274e7 --- /dev/null +++ b/590-h/images/p6s.jpg @@ -0,0 +1,6811 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Robert Louis Stevenson, by Alexander H. Japp + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Robert Louis Stevenson + a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial + + +Author: Alexander H. Japp + + + +Release Date: May 5, 2007 [eBook #590] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON*** + + + + +Transcribed from the Charles Scribner's Sons 1905 edition by David Price, +email ccx074@pglaf.org + + + + + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON +A RECORD, AN ESTIMATE, AND A MEMORIAL + + +BY ALEXANDER H. JAPP, LL.D., F.R.S.E + +AUTHOR OF "THOREAU: HIS LIFE AND AIMS"; "MEMOIR OF THOMAS DE QUINCEY"; +"DE QUINCEY MEMORIALS," ETC., ETC. + +WITH HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED LETTERS FROM R. L. STEVENSON IN FACSIMILIE . . +. + +SECOND EDITION + +NEW YORK +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +153-157 FIFTH AVENUE +1905 + +_Printed in Great Britain_. + +{Robert Louis Stevenson, from a sketch in oils by Sir William B. +Richmond, K.G.B., R.A.: p0.jpg} + +Dedicated to +C. A. LICHTENBERG, ESQ. +AND +Mrs LICHTENBERG, +OF VILLA MARGHERITA, TREVISO, +WITH MOST GRATEFUL REGARDS, + +ALEXANDER H. JAPP. + +19_th_ _December_ 1904. + + + + +PREFACE + + +A few words may here be allowed me to explain one or two points. First, +about the facsimile of last page of Preface to _Familiar Studies of Men +and Books_. Stevenson was in Davos when the greater portion of that work +went through the press. He felt so much the disadvantage of being there +in the circumstances (both himself and his wife ill) that he begged me to +read the proofs of the Preface for him. This illness has record in the +letter from him (pp. 28-29). The printers, of course, had directions to +send the copy and proofs of the Preface to me. Hence I am able now to +give this facsimile. + +With regard to the letter at p. 19, of which facsimile is also given, +what Stevenson there meant is not the "three last" of that batch, but the +three last sent to me before--though that was an error on his part--he +only then sent two chapters, making the "eleven chapters now"--sent to me +by post. + +Another point on which I might have dwelt and illustrated by many +instances is this, that though Stevenson was fond of hob-nobbing with all +sorts and conditions of men, this desire of wide contact and intercourse +has little show in his novels--the ordinary fibre of commonplace human +beings not receiving much celebration from him there; another case in +which his private bent and sympathies received little illustration in his +novels. But the fact lies implicit in much I have written. + +I have to thank many authors for permission to quote extracts I have +used. + +ALEXANDER H. JAPP. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I. INTRODUCTION AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS +II. _TREASURE ISLAND_ AND SOME REMINISCENCES +III. THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN +IV. HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED +V. TRAVELS +VI. SOME EARLIER LETTERS +VII. THE VAILIMA LETTERS +VIII. WORK OF LATER YEARS +IX. SOME CHARACTERISTICS +X. A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON +XI. MISS STUBBS' RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE +XII. HIS GENIUS AND METHODS +XIII. PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST +XIV. STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST +XV. THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL +XVI. STEVENSON'S GLOOM +XVII. PROOFS OF GROWTH +XVIII. EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS +XIX. MR EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN'S ESTIMATE +XX. EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS +XXI. UNITY IN STEVENSON'S STORIES +XXII. PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED GLOOM +XXIII. EDINBURGH REVIEWERS' DICTA INAPPLICABLE TO LATER WORK +XXIV. MR HENLEY'S SPITEFUL PERVERSIONS +XXV. MR CHRISTIE MURRAY'S IMPRESSIONS +XXVI. HERO-VILLAINS +XXVII. MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON, AND OTHERS +XXVIII. UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS +XXIX. LOVE OF VAGABONDS +XXX. LORD ROSEBERY'S CASE +XXXI. MR GOSSE AND MS. OF _TREASURE ISLAND_ +XXXII. STEVENSON PORTRAITS +XXXIII. LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM +XXXIV. LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY +APPENDIX + + + + +CHAPTER I--INTRODUCTION AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS + + +My little effort to make Thoreau better known in England had one result +that I am pleased to think of. It brought me into personal association +with R. L. Stevenson, who had written and published in _The Cornhill +Magazine_ an essay on Thoreau, in whom he had for some time taken an +interest. He found in Thoreau not only a rare character for originality, +courage, and indefatigable independence, but also a master of style, to +whom, on this account, as much as any, he was inclined to play the part +of the "sedulous ape," as he had acknowledged doing to many others--a +later exercise, perhaps in some ways as fruitful as any that had gone +before. A recent poet, having had some seeds of plants sent to him from +Northern Scotland to the South, celebrated his setting of them beside +those native to the Surrey slope on which he dwelt, with the lines-- + + "And when the Northern seeds are growing, + Another beauty then bestowing, + We shall be fine, and North to South + Be giving kisses, mouth to mouth." + +So the Thoreau influence on Stevenson was as if a tart American +wild-apple had been grafted on an English pippin, and produced a wholly +new kind with the flavours of both; and here wild America and England +kissed each other mouth to mouth. + +The direct result was the essay in _The Cornhill_, but the indirect +results were many and less easily assessed, as Stevenson himself, as we +shall see, was ever ready to admit. The essay on Thoreau was written in +America, which further, perhaps, bears out my point. + +One of the authorities, quoted by Mr Hammerton, in _Stevensoniana_ says +of the circumstances in which he found our author, when he was busily +engaged on that bit of work: + + "I have visited him in a lonely lodging in California, it was previous + to his happy marriage, and found him submerged in billows of + bed-clothes; about him floated the scattered volumes of a complete set + of Thoreau; he was preparing an essay on that worthy, and he looked at + the moment like a half-drowned man, yet he was not cast down. His + work, an endless task, was better than a straw to him. It was to + become his life-preserver and to prolong his years. I feel convinced + that without it he must have surrendered long since. I found + Stevenson a man of the frailest physique, though most unaccountably + tenacious of life; a man whose pen was indefatigable, whose brain was + never at rest, who, as far as I am able to judge, looked upon + everybody and everything from a supremely intellectual point of view." + {1} + +We remember the common belief in Yorkshire and other parts that a man +could not die so long as he could stand up--a belief on which poor +Branwell Bronte was fain to act and to illustrate, but R. L. Stevenson +illustrated it, as this writer shows, in a better, calmer, and healthier +way, despite his lack of health. + +On some little points of fact, however, Stevenson was wrong; and I wrote +to the Editor of _The Spectator_ a letter, titled, I think, "Thoreau's +Pity and Humour," which he inserted. This brought me a private letter +from Stevenson, who expressed the wish to see me, and have some talk with +me on that and other matters. To this letter I at once replied, +directing to 17 Heriot Row, Edinburgh, saying that, as I was soon to be +in that City, it might be possible for me to see him there. In reply to +this letter Mr Stevenson wrote: + + "THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR, + _Sunday_, _August_ (? _th_), 1881. + + "MY DEAR SIR,--I should long ago have written to thank you for your + kind and frank letter; but, in my state of health, papers are apt to + get mislaid, and your letter has been vainly hunted for until this + (Sunday) morning. + + "I must first say a word as to not quoting your book by name. It was + the consciousness that we disagreed which led me, I daresay, wrongly, + to suppress _all_ references throughout the paper. But you may be + certain a proper reference will now be introduced. + + "I regret I shall not be able to see you in Edinburgh: one visit to + Edinburgh has already cost me too dear in that invaluable particular, + health; but if it should be at all possible for you to pass by + Braemar, I believe you would find an attentive listener, and I can + offer you a bed, a drive, and necessary food. + + "If, however, you should not be able to come thus far, I can promise + two things. First, I shall religiously revise what I have written, + and bring out more clearly the point of view from which I regarded + Thoreau. Second, I shall in the preface record your objection. + + "The point of view (and I must ask you not to forget that any such + short paper is essentially only a _section through_ a man) was this: I + desired to look at the man through his books. Thus, for instance, + when I mentioned his return to the pencil-making, I did it only in + passing (perhaps I was wrong), because it seemed to me not an + illustration of his principles, but a brave departure from them. + Thousands of such there were I do not doubt; still they might be + hardly to my purpose; though, as you say so, I suppose some of them + would be. + + "Our difference as to 'pity,' I suspect, was a logomachy of my making. + No pitiful acts, on his part, would surprise me: I know he would be + more pitiful in practice than most of the whiners; but the spirit of + that practice would still seem to me to be unjustly described by the + word pity. + + "When I try to be measured, I find myself usually suspected of a + sneaking unkindness for my subject, but you may be sure, sir, I would + give up most other things to be as good a man as Thoreau. Even my + knowledge of him leads me thus far. + + "Should you find yourself able to push on so far--it may even lie on + your way--believe me your visit will be very welcome. The weather is + cruel, but the place is, as I daresay you know, the very _wale_ of + Scotland--bar Tummelside.--Yours very sincerely, + + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +{Manuscript letter by R.L.S.: p6.jpg} + +Some delay took place in my leaving London for Scotland, and hence what +seemed a hitch. I wrote mentioning the reason of my delay, and +expressing the fear that I might have to forego the prospect of seeing +him in Braemar, as his circumstances might have altered in the meantime. +In answer came this note, like so many, if not most of his, indeed, +without date:-- + + THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR. + (_No date_.) + + "MY DEAR SIR,--I am here as yet a fixture, and beg you to come our + way. Would Tuesday or Wednesday suit you by any chance? We shall + then, I believe, be empty: a thing favourable to talks. You get here + in time for dinner. I stay till near the end of September, unless, as + may very well be, the weather drive me forth.--Yours very sincerely, + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +I accordingly went to Braemar, where he and his wife and her son were +staying with his father and mother. + +These were red-letter days in my calendar alike on account of pleasant +intercourse with his honoured father and himself. Here is my pen-and-ink +portrait of R. L. Stevenson, thrown down at the time: + +Mr Stevenson's is, indeed, a very picturesque and striking figure. Not +so tall probably as he seems at first sight from his extreme thinness, +but the pose and air could not be otherwise described than as +distinguished. Head of fine type, carried well on the shoulders and in +walking with the impression of being a little thrown back; long brown +hair, falling from under a broadish-brimmed Spanish form of soft felt +hat, Rembrandtesque; loose kind of Inverness cape when walking, and +invariable velvet jacket inside the house. You would say at first sight, +wherever you saw him, that he was a man of intellect, artistic and +individual, wholly out of the common. His face is sensitive, full of +expression, though it could not be called strictly beautiful. It is +longish, especially seen in profile, and features a little irregular; the +brow at once high and broad. A hint of vagary, and just a hint in the +expression, is qualified by the eyes, which are set rather far apart from +each other as seems, and with a most wistful, and at the same time +possibly a merry impish expression arising over that, yet frank and +clear, piercing, but at the same time steady, and fall on you with a +gentle radiance and animation as he speaks. Romance, if with an +indescribable _soupcon_ of whimsicality, is marked upon him; sometimes he +has the look as of the Ancient Mariner, and could fix you with his +glittering e'e, and he would, as he points his sentences with a movement +of his thin white forefinger, when this is not monopolised with the +almost incessant cigarette. There is a faint suggestion of a +hair-brained sentimental trace on his countenance, but controlled, after +all, by good Scotch sense and shrewdness. In conversation he is very +animated, and likes to ask questions. A favourite and characteristic +attitude with him was to put his foot on a chair or stool and rest his +elbow on his knee, with his chin on his hand; or to sit, or rather to +half sit, half lean, on the corner of a table or desk, one of his legs +swinging freely, and when anything that tickled him was said he would +laugh in the heartiest manner, even at the risk of bringing on his cough, +which at that time was troublesome. Often when he got animated he rose +and walked about as he spoke, as if movement aided thought and +expression. Though he loved Edinburgh, which was full of associations +for him, he had no good word for its east winds, which to him were as +death. Yet he passed one winter as a "Silverado squatter," the story of +which he has inimitably told in the volume titled _The Silverado +Squatters_; and he afterwards spent several winters at Davos Platz, +where, as he said to me, he not only breathed good air, but learned to +know with closest intimacy John Addington Symonds, who "though his books +were good, was far finer and more interesting than any of his books." He +needed a good deal of nursery attentions, but his invalidism was never +obtrusively brought before one in any sympathy-seeking way by himself; on +the contrary, a very manly, self-sustaining spirit was evident; and the +amount of work which he managed to turn out even when at his worst was +truly surprising. + +His wife, an American lady, is highly cultured, and is herself an author. +In her speech there is just the slightest suggestion of the American +accent, which only made it the more pleasing to my ear. She is heart and +soul devoted to her husband, proud of his achievements, and her delight +is the consciousness of substantially aiding him in his enterprises. + +They then had with them a boy of eleven or twelve, Samuel Lloyd Osbourne, +to be much referred to later (a son of Mrs Stevenson by a former +marriage), whose delight was to draw the oddest, but perhaps half +intentional or unintentional caricatures, funny, in some cases, beyond +expression. His room was designated the picture-gallery, and on entering +I could scarce refrain from bursting into laughter, even at the general +effect, and, noticing this, and that I was putting some restraint on +myself out of respect for the host's feelings, Stevenson said to me with +a sly wink and a gentle dig in the ribs, "It's laugh and be thankful +here." On Lloyd's account simple engraving materials, types, and a small +printing-press had been procured; and it was Stevenson's delight to make +funny poems, stories, and morals for the engravings executed, and all +would be duly printed together. Stevenson's thorough enjoyment of the +picture-gallery, and his goodness to Lloyd, becoming himself a very boy +for the nonce, were delightful to witness and in degree to share. +Wherever they were--at Braemar, in Edinburgh, at Davos Platz, or even at +Silverado--the engraving and printing went on. The mention of the +picture-gallery suggests that it was out of his interest in the colour- +drawing and the picture-gallery that his first published story, _Treasure +Island_, grew, as we shall see. + +I have some copies of the rude printing-press productions, inexpressibly +quaint, grotesque, a kind of literary horse-play, yet with a certain +squint-eyed, sprawling genius in it, and innocent childish Rabelaisian +mirth of a sort. At all events I cannot look at the slight memorials of +that time, which I still possess, without laughing afresh till my eyes +are dewy. Stevenson, as I understood, began _Treasure Island_ more to +entertain Lloyd Osbourne than anything else; the chapters being regularly +read to the family circle as they were written, and with scarcely a +purpose beyond. The lad became Stevenson's trusted companion and +collaborator--clearly with a touch of genius. + +I have before me as I write some of these funny momentoes of that time, +carefully kept, often looked at. One of them is, "_The Black Canyon_; +_or_, _Wild Adventures in the Far West_: a Tale of Instruction and +Amusement for the Young, by Samuel L. Osbourne, printed by the author; +Davos Platz," with the most remarkable cuts. It would not do some of the +sensationalists anything but good to read it even at this day, since many +points in their art are absurdly caricatured. Another is "_Moral +Emblems_; _a Collection of Cuts and Verses_, by R. L. Stevenson, author +of the _Blue Scalper_, etc., etc. Printers, S. L. Osbourne and Company, +Davos Platz." Here are the lines to a rare piece of grotesque, titled _A +Peak in Darien_-- + + "Broad-gazing on untrodden lands, + See where adventurous Cortez stands, + While in the heavens above his head, + The eagle seeks its daily bread. + How aptly fact to fact replies, + Heroes and eagles, hills and skies. + Ye, who contemn the fatted slave, + Look on this emblem and be brave." + +Another, _The Elephant_, has these lines-- + + "See in the print how, moved by whim, + Trumpeting Jumbo, great and grim, + Adjusts his trunk, like a cravat, + To noose that individual's hat; + The Sacred Ibis in the distance, + Joys to observe his bold resistance." + +R. L. Stevenson wrote from Davos Platz, in sending me _The Black Canyon_: + + "Sam sends as a present a work of his own. I hope you feel flattered, + for _this is simply the first time he has ever given one away_. I + have to buy my own works, I can tell you." + +Later he said, in sending a second: + + "I own I have delayed this letter till I could forward the enclosed. + Remembering the night at Braemar, when we visited the picture-gallery, + I hope it may amuse you: you see we do some publishing hereaway." + +Delightfully suggestive and highly enjoyable, too, were the meetings in +the little drawing-room after dinner, when the contrasted traits of +father and son came into full play--when R. L. Stevenson would sometimes +draw out a new view by bold, half-paradoxical assertion, or compel +advance on the point from a new quarter by a searching question couched +in the simplest language, or reveal his own latest conviction finally, by +a few sentences as nicely rounded off as though they had been written, +while he rose and gently moved about, as his habit was, in the course of +those more extended remarks. Then a chapter or two of _The Sea-Cook_ +would be read, with due pronouncement on the main points by one or other +of the family audience. + +The reading of the book is one thing. It was quite another thing to hear +Stevenson as he stood reading it aloud, with his hand stretched out +holding the manuscript, and his body gently swaying as a kind of +rhythmical commentary on the story. His fine voice, clear and keen it +some of its tones, had a wonderful power of inflection and variation, and +when he came to stand in the place of Silver you could almost have +imagined you saw the great one-legged John Silver, joyous-eyed, on the +rolling sea. Yes, to read it in print was good, but better yet to hear +Stevenson read it. + + + + +CHAPTER II--_TREASURE ISLAND_ AND SOME REMINISCENCES + + +When I left Braemar, I carried with me a considerable portion of the MS. +of _Treasure Island_, with an outline of the rest of the story. It +originally bore the odd title of _The Sea-Cook_, and, as I have told +before, I showed it to Mr Henderson, the proprietor of the _Young Folks' +Paper_, who came to an arrangement with Mr Stevenson, and the story duly +appeared in its pages, as well as the two which succeeded it. + +Stevenson himself in his article in _The Idler_ for August 1894 +(reprinted in _My First Book_ volume and in a late volume of the +_Edinburgh Edition_) has recalled some of the circumstances connected +with this visit of mine to Braemar, as it bore on the destination of +_Treasure Island_: + + "And now, who should come dropping in, _ex machina_, but Dr Japp, like + the disguised prince, who is to bring down the curtain upon peace and + happiness in the last act; for he carried in his pocket, not a horn or + a talisman, but a publisher, in fact, ready to unearth new writers for + my old friend Mr Henderson's _Young Folks_. Even the ruthlessness of + a united family recoiled before the extreme measure of inflicting on + our guest the mutilated members of _The Sea-Cook_; at the same time, + we would by no means stop our readings, and accordingly the tale was + begun again at the beginning, and solemnly redelivered for the benefit + of Dr Japp. From that moment on, I have thought highly of his + critical faculty; for when he left us, he carried away the manuscript + in his portmanteau. + + "_Treasure Island_--it was Mr Henderson who deleted the first title, + _The Sea-Cook_--appeared duly in _Young Folks_, where it figured in + the ignoble midst without woodcuts, and attracted not the least + attention. I did not care. I liked the tale myself, for much the + same reason as my father liked the beginning: it was my kind of + picturesque. I was not a little proud of John Silver also; and to + this day rather admire that smooth and formidable adventurer. What + was infinitely more exhilarating, I had passed a landmark. I had + finished a tale and written The End upon my manuscript, as I had not + done since _The Pentland Rising_, when I was a boy of sixteen, not yet + at college. In truth, it was so by a lucky set of accidents: had not + Dr Japp come on his visit, had not the tale flowed from me with + singular ease, it must have been laid aside, like its predecessors, + and found a circuitous and unlamented way to the fire. Purists may + suggest it would have been better so. I am not of that mind. The + tale seems to have given much pleasure, and it brought (or was the + means of bringing) fire, food, and wine to a deserving family in which + I took an interest. I need scarcely say I mean my own." + +He himself gives a goodly list of the predecessors which had found a +circuitous and unlamented way to the fire + + "As soon as I was able to write, I became a good friend to the paper- + makers. Reams upon reams must have gone to the making of _Rathillet_, + _The Pentland Rising_, _The King's Pardon_ (otherwise _Park + Whitehead_), _Edward Daven_, _A Country Dance_, and _A Vendetta in the + West_. _Rathillet_ was attempted before fifteen, _The Vendetta_ at + twenty-nine, and the succession of defeats lasted unbroken till I was + thirty-one." + +Another thing I carried from Braemar with me which I greatly prize--this +was a copy of _Christianity confirmed by Jewish and Heathen Testimony_, +by Mr Stevenson's father, with his autograph signature and many of his +own marginal notes. He had thought deeply on many subjects--theological, +scientific, and social--and had recorded, I am afraid, but the smaller +half of his thoughts and speculations. Several days in the mornings, +before R. L. Stevenson was able to face the somewhat "snell" air of the +hills, I had long walks with the old gentleman, when we also had long +talks on many subjects--the liberalising of the Scottish Church, +educational reform, etc.; and, on one occasion, a statement of his +reason, because of the subscription, for never having become an elder. +That he had in some small measure enjoyed my society, as I certainly had +much enjoyed his, was borne out by a letter which I received from the son +in reply to one I had written, saying that surely his father had never +meant to present me at the last moment on my leaving by coach with that +volume, with his name on it, and with pencilled notes here and there, but +had merely given it me to read and return. In the circumstances I may +perhaps be excused quoting from a letter dated Castleton of Braemar, +September 1881, in illustration of what I have said-- + + "MY DEAR DR JAPP,--My father has gone, but I think I may take it upon + me to ask you to keep the book. Of all things you could do to endear + yourself to me you have done the best, for, from your letter, you have + taken a fancy to my father. + + "I do not know how to thank you for your kind trouble in the matter of + _The Sea-Cook_, but I am not unmindful. My health is still poorly, + and I have added intercostal rheumatism--a new attraction, which sewed + me up nearly double for two days, and still gives me 'a list to + starboard'--let us be ever nautical. . . . I do not think with the + start I have, there will be any difficulty in letting Mr Henderson go + ahead whenever he likes. I will write my story up to its legitimate + conclusion, and then we shall be in a position to judge whether a + sequel would be desirable, and I myself would then know better about + its practicability from the story-telling point of view.--Yours very + sincerely, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +A little later came the following:-- + + "THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR. + (_No date_.) + + "MY DEAR DR JAPP,--Herewith go nine chapters. I have been a little + seedy; and the two last that I have written seem to me on a false + venue; hence the smallness of the batch. I have now, I hope, in the + three last sent, turned the corner, with no great amount of dulness. + + "The map, with all its names, notes, soundings, and things, should + make, I believe, an admirable advertisement for the story. Eh? + + "I hope you got a telegram and letter I forwarded after you to + Dinnat.--Believe me, yours very sincerely, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +In the afternoon, if fine and dry, we went walking, and Stevenson would +sometimes tell us stories of his short experience at the Scottish Bar, +and of his first and only brief. I remember him contrasting that with +his experiences as an engineer with Bob Bain, who, as manager, was then +superintending the building of a breakwater. Of that time, too, he told +the choicest stories, and especially of how, against all orders, he +bribed Bob with five shillings to let him go down in the diver's dress. +He gave us a splendid description--finer, I think, than even that in his +_Memories_--of his sensations on the sea-bottom, which seems to have +interested him as deeply, and suggested as many strange fancies, as +anything which he ever came across on the surface. But the possibility +of enterprises of this sort ended--Stevenson lost his interest in +engineering. + +{Manuscript letter by R.L.S.: p20.jpg} + +Stevenson's father had, indeed, been much exercised in his day by +theological questions and difficulties, and though he remained a staunch +adherent of the Established Church of Scotland he knew well and +practically what is meant by the term "accommodation," as it is used by +theologians in reference to creeds and formulas; for he had over and over +again, because of the strict character of the subscription required from +elders of the Scottish Church declined, as I have said, to accept the +office. In a very express sense you could see that he bore the marks of +his past in many ways--a quick, sensitive, in some ways even a fantastic- +minded man, yet with a strange solidity and common-sense amid it all, +just as though ferns with the veritable fairies' seed were to grow out of +a common stone wall. He looked like a man who had not been without +sleepless nights--without troubles, sorrows, and perplexities, and even +yet, had not wholly risen above some of them, or the results of them. His +voice was "low and sweet"--with just a possibility in it of rising to a +shrillish key. A sincere and faithful man, who had walked very demurely +through life, though with a touch of sudden, bright, quiet humour and +fancy, every now and then crossing the grey of his characteristic +pensiveness or melancholy, and drawing effect from it. He was most frank +and genial with me, and I greatly honour his memory. {2} + +Thomas Stevenson, with a strange, sad smile, told me how much of a +disappointment, in the first stage, at all events, Louis (he always +called his son Louis at home), had caused him, by failing to follow up +his profession at the Scottish Bar. How much he had looked forward, +after the engineering was abandoned, to his devoting himself to the work +of the Parliament House (as the Hall of the Chief Court is called in +Scotland, from the building having been while yet there was a Scottish +Parliament the place where it sat), though truly one cannot help feeling +how much Stevenson's very air and figure would have been out of keeping +among the bewigged, pushing, sharp-set, hard-featured, and even red-faced +and red-nosed (some of them, at any rate) company, who daily walked the +Parliament House, and talked and gossiped there, often of other things +than law and equity. "Well, yes, perhaps it was all for the best," he +said, with a sigh, on my having interjected the remark that R. L. +Stevenson was wielding far more influence than he ever could have done as +a Scottish counsel, even though he had risen rapidly in his profession, +and become Lord-Advocate or even a judge. + +There was, indeed, a very pathetic kind of harking back on the might-have- +beens when I talked with him on this subject. He had reconciled himself +in a way to the inevitable, and, like a sensible man, was now inclined to +make the most and the best of it. The marriage, which, on the report of +it, had been but a new disappointment to him, had, as if by magic, been +transformed into a blessing in his mind and his wife's by personal +contact with Fanny Van der Griff Stevenson, which no one who ever met her +could wonder at; but, nevertheless, his dream of seeing his only son +walking in the pathways of the Stevensons, and adorning a profession in +Edinburgh, and so winning new and welcome laurels for the family and the +name, was still present with him constantly, and by contrast, he was +depressed with contemplation of the real state of the case, when, as I +have said, I pointed out to him, as more than once I did, what an +influence his son was wielding now, not only over those near to him, but +throughout the world, compared with what could have come to him as a +lighthouse engineer, however successful, or it may be as a briefless +advocate or barrister, walking, hardly in glory and in joy, the Hall of +the Edinburgh Parliament House. And when I pictured the yet greater +influence that was sure to come to him, he only shook his head with that +smile which tells of hopes long-cherished and lost at last, and of +resignation gained, as though at stern duty's call and an honest desire +for the good of those near and dear to him. It moved me more than I can +say, and always in the midst of it he adroitly, and somewhat abruptly, +changed the subject. Such penalties do parents often pay for the honour +of giving geniuses to the world. Here, again, it may be true, "the +individual withers but the world is more and more." + +The impression of a kind of tragic fatality was but added to when +Stevenson would speak of his father in such terms of love and admiration +as quite moved one, of his desire to please him, of his highest respect +and gratitude to him, and pride in having such a father. It was most +characteristic that when, in his travels in America, he met a gentleman +who expressed plainly his keen disappointment on learning that he had but +been introduced to the son and not to the father--to the as yet but +budding author--and not to the builder of the great lighthouse beacons +that constantly saved mariners from shipwreck round many stormy coasts, +he should record the incident, as his readers will remember, with such a +strange mixture of a pride and filial gratitude, and half humorous +humiliation. Such is the penalty a son of genius often pays in heart- +throbs for the inability to do aught else but follow his destiny--follow +his star, even though as Dante says:-- + + "Se tu segui tua stella + Non puoi fallire a glorioso porto." {3} + +What added a keen thrill as of quivering flesh exposed, was that Thomas +Stevenson on one side was exactly the man to appreciate such attainments +and work in another, and I often wondered how far the sense of Edinburgh +propriety and worldly estimates did weigh with him here. + +Mr Stevenson mentioned to me a peculiar fact which has since been noted +by his son, that, notwithstanding the kind of work he had so successfully +engaged in, he was no mathematician, and had to submit his calculations +to another to be worked out in definite mathematical formulae. Thomas +Stevenson gave one the impression of a remarkably sweet, great +personality, grave, anxious, almost morbidly forecasting, yet full of +childlike hope and ready affection, but, perhaps, so earnestly taken up +with some points as to exaggerate their importance and be too +self-conscious and easily offended in respect to them. But there was no +affectation in him. He was simple-minded, sincere to the core; most +kindly, homely, hospitable, much intent on brotherly offices. He had the +Scottish _perfervidum_ too--he could tolerate nothing mean or creeping; +and his eye would lighten and glance in a striking manner when such was +spoken of. I have since heard that his charities were very extensive, +and dispensed in the most hidden and secret ways. He acted here on the +Scripture direction, "Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand +doeth." He was much exercised when I saw him about some defects, as he +held, in the methods of Scotch education (for he was a true lover of +youth, and cared more for character being formed than for heads being +merely crammed). Sagacious, with fine forecast, with a high ideal, and +yet up to a certain point a most tolerant temper, he was a fine specimen +of the Scottish gentleman. His son tells that, as he was engaged in work +calculated to benefit the world and to save life, he would not for long +take out a patent for his inventions, and thus lost immense sums. I can +well believe that: it seems quite in keeping with my impressions of the +man. There was nothing stolid or selfishly absorbed in him. He bore the +marks of deep, true, honest feeling, true benevolence, and open-handed +generosity, and despite the son's great pen-craft, and inventive power, +would have forgiven my saying that sometimes I have had a doubt whether +the father was not, after all, the greater man of the two, though +certainly not, like the hero of _In Memoriam_, moulded "in colossal +calm." + +In theological matters, in which Thomas Stevenson had been much and +deeply exercised, he held very strong views, leading decisively to ultra- +Calvinism; but, as I myself could well sympathise with such views, if I +did not hold them, knowing well the strange ways in which they had gone +to form grand, if sometimes sternly forbidding characters, there were no +cross-purposes as there might have been with some on that subject. And +always I felt I had an original character and a most interesting one to +study. + +This is another very characteristic letter to me from Davos Platz: + + "CHALET BUOL, DAVOS, GRISONS, + SWITZERLAND. (_No date_.) + + "MY DEAR DR JAPP,--You must think me a forgetful rogue, as indeed I + am; for I have but now told my publisher to send you a copy of the + _Familiar Studies_. However, I own I have delayed this letter till I + could send you the enclosed. Remembering the night at Braemar, when + we visited the picture-gallery, I hoped they might amuse you. + + "You see we do some publishing hereaway. + + "With kind regards, believe me, always yours faithfully, + + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + + "I shall hope to see you in town in May." + +The enclosed was the second series of _Moral Emblems_, by R. L. +Stevenson, printed by Samuel Osbourne. My answer to this letter brought +the following: + + "CHALET-BUOL, DAVOS, + _April_ 1_st_, 1882. + + "MY DEAR DR JAPP,--A good day to date this letter, which is, in fact, + a confession of incapacity. During my wife's wretched illness--or I + should say the worst of it, for she is not yet rightly well--I + somewhat lost my head, and entirely lost a great quire of corrected + proofs. This is one of the results: I hope there are none more + serious. I was never so sick of any volume as I was of that; I was + continually receiving fresh proofs with fresh infinitesimal + difficulties. I was ill; I did really fear, for my wife was worse + than ill. Well, 'tis out now; and though I have already observed + several carelessnesses myself, and now here is another of your + finding--of which indeed, I ought to be ashamed--it will only justify + the sweeping humility of the preface. + + "Symonds was actually dining with us when your letter came, and I + communicated your remarks, which pleased him. He is a far better and + more interesting thing than his books. + + "The elephant was my wife's, so she is proportionately elate you + should have picked it out for praise from a collection, let us add, so + replete with the highest qualities of art. + + "My wicked carcass, as John Knox calls it, holds together wonderfully. + In addition to many other things, and a volume of travel, I find I + have written since December ninety Cornhill pp. of Magazine + work--essays and stories--40,000 words; and I am none the worse--I am + better. I begin to hope I may, if not outlive this wolverine upon my + shoulders, at least carry him bravely like Symonds or Alexander Pope. + I begin to take a pride in that hope. + + "I shall be much interested to see your criticisms: you might perhaps + send them on to me. I believe you know that I am not dangerous--one + folly I have not--I am not touchy under criticism. + + "Sam and my wife both beg to be remembered, and Sam also sends as a + present a work of his own.--Yours very sincerely, + + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +As indicating the estimate of many of the good Edinburgh people of +Stevenson and the Stevensons that still held sway up to so late a date as +1893, I will here extract two characteristic passages from the letters of +the friend and correspondent of these days just referred to, and to whom +I had sent a copy of the _Atalanta_ Magazine, with an article of mine on +Stevenson. + + "If you can excuse the garrulity of age, I can tell you one or two + things about Louis Stevenson, his father and even his grandfather, + which you may work up some other day, as you have so deftly embedded + in the _Atalanta_ article that small remark on his acting. Your paper + is pleasant and modest: most of R. L. Stevenson's admirers are + inclined to lay it on far too thick. That he is a genius we all + admit; but his genius, if fine, is limited. For example, he cannot + paint (or at least he never has painted) a woman. No more could + Fettes Douglas, skilful artist though he was in his own special line, + and I shall tell you a remark of Russel's thereon some day. {4} There + are women in his books, but there is none of the beauty and subtlety + of womanhood in them. + + "R. L. Stevenson I knew well as a lad and often met him and talked + with him. He acted in private theatricals got up by the late + Professor Fleeming Jenkin. But he had then, as always, a pretty guid + conceit o' himsel'--which his clique have done nothing to check. His + father and his grandfather (I have danced with his mother before her + marriage) I knew better; but 'the family theologian,' as some of R. L. + Stevenson's friends dabbed his father, was a very touchy theologian, + and denounced any one who in the least differed from his extreme + Calvinistic views. I came under his lash most unwittingly in this way + myself. But for this twist, he was a good fellow--kind and + hospitable--and a really able man in his profession. His father-in- + law, R. L. Stevenson's maternal grandfather, was the Rev. Dr Balfour, + minister of Colinton--one of the finest-looking old men I ever + saw--tall, upright, and ruddy at eighty. But he was marvellously + feeble as a preacher, and often said things that were deliciously, + unconsciously, unintentionally laughable, if not witty. We were near + Colinton for some years; and Mr Russell (of the _Scotsman_), who once + attended the Parish Church with us, was greatly tickled by Balfour + discoursing on the story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, remarking that + Mrs P-'s conduct was 'highly improper'!" + +The estimate of R. L. Stevenson was not and could not be final in this +case, for _Weir of Hermiston_ and _Catriona_ were yet unwritten, not to +speak of others, but the passages reflect a certain side of Edinburgh +opinion, illustrating the old Scripture doctrine that a prophet has +honour everywhere but in his own country. And the passages themselves +bear evidence that I violate no confidence then, for they were given to +me to be worked into any after-effort I might make on Stevenson. My +friend was a good and an acute critic who had done some acceptable +literary work in his day. + + + + +CHAPTER III--THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN + + +R. L. Stevenson was born on 13th November 1850, the very year of the +death of his grandfather, Robert Stevenson, whom he has so finely +celebrated. As a mere child he gave token of his character. As soon as +he could read, he was keen for books, and, before very long, had read all +the story-books he could lay hands on; and, when the stock ran out, he +would go and look in at all the shop windows within reach, and try to +piece out the stories from the bits exposed in open pages and the +woodcuts. + +He had a nurse of very remarkable character--evidently a paragon--who +deeply influenced him and did much to form his young mind--Alison +Cunningham, who, in his juvenile lingo, became "Cumy," and who not only +was never forgotten, but to the end was treated as his "second mother." +In his dedication of his _Child's Garden of Verses_ to her, he says: + + "My second mother, my first wife, + The angel of my infant life." + +Her copy of _Kidnapped_ was inscribed to her by the hand of Stevenson, +thus: + + "TO CUMY, FROM HER BOY, THE AUTHOR. + SKERRYVORE, 18_th_ _July_ 1888." + +Skerryvore was the name of Stevenson's Bournemouth home, so named after +one of the Stevenson lighthouses. His first volume, _An Inland Voyage_ +has this pretty dedication, inscribed in a neat, small hand: + + "MY DEAR CUMY,--If you had not taken so much trouble with me all the + years of my childhood, this little book would never have been written. + Many a long night you sat up with me when I was ill. I wish I could + hope, by way of return, to amuse a single evening for you with my + little book. But whatever you think of it, I know you will think + kindly of + + THE AUTHOR." + +"Cumy" was perhaps the most influential teacher Stevenson had. What she +and his mother taught took effect and abode with him, which was hardly +the case with any other of his teachers. + + "In contrast to Goethe," says Mr Baildon, "Stevenson was but little + affected by his relations to women, and, when this point is fully gone + into, it will probably be found that his mother and nurse in + childhood, and his wife and step-daughter in later life, are about the + only women who seriously influenced either his character or his art." + (p. 32). + +When Mr Kelman is celebrating Stevenson for the consistency and +continuity of his undogmatic religion, he is almost throughout +celebrating "Cumy" and her influence, though unconsciously. Here, again, +we have an apt and yet more striking illustration, after that of the good +Lord Shaftesbury and many others, of the deep and lasting effect a good +and earnest woman, of whom the world may never hear, may have had upon a +youngster of whom all the world shall hear. When Mr Kelman says that +"the religious element in Stevenson was not a thing of late growth, but +an integral part and vital interest of his life," he but points us back +to the earlier religious influences to which he had been effectually +subject. "His faith was not for himself alone, and the phases of +Christianity which it has asserted are peculiarly suited to the spiritual +needs of many in the present time." + +We should not lay so much weight as Mr Kelman does on the mere number of +times "the Divine name" is found in Stevenson's writings, but there is +something in such confessions as the following to his father, when he +was, amid hardship and illness, in Paris in 1878: + + "Still I believe in myself and my fellow-men and the God who made us + all. . . . I am lonely and sick and out of heart. Well, I still hope; + I still believe; I still see the good in the inch, and cling to it. It + is not much, perhaps, but it is always something." + +Yes, "Cumy" was a very effective teacher, whose influence and teaching +long remained. His other teachers, however famous and highly gifted, did +not attain to such success with him. And because of this non-success +they blamed him, as is usual. He was fond of playing truant--declared, +indeed, that he was about as methodic a truant as ever could have +existed. He much loved to go on long wanderings by himself on the +Pentland Hills and read about the Covenanters, and while yet a youth of +sixteen he wrote _The Pentland Rising_--a pamphlet in size and a piece of +fine work--which was duly published, is now scarce, and fetches a high +price. He had made himself thoroughly familiar with all the odd old +corners of Edinburgh--John Knox's haunts and so on, all which he has +turned to account in essays, descriptions and in stories--especially in +_Catriona_. When a mere youth at school, as he tells us himself, he had +little or no desire to carry off prizes and do just as other boys did; he +was always wishing to observe, and to see, and try things for +himself--was, in fact, in the eyes of schoolmasters and tutors something +of an _idler_, with splendid gifts which he would not rightly apply. He +was applying them rightly, though not in their way. It is not only in +his _Apology for Idlers_ that this confession is made, but elsewhere, as +in his essay on _A College Magazine_, where he says, "I was always busy +on my own private end, which was to learn to write. I kept always two +books in my pocket, one to read and one to write in!" + +When he went to College it was still the same--he tells us in the +funniest way how he managed to wheedle a certificate for Greek out of +Professor Blackie, though the Professor owned "his face was not familiar +to him"! He fared very differently when, afterwards his father, eager +that he should follow his profession, got him to enter the civil +engineering class under Professor Fleeming Jenkin. He still stuck to his +old courses--wandering about, and, in sheltered corners, writing in the +open air, and was not present in class more than a dozen times. When the +session was ended he went up to try for a certificate from Fleeming +Jenkin. "No, no, Mr Stevenson," said the Professor; "I might give it in +a doubtful case, but yours is not doubtful: you have not kept my +classes." And the most characteristic thing--honourable to both men--is +to come; for this was the beginning of a friendship which grew and +strengthened and is finally celebrated in the younger man's sketch of the +elder. He learned from Professor Fleeming Jenkin, perhaps unconsciously, +more of the _humaniores_, than consciously he did of engineering. A +friend of mine, who knew well both the Stevenson family and the Balfours, +to which R. L. Stevenson's mother belonged, recalls, as we have seen, his +acting in the private theatricals that were got up by the Professor, and +adds, "He was then a very handsome fellow, and looked splendidly as Sir +Charles Pomander, and essayed, not wholly without success, Sir Peter +Teazle," which one can well believe, no less than that he acted such +parts splendidly as well as looked them. + +_Longman's Magazine_, immediately after his death, published the +following poem, which took a very pathetic touch from the circumstances +of its appearance--the more that, while it imaginatively and finely +commemorated these days of truant wanderings, it showed the ruling +passion for home and the old haunts, strongly and vividly, even not +unnigh to death: + + "The tropics vanish, and meseems that I, + From Halkerside, from topmost Allermuir, + Or steep Caerketton, dreaming gaze again. + Far set in fields and woods, the town I see + Spring gallant from the shallows of her smoke, + Cragg'd, spired, and turreted, her virgin fort + Beflagg'd. About, on seaward drooping hills, + New folds of city glitter. Last, the Forth + Wheels ample waters set with sacred isles, + And populous Fife smokes with a score of towns, + There, on the sunny frontage of a hill, + Hard by the house of kings, repose the dead, + My dead, the ready and the strong of word. + Their works, the salt-encrusted, still survive; + The sea bombards their founded towers; the night + Thrills pierced with their strong lamps. The artificers, + One after one, here in this grated cell, + Where the rain erases and the rust consumes, + Fell upon lasting silence. Continents + And continental oceans intervene; + A sea uncharted, on a lampless isle, + Environs and confines their wandering child + In vain. The voice of generations dead + Summons me, sitting distant, to arise, + My numerous footsteps nimbly to retrace, + And all mutation over, stretch me down + In that denoted city of the dead." + + + + +CHAPTER IV--HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED + + +At first sight it would seem hard to trace any illustration of the +doctrine of heredity in the case of this master of romance. George +Eliot's dictum that we are, each one of us, but an omnibus carrying down +the traits of our ancestors, does not appear at all to hold here. This +fanciful realist, this naive-wistful humorist, this dreamy mystical +casuist, crossed by the innocent bohemian, this serious and genial +essayist, in whom the deep thought was hidden by the gracious play of wit +and phantasy, came, on the father's side, of a stock of what the world +regarded as a quiet, ingenious, demure, practical, home-keeping people. +In his rich colour, originality, and graceful air, it is almost as though +the bloom of japonica came on a rich old orchard apple-tree, all out of +season too. Those who go hard on heredity would say, perhaps, that he +was the result of some strange back-stroke. But, on closer examination, +we need not go so far. His grandfather, Robert Stevenson, the great +lighthouse-builder, the man who reared the iron-bound pillar on the +destructive Bell Rock, and set life-saving lights there, was very intent +on his professional work, yet he had his ideal, and romantic, and +adventurous side. In the delightful sketch which his famous grandson +gave of him, does he not tell of the joy Robert Stevenson had on the +annual voyage in the _Lighthouse Yacht_--how it was looked forward to, +yearned for, and how, when he had Walter Scott on board, his fund of +story and reminiscence all through the tour never failed--how Scott drew +upon it in _The Pirate_ and the notes to _The Pirate_, and with what +pride Robert Stevenson preserved the lines Scott wrote in the lighthouse +album at the Bell Rock on that occasion: + + "PHAROS LOQUITUR + + "Far in the bosom of the deep + O'er these wild shelves my watch I keep, + A ruddy gem of changeful light + Bound on the dusky brow of night. + The seaman bids my lustre hail, + And scorns to strike his timorous sail." + +And how in 1850 the old man, drawing nigh unto death, was with the utmost +difficulty dissuaded from going the voyage once more, and was found +furtively in his room packing his portmanteau in spite of the protests of +all his family, and would have gone but for the utter weakness of death. + +His father was also a splendid engineer; was full of invention and +devoted to his profession, but he, too, was not without his romances, and +even vagaries. He loved a story, was a fine teller of stories, used to +sit at night and spin the most wondrous yarns, a man of much reserve, yet +also of much power in discourse, with an aptness and felicity in the use +of phrases--so much so, as his son tells, that on his deathbed, when his +power of speech was passing from him, and he couldn't articulate the +right word, he was silent rather than use the wrong one. I shall never +forget how in these early morning walks at Braemar, finding me +sympathetic, he unbent with the air of a man who had unexpectedly found +something he had sought, and was fairly confidential. + +On the mother's side our author came of ministers. His maternal +grandfather, the Rev. Dr Balfour of Colinton, was a man of handsome +presence, tall, venerable-looking, and not without a mingled authority +and humour of his own--no very great preacher, I have heard, but would +sometimes bring a smile to the faces of his hearers by very naive and +original ways of putting things. R. L. Stevenson quaintly tells a story +of how his grandfather when he had physic to take, and was indulged in a +sweet afterwards, yet would not allow the child to have a sweet because +he had not had the physic. A veritable Calvinist in daily action--from +him, no doubt, our subject drew much of his interest in certain +directions--John Knox, Scottish history, the '15 and the '45, and no +doubt much that justifies the line "something of shorter-catechist," as +applied by Henley to Stevenson among very contrasted traits indeed. + +But strange truly are the interblendings of race, and the way in which +traits of ancestors reappear, modifying and transforming each other. The +gardener knows what can be done by grafts and buddings; but more +wonderful far than anything there, are the mysterious blendings and +outbursts of what is old and forgotten, along with what is wholly new and +strange, and all going to produce often what we call sometimes +eccentricity, and sometimes originality and genius. + +Mr J. F. George, in _Scottish Notes and Queries_, wrote as follows on +Stevenson's inheritances and indebtedness to certain of his ancestors: + + "About 1650, James Balfour, one of the Principal Clerks of the Court + of Session, married Bridget, daughter of Chalmers of Balbaithan, + Keithhall, and that estate was for some time in the name of Balfour. + His son, James Balfour of Balbaithan, Merchant and Magistrate of + Edinburgh, paid poll-tax in 1696, but by 1699 the land had been sold. + This was probably due to the fact that Balfour was one of the + Governors of the Darien Company. His grandson, James Balfour of + Pilrig (1705-1795), sometime Professor of Moral Philosophy in + Edinburgh University, whose portrait is sketched in _Catriona_, also + made a Garioch [Aberdeenshire district] marriage, his wife being + Cecilia, fifth daughter of Sir John Elphinstone, second baronet of + Logie (Elphinstone) and Sheriff of Aberdeen, by Mary, daughter of Sir + Gilbert Elliot, first baronet of Minto. + + "Referring to the Minto descent, Stevenson claims to have 'shaken a + spear in the Debatable Land and shouted the slogan of the Elliots.' He + evidently knew little or nothing of his relations on the Elphinstone + side. The Logie Elphinstones were a cadet branch of Glack, an estate + acquired by Nicholas Elphinstone in 1499. William Elphinstone, a + younger son of James of Glack, and Elizabeth Wood of Bonnyton, married + Margaret Forbes, and was father of Sir James Elphinstone, Bart., of + Logie, so created in 1701. . . . + + "Stevenson would have been delighted to acknowledge his relationship, + remote though it was, to 'the Wolf of Badenoch,' who burned Elgin + Cathedral without the Earl of Kildare's excuse that he thought the + Bishop was in it; and to the Wolf's son, the Victor of Harlaw [and] to + his nephew 'John O'Coull,' Constable of France. . . . Also among + Tusitala's kin may be noted, in addition to the later Gordons of + Gight, the Tiger Earl of Crawford, familiarly known as 'Earl Beardie,' + the 'Wicked Master' of the same line, who was fatally stabbed by a + Dundee cobbler 'for taking a stoup of drink from him'; Lady Jean + Lindsay, who ran away with 'a common jockey with the horn,' and + latterly became a beggar; David Lindsay, the last Laird of Edzell [a + lichtsome Lindsay fallen on evil days], who ended his days as hostler + at a Kirkwall inn, and 'Mussel Mou'ed Charlie,' the Jacobite ballad- + singer. + + "Stevenson always believed that he had a strong spiritual affinity to + Robert Fergusson. It is more than probable that there was a distant + maternal affinity as well. Margaret Forbes, the mother of Sir James + Elphinstone, the purchaser of Logie, has not been identified, but it + is probable she was of the branch of the Tolquhon Forbeses who + previously owned Logie. Fergusson's mother, Elizabeth Forbes, was the + daughter of a Kildrummy tacksman, who by constant tradition is stated + to have been of the house of Tolquhon. It would certainly be + interesting if this suggested connection could be proved." {5} + + "From his Highland ancestors," says the _Quarterly Review_, "Louis + drew the strain of Celtic melancholy with all its perils and + possibilities, and its kinship, to the mood of day-dreaming, which has + flung over so many of his pages now the vivid light wherein figures + imagined grew as real as flesh and blood, and yet, again, the ghostly, + strange, lonesome, and stinging mist under whose spell we see the + world bewitched, and every object quickens with a throb of infectious + terror." + +Here, as in many other cases, we see how the traits of ancestry reappear +and transform other strains, strangely the more remote often being the +strongest and most persistent and wonderful. + +"It is through his father, strange as it may seem," says Mr Baildon, +"that Stevenson gets the Celtic elements so marked in his person, +character, and genius; for his father's pedigree runs back to the +Highland clan Macgregor, the kin of Rob Roy. Stevenson thus drew in +Celtic strains from both sides--from the Balfours and the Stevensons +alike--and in his strange, dreamy, beautiful, and often far-removed +fancies we have the finest and most effective witness of it." + +Mr William Archer, in his own characteristic way, has brought the +inheritances from the two sides of the house into more direct contact and +contrast in an article he wrote in _The Daily Chronicle_ on the +appearance of the _Letters to Family and Friends_. + + "These letters show," he says, "that Stevenson's was not one of those + sunflower temperaments which turn by instinct, not effort, towards the + light, and are, as Mr Francis Thompson puts it, 'heartless and happy, + lackeying their god.' The strains of his heredity were very + curiously, but very clearly, mingled. It may surprise some readers to + find him speaking of 'the family evil, despondency,' but he spoke with + knowledge. He inherited from his father not only a stern Scottish + intentness on the moral aspect of life ('I would rise from the dead to + preach'), but a marked disposition to melancholy and hypochondria. + From his mother, on the other hand, he derived, along with his + physical frailty, a resolute and cheery stoicism. These two elements + in his nature fought many a hard fight, and the besieging forces from + without--ill-health, poverty, and at one time family dissensions--were + by no means without allies in the inner citadel of his soul. His + spirit was courageous in the truest sense of the word: by effort and + conviction, not by temperamental insensibility to fear. It is clear + that there was a period in his life (and that before the worst of his + bodily ills came upon him) when he was often within measurable + distance of Carlylean gloom. He was twenty-four when he wrote thus, + from Swanston, to Mrs Sitwell: + + "'It is warmer a bit; but my body is most decrepit, and I can just + manage to be cheery and tread down hypochondria under foot by work. I + lead such a funny life, utterly without interest or pleasure outside + of my work: nothing, indeed, but work all day long, except a short + walk alone on the cold hills, and meals, and a couple of pipes with my + father in the evening. It is surprising how it suits me, and how + happy I keep.' + + "This is the serenity which arises, not from the absence of fuliginous + elements in the character, but from a potent smoke-consuming faculty, + and an inflexible will to use it. Nine years later he thus admonishes + his backsliding parent: + + "'MY DEAR MOTHER,--I give my father up. I give him a parable: that + the Waverley novels are better reading for every day than the tragic + _Life_. And he takes it back-side foremost, and shakes his head, and + is gloomier than ever. Tell him that I give him up. I don't want no + such a parent. This is not the man for my money. I do not call that + by the name of religion which fills a man with bile. I write him a + whole letter, bidding him beware of extremes, and telling him that his + gloom is gallows-worthy; and I get back an answer--. Perish the + thought of it. + + "'Here am I on the threshold of another year, when, according to all + human foresight, I should long ago have been resolved into my + elements: here am I, who you were persuaded was born to disgrace + you--and, I will do you the justice to add, on no such insufficient + grounds--no very burning discredit when all is done; here am I + married, and the marriage recognised to be a blessing of the first + order. A1 at Lloyd's. There is he, at his not first youth, able to + take more exercise than I at thirty-three, and gaining a stone's + weight, a thing of which I am incapable. There are you; has the man + no gratitude? . . . + + "'Even the Shorter Catechism, not the merriest epitome of religion, + and a work exactly as pious although not quite so true as the + multiplication table--even that dry-as-dust epitome begins with a + heroic note. What is man's chief end? Let him study that; and ask + himself if to refuse to enjoy God's kindest gifts is in the spirit + indicated.' + + "As may be judged from this half-playful, half-serious remonstrance, + Stevenson's relation to his parents was eminently human and beautiful. + The family dissensions above alluded to belonged only to a short but + painful period, when the father could not reconcile himself to the + discovery that the son had ceased to accept the formulas of Scottish + Calvinism. In the eyes of the older man such heterodoxy was for the + moment indistinguishable from atheism; but he soon arrived at a better + understanding of his son's position. Nothing appears more + unmistakably in these letters than the ingrained theism of Stevenson's + way of thought. The poet, the romancer within him, revolted from the + conception of formless force. A personal deity was a necessary + character in the drama, as he conceived it. And his morality, though + (or inasmuch as) it dwelt more on positive kindness than on negative + lawlessness, was, as he often insisted, very much akin to the morality + of the New Testament." + +Anyway it is clear that much in the interminglings of blood we _can_ +trace, may go to account for not a little in Stevenson. His peculiar +interest in the enormities of old-time feuds, the excesses, the +jealousies, the queer psychological puzzles, the desire to work on the +outlying and morbid, and even the unallowed and unhallowed, for purposes +of romance--the delight in dealing with revelations of primitive feeling +and the out-bursts of the mere natural man always strangely checked and +diverted by the uprise of other tendencies to the dreamy, impalpable, +vague, weird and horrible. There was the undoubted Celtic element in him +underlying what seemed foreign to it, the disregard of conventionality in +one phase, and the falling under it in another--the reaction and the +retreat from what had attracted and interested him, and then the return +upon it, as with added zest because of the retreat. The confessed +Hedonist, enjoying life and boasting of it just a little, and yet the +Puritan in him, as it were, all the time eyeing himself as from some +loophole of retreat, and then commenting on his own behaviour as a +Hedonist and Bohemian. This clearly was not what most struck Beerbohm +Tree, during the time he was in close contact with Stevenson, while +arranging the production of _Beau Austin_ at the Haymarket Theatre, for +he sees, or confesses to seeing, only one side, and that the most +assertive, and in a sense, unreal one: + + "Stevenson," says Mr Tree, "always seemed to me an epicure in life. He + was always intent on extracting the last drop of honey from every + flower that came in his way. He was absorbed in the business of the + moment, however trivial. As a companion, he was delightfully witty; + as a personality, as much a creature of romance as his own creations." + +This is simple, and it looks sincere; but it does not touch 'tother side, +or hint at, not to say, solve the problem of Stevenson's personality. Had +he been the mere Hedonist he could never have done the work he did. Mr +Beerbohm Tree certainly did not there see far or all round. + +Miss Simpson says: + + "Mr Henley recalls him to Edinburgh folk as he was and as the true + Stevenson would have wished to be known--a queer, inexplicable + creature, his Celtic blood showing like a vein of unknown metal in the + stolid, steady rock of his sure-founded Stevensonian pedigree. His + cousin and model, 'Bob' Stevenson, the art critic, showed that this + foreign element came from the men who lit our guiding lights for + seamen, not from the gentle-blooded Balfours. + + "Mr Henley is right in saying that the gifted boy had not much humour. + When the joke was against himself he was very thin-skinned and had a + want of balance. This made him feel his honest father's sensible + remarks like the sting of a whip." + +Miss Simpson then proceeds to say: + + "The R. L. Stevenson of old Edinburgh days was a conceited, + egotistical youth, but a true and honest one: a youth full of fire and + sentiment, protesting he was misunderstood, though he was not. Posing + as 'Velvet Coat' among the slums, he did no good to himself. He had + not the Dickens aptitude for depicting the ways of life of his adopted + friends. When with refined judgment he wanted a figure for a novel, + he went back to the Bar he scorned in his callow days and then drew in + _Weir of Hermiston_." + + + + +CHAPTER V--TRAVELS + + +His interest in engineering soon went--his mind full of stories and +fancies and human nature. As he had told his mother: he did not care +about finding what was "the strain on a bridge," he wanted to know +something of human beings. + +No doubt, much to the disappointment and grief of his father, who wished +him as an only son to carry on the traditions of the family, though he +had written two engineering essays of utmost promise, the engineering was +given up, and he consented to study law. He had already contributed to +College Magazines, and had had even a short spell of editing one; of one +of these he has given a racy account. Very soon after his call to the +Bar articles and essays from his pen began to appear in _Macmillan's_, +and later, more regularly in the _Cornhill_. Careful readers soon began +to note here the presence of a new force. He had gone on the _Inland +Voyage_ and an account of it was in hand; and had done that tour in the +Cevennes which he has described under the title _Travels with a Donkey in +the Cevennes_, with Modestine, sometimes doubting which was the donkey, +but on that tour a chill caught either developed a germ of lung disease +already present, or produced it; and the results unfortunately remained. + +He never practised at the Bar, though he tells facetiously of his one +brief. He had chosen his own vocation, which was literature, and the +years which followed were, despite the delicacy which showed itself, very +busy years. He produced volume on volume. He had written many stories +which had never seen the light, but, as he says, passed through the +ordeal of the fire by more or less circuitous ways. + +By this time some trouble and cause for anxiety had arisen about the +lungs, and trials of various places had been made. _Ordered South_ +suggests the Mediterranean, sunny Italy, the Riviera. Then a sea-trip to +America was recommended and undertaken. Unfortunately, he got worse +there, his original cause of trouble was complicated with others, and the +medical treatment given was stupid, and exaggerated some of the symptoms +instead of removing them, All along--up, at all events, to the time of +his settlement in Samoa--Stevenson was more or less of an invalid. + +Indeed, were I ever to write an essay on the art of wisely "laying-to," +as the sailors say, I would point it by a reference to R. L. Stevenson. +For there is a wise way of "laying-to" that does not imply inaction, but +discreet, well-directed effort, against contrary winds and rough seas, +that is, amid obstacles and drawbacks, and even ill-health, where passive +and active may balance and give effect to each other. Stevenson was by +native instinct and temperament a rover--a lover of adventure, of strange +by-ways, errant tracts (as seen in his _Inland Voyage_ and _Travels with +a Donkey through the Cevennes_--seen yet more, perhaps, in a certain +account of a voyage to America as a steerage passenger), lofty mountain- +tops, with stronger air, and strange and novel surroundings. He would +fain, like Ulysses, be at home in foreign lands, making acquaintance with +outlying races, with + + "Cities of men, + And manners, climates, councils, governments: + Myself not least, but honoured of them all, + Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy." + +If he could not move about as he would, he would invent, make fancy serve +him instead of experience. We thus owe something to the staying and +restraining forces in him, and a wise "laying-to"--for his works, which +are, in large part, finely-healthy, objective, and in almost everything +unlike the work of an invalid, yet, in some degree, were but the devices +to beguile the burdens of an invalid's days. Instead of remaining in our +climate, it might be, to lie listless and helpless half the day, with no +companion but his own thoughts and fancies (not always so pleasant +either, if, like Frankenstein's monster, or, better still like the imp in +the bottle in the _Arabian Nights_, you cannot, once for all liberate +them, and set them adrift on their own charges to visit other people), he +made a home in the sweeter air and more steady climate of the South +Pacific, where, under the Southern Cross, he could safely and +beneficially be as active as he would be involuntarily idle at home, or +work only under pressure of hampering conditions. That was surely an +illustration of the true "laying-to" with an unaffectedly brave, bright +resolution in it. + + + + +CHAPTER VI--SOME EARLIER LETTERS + + +Carlyle was wont to say that, next to a faithful portrait, familiar +letters were the best medium to reveal a man. The letters must have been +written with no idea of being used for this end, however--free, artless, +the unstudied self-revealings of mind and heart. Now, these letters of +R. L. Stevenson, written to his friends in England, have a vast value in +this way--they reveal the man--reveal him in his strength and his +weakness--his ready gift in pleasing and adapting himself to those with +whom he corresponded, and his great power at once of adapting himself to +his circumstances and of humorously rising superior to them. When he was +ill and almost penniless in San Francisco, he could give Mr Colvin this +account of his daily routine: + + "Any time between eight and half-past nine in the morning a slender + gentleman in an ulster, with a volume buttoned into the breast of it, + maybe observed leaving No. 608 Bush and descending Powell with an + active step. The gentleman is R. L. Stevenson; the volume relates to + Benjamin Franklin, on whom he meditates one of his charming essays. He + descends Powell, crosses Market, and descends in Sixth on a branch of + the original Pine Street Coffee-House, no less. . . . He seats himself + at a table covered with waxcloth, and a pampered menial of High-Dutch + extraction, and, indeed, as yet only partially extracted, lays before + him a cup of coffee, a roll, and a pat of butter, all, to quote the + deity, very good. A while ago, and R. L. Stevenson used to find the + supply of butter insufficient; but he has now learned the art to + exactitude, and butter and roll expire at the same moment. For this + rejection he pays ten cents, or fivepence sterling (0 pounds 0s. 5d.). + + "Half an hour later, the inhabitants of Bush Street observed the same + slender gentleman armed, like George Washington, with his little + hatchet, splitting kindling, and breaking coal for his fire. He does + this quasi-publicly upon the window-sill; but this is not to be + attributed to any love of notoriety, though he is indeed vain of his + prowess with the hatchet (which he persists in calling an axe), and + daily surprised at the perpetuation of his fingers. The reason is + this: That the sill is a strong supporting beam, and that blows of the + same emphasis in other parts of his room might knock the entire shanty + into hell. Thenceforth, for from three hours, he is engaged darkly + with an ink-bottle. Yet he is not blacking his boots, for the only + pair that he possesses are innocent of lustre, and wear the natural + hue of the material turned up with caked and venerable slush. The + youngest child of his landlady remarks several times a day, as this + strange occupant enters or quits the house, 'Dere's de author.' Can + it be that this bright-haired innocent has found the true clue to the + mystery? The being in question is, at least, poor enough to belong to + that honourable craft." + +Here are a few letters belonging to the winter of 1887-88, nearly all +written from Saranac Lake, in the Adirondacks, celebrated by Emerson, and +now a most popular holiday resort in the United States, and were +originally published in _Scribner's Magazine_. . . "It should be said +that, after his long spell of weakness at Bournemouth, Stevenson had gone +West in search of health among the bleak hill summits--'on the Canadian +border of New York State, very unsettled and primitive and cold.' He had +made the voyage in an ocean tramp, the _Ludgate Hill_, the sort of craft +which any person not a born child of the sea would shun in horror. +Stevenson, however, had 'the finest time conceivable on board the +"strange floating menagerie."'" Thus he describes it in a letter to Mr +Henry James: + + "Stallions and monkeys and matches made our cargo; and the vast + continent of these incongruities rolled the while like a haystack; and + the stallions stood hypnotised by the motion, looking through the port + at our dinner-table, and winked when the crockery was broken; and the + little monkeys stared at each other in their cages, and were thrown + overboard like little bluish babies; and the big monkey, Jacko, + scoured about the ship and rested willingly in my arms, to the ruin of + my clothing; and the man of the stallions made a bower of the black + tarpaulin, and sat therein at the feet of a raddled divinity, like a + picture on a box of chocolates; and the other passengers, when they + were not sick, looked on and laughed. Take all this picture, and make + it roll till the bell shall sound unexpected notes and the fittings + shall break loose in our stateroom, and you have the voyage of the + _Ludgate Hill_. She arrived in the port of New York without beer, + porter, soda-water, curacoa, fresh meat, or fresh water; and yet we + lived, and we regret her." + +He discovered this that there is no joy in the Universe comparable to +life on a villainous ocean tramp, rolling through a horrible sea in +company with a cargo of cattle. + + "I have got one good thing of my sea voyage; it is proved the sea + agrees heartily with me, and my mother likes it; so if I get any + better, or no worse, my mother will likely hire a yacht for a month or + so in the summer. Good Lord! what fun! Wealth is only useful for two + things: a yacht and a string quartette. For these two I will sell my + soul. Except for these I hold that 700 pounds a year is as much as + anybody can possibly want; and I have had more, so I know, for the + extra coins were of no use, excepting for illness, which damns + everything. I was so happy on board that ship, I could not have + believed it possible; we had the beastliest weather, and many + discomforts; but the mere fact of its being a tramp ship gave us many + comforts. We could cut about with the men and officers, stay in the + wheel-house, discuss all manner of things, and really be a little at + sea. And truly there is nothing else. I had literally forgotten what + happiness was, and the full mind--full of external and physical + things, not full of cares and labours, and rot about a fellow's + behaviour. My heart literally sang; I truly care for nothing so much + as for that. + + "To go ashore for your letters and hang about the pier among the + holiday yachtsmen--that's fame, that's glory--and nobody can take it + away." + +At Saranac Lake the Stevensons lived in a "wind-beleaguered hill-top hat- +box of a house," which suited the invalid, but, on the other hand, +invalided his wife. Soon after getting there he plunged into _The Master +of Ballantrae_. + + "No thought have I now apart from it, and I have got along up to page + ninety-two of the draught with great interest. It is to me a most + seizing tale: there are some fantastic elements, the most is a dead + genuine human problem--human tragedy, I should say rather. It will be + about as long, I imagine, as _Kidnapped_. . . . I have done most of + the big work, the quarrel, duel between the brothers, and the + announcement of the death to Clementina and my Lord--Clementina, + Henry, and Mackellar (nicknamed Squaretoes) are really very fine + fellows; the Master is all I know of the devil; I have known hints of + him, in the world, but always cowards: he is as bold as a lion, but + with the same deadly, causeless duplicity I have watched with so much + surprise in my two cowards. 'Tis true, I saw a hint of the same + nature in another man who was not a coward; but he had other things to + attend to; the Master has nothing else but his devilry." + +His wife grows seriously ill, and Stevenson has to turn to household +work. + + "Lloyd and I get breakfast; I have now, 10.15, just got the dishes + washed and the kitchen all clean, and sit down to give you as much + news as I have spirit for, after such an engagement. Glass is a thing + that really breaks my spirit; and I do not like to fail, and with + glass I cannot reach the work of my high calling--the artist's." + +In the midst of such domestic tasks and entanglements he writes _The +Master_, and very characteristically gets dissatisfied with the last +parts, "which shame, perhaps degrade, the beginning." + +Of Mr Kipling this is his judgment--in the year 1890: + + "Kipling is by far the most promising young man who has appeared + since--ahem--I appeared. He amazes me by his precocity and various + endowments. But he alarms me by his copiousness and haste. He should + shield his fire with both hands, 'and draw up all his strength and + sweetness in one ball.' ('Draw all his strength and all his sweetness + up into one ball'? I cannot remember Marvell's words.) So the + critics have been saying to me; but I was never capable of--and surely + never guilty of--such a debauch of production. At this rate his works + will soon fill the habitable globe, and surely he was armed for better + conflicts than these succinct sketches and flying leaves of verse? I + look on, I admire, I rejoice for myself; but in a kind of ambition we + all have for our tongue and literature I am wounded. If I had this + man's fertility and courage, it seems to me I could heave a pyramid. + + "Well, we begin to be the old fogies now, and it was high time + _something_ rose to take our places. Certainly Kipling has the gifts; + the fairy godmothers were all tipsy at his christening. What will he + do with them?" + +Of the rest of Stevenson's career we cannot speak at length, nor is it +needful. How in steady succession came his triumphs: came, too, his +trials from ill-health--how he spent winters at Davos Platz, Bournemouth, +and tried other places in America; and how, at last, good fortune led him +to the South Pacific. After many voyagings and wanderings among the +islands, he settled near Apia, in Samoa, early in 1890, cleared some four +hundred acres, and built a house; where, while he wrote what delighted +the English-speaking race, he took on himself the defence of the natives +against foreign interlopers, writing under the title _A Footnote to +History_, the most powerful _expose_ of the mischief they had done and +were doing there. He was the beloved of the natives, as he made himself +the friend of all with whom he came in contact. There, as at home, he +worked--worked with the same determination and in the enjoyment of better +health. The obtaining idea with him, up to the end, as it had been from +early life, was a brave, resolute, cheerful endeavour to make the best of +it. + +"I chose Samoa instead of Honolulu," he told Mr W. H. Trigg, who reports +the talk in _Cassells' Magazine_, "for the simple and eminently +satisfactory reason that it is less civilised. Can you not conceive that +it is awful fun?" His house was called "Vailima," which means Five +Waters in the Samoan, and indicates the number of streams that flow by +the spot. + + + + +CHAPTER VII--THE VAILIMA LETTERS + + +The Vailima Letters, written to Mr Sidney Colvin and other friends, are +in their way delightful if not inimitable: and this, in spite of the idea +having occurred to him, that some use might hereafter be made of these +letters for publication purposes. There is, indeed, as little trace of +any change in the style through this as well could be--the utterly +familiar, easy, almost child-like flow remains, unmarred by +self-consciousness or tendency "to put it on." + +In June, 1892, Stevenson says: + + "It came over me the other day suddenly that this diary of mine to you + would make good pickings after I am dead, and a man could make some + kind of a book out of it, without much trouble. So for God's sake + don't lose them, and they will prove a piece of provision for 'my + floor old family,' as Simele calls it." + +But their great charm remains: they are as free and gracious and serious +and playful and informal as before. Stevenson's traits of character are +all here: his largeness of heart, his delicacy, his sympathy, his fun, +his pathos, his boylike frolicsomeness, his fine courage, his love of the +sea (for he was by nature a sailor), his passion for action and adventure +despite his ill-health, his great patience with others and fine +adaptability to their temper (he says that he never gets out of temper +with those he has to do with), his unbounded, big-hearted hopefulness, +and fine perseverance in face of difficulties. What could be better than +the way in which he tells that in January, 1892, when he had a bout of +influenza and was dictating _St Ives_ to his stepdaughter, Mrs Strong, he +was "reduced to dictating to her in the deaf-and-dumb alphabet"?--and +goes on: + + "The amanuensis has her head quite turned, and believes herself to be + the author of this novel [_and is to some extent_.--A.M.] and as the + creature (!) has not been wholly useless in the matter [_I told you + so_!--A.M.] I propose to foster her vanity by a little commemoration + gift! . . . I shall tell you on some other occasion, and when the A.M. + is out of hearing, how _very_ much I propose to invest in this + testimonial; but I may as well inform you at once that I intend it to + be cheap, sir--damned cheap! My idea of running amanuenses is by + praise, not pudding, flattery, and not coins." + +Truly, a rare and rich nature which could thus draw sunshine out of its +trials!--which, by aid of the true philosopher's stone of cheerfulness +and courage, could transmute the heavy dust and clay to gold. + +His interests are so wide that he is sometimes pulled in different and +conflicting directions, as in the contest between his desire to aid +Mataafa and the other chiefs, and his literary work--between letters to +the _Times_ about Samoan politics, and, say, _David Balfour_. Here is a +characteristic bit in that strain: + + "I have a good dose of the devil in my pipestem atomy; I have had my + little holiday outing in my kick at _The Young Chevalier_, and I guess + I can settle to _David Balfour_, to-morrow or Friday like a little + man. I wonder if any one had ever more energy upon so little + strength? I know there is a frost; . . . but I mean to break that + frost inside two years, and pull off a big success, and Vanity + whispers in my ear that I have the strength. If I haven't, whistle + owre the lave o't! I can do without glory, and perhaps the time is + not far off when I can do without corn. It is a time coming soon + enough, anyway; and I have endured some two and forty years without + public shame, and had a good time as I did it. If only I could secure + a violent death, what a fine success! I wish to die in my boots; no + more Land of Counterpane for me. To be drowned, to be shot, to be + thrown from a horse--ay, to be hanged, rather than pass again through + that slow dissolution." + +He would not consent to act the invalid unless the spring ran down +altogether; was keen for exercise and for mixing among men--his native +servants if no others were near by. Here is a bit of confession and +casuistry quite _a la_ Stevenson: + + "To come down covered with mud and drenched with sweat and rain after + some hours in the bush, change, rub down, and take a chair in the + verandah, is to taste a quiet conscience. And the strange thing that + I mark is this: If I go out and make sixpence, bossing my labourers + and plying the cutlass or the spade, idiot conscience applauds me; if + I sit in the house and make twenty pounds, idiot conscience wails over + my neglect and the day wasted." + +His relish for companionship is indeed strong. At one place he says: + + "God knows I don't care who I chum with perhaps I like sailors best, + but to go round and sue and sneak to keep a crowd together--never!" + +If Stevenson's natural bent was to be an explorer, a mountain-climber, or +a sailor--to sail wide seas, or to range on mountain-tops to gain free +and extensive views--yet he inclines well to farmer work, and indeed, has +to confess it has a rare attraction for him. + + "I went crazy over outdoor work," he says at one place, "and had at + last to confine myself to the house, or literature must have gone by + the board. _Nothing_ is so interesting as weeding, clearing, and path- + making: the oversight of labourers becomes a disease. It is quite an + effort not to drop into the farmer; and it does make you feel so + well." + +The odd ways of these Samoans, their pride of position, their vices, +their virtues, their vanities, their small thefts, their tricks, their +delightful _insouciance_ sometimes, all amused him. He found in them a +fine field of study and observation--a source of fun and fund of +humanity--as this bit about the theft of some piglings will sufficiently +prove: + + "Last night three piglings were stolen from one of our pig-pens. The + great Lafaele appeared to my wife uneasy, so she engaged him in + conversation on the subject, and played upon him the following + engaging trick: You advance your two forefingers towards the sitter's + eyes; he closes them, whereupon you substitute (on his eyelids) the + fore and middle fingers of the left hand, and with your right (which + he supposes engaged) you tap him on the head and back. When you let + him open his eyes, he sees you withdrawing the two forefingers. 'What + that?' asked Lafaele. 'My devil,' says Fanny. 'I wake um, my devil. + All right now. He go catch the man that catch my pig.' About an hour + afterwards Lafaele came for further particulars. 'Oh, all right,' my + wife says. 'By-and-by that man be sleep, devil go sleep same place. + By-and-by that man plenty sick. I no care. What for he take my pig?' + Lafaele cares plenty; I don't think he is the man, though he may be; + but he knows him, and most likely will eat some of that pig to-night. + He will not eat with relish.'" + +Yet in spite of this R. L. Stevenson declares that: + + "They are a perfectly honest people: nothing of value has ever been + taken from our house, where doors and windows are always wide open; + and upon one occasion when white ants attacked the silver chest, the + whole of my family treasure lay spread upon the floor of the hall for + two days unguarded." + +Here is a bit on a work of peace, a reflection on a day's weeding at +Vailima--in its way almost as touching as any: + + "I wonder if any one had ever the same attitude to Nature as I hold, + and have held for so long? This business fascinates me like a tune or + a passion; yet all the while I thrill with a strong distaste. The + horror of the thing, objective and subjective, is always present to my + mind; the horror of creeping things, a superstitious horror of the + void and the powers about me, the horror of my own devastation and + continual murders. The life of the plants comes through my finger- + tips, their struggles go to my heart like supplications. I feel + myself blood-boltered; then I look back on my cleared grass, and count + myself an ally in a fair quarrel, and make stout my heart." + +Here, again, is the way in which he celebrates an act of friendly +kindness on the part of Mr Gosse: + + "MY DEAR GOSSE,--Your letter was to me such a bright spot that I + answer it right away to the prejudice of other correspondents or--dants + (don't know how to spell it) who have prior claims. . . . It is the + history of our kindnesses that alone makes this world tolerable. If + it were not for that, for the effect of kind words, kind looks, kind + letters, multiplying, spreading, making one happy through another and + bringing forth benefits, some thirty, some fifty, some a thousandfold, + I should be tempted to think our life a practical jest in the worst + possible spirit. So your four pages have confirmed my philosophy as + well as consoled my heart in these ill hours." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII--WORK OF LATER YEARS + + +Mr Hammerton, in his _Stevensoniana_ (pp. 323-4), has given the humorous +inscriptions on the volumes of his works which Stevenson presented to Dr +Trudeau, who attended him when he was in Saranac in 1887-88--very +characteristic in every way, and showing fully Stevenson's fine +appreciation of any attention or service. On the _Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_ +volume he wrote: + + "Trudeau was all the winter at my side: + I never saw the nose of Mr Hyde." + +And on _Kidnapped_ is this: + + "Here is the one sound page of all my writing, + The one I'm proud of and that I delight in." + +Stevenson was exquisite in this class of efforts, and were they all +collected they would form indeed, a fine supplement and illustration of +the leading lesson of his essays--the true art of pleasing others, and of +truly pleasing one's self at the same time. To my thinking the finest of +all in this line is the legal (?) deed by which he conveyed his birthday +to little Miss Annie Ide, the daughter of Mr H. C. Ide, a well-known +American, who was for several years a resident of Upolo, in Samoa, first +as Land Commissioner, and later as Chief Justice under the joint +appointment of England, Germany, and the United States. While living at +Apia, Mr Ide and his family were very intimate with the family of R. L. +Stevenson. Little Annie was a special pet and protege of Stevenson and +his wife. After the return of the Ides to their American home, Stevenson +"deeded" to Annie his birthday in the following unique document: + + I, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, advocate of the Scots Bar, author of _The + Master of Ballantrae_ and _Moral Emblems_, civil engineer, sole owner + and patentee of the palace and plantation known as Vailima, in the + island of Upolo, Samoa, a British subject, being in sound mind, and + pretty well, I thank you, in mind and body; + + In consideration that Miss Annie H. Ide, daughter of H. C. Ide, in the + town of Saint Johnsbury, in the County of Caledonia, in the State of + Vermont, United States of America, was born, out of all reason, upon + Christmas Day, and is, therefore, out of all justice, denied the + consolation and profit of a proper birthday; + + And considering that I, the said Robert Louis Stevenson, have attained + the age when we never mention it, and that I have now no further use + for a birthday of any description; + + And in consideration that I have met H. C. Ide, the father of the said + Annie H. Ide, and found him as white a land commissioner as I require, + I have transferred, and do hereby transfer, to the said Annie H. Ide, + all and whole of my rights and privileges in the 13th day of November, + formerly my birthday, now, hereby and henceforth, the birthday of the + said Annie H. Ide, to have, hold, exercise, and enjoy the same in the + customary manner, by the sporting of fine raiment, eating of rich + meats, and receipt of gifts, compliments, and copies of verse, + according to the manner of our ancestors; + + And I direct the said Annie H. Ide to add to the said name of Annie H. + Ide the name of Louisa--at least in private--and I charge her to use + my said birthday with moderation and humanity, _et tamquam bona filia + familias_, the said birthday not being so young as it once was and + having carried me in a very satisfactory manner since I can remember; + + And in case the said Annie H. Ide shall neglect or contravene either + of the above conditions, I hereby revoke the donation and transfer my + rights in the said birthday to the President of the United States of + America for the time being. + + In witness whereof I have hereto set my hand and seal this 19th day of + June, in the year of grace eighteen hundred and ninety-one. + + ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. [Seal.] + + _Witness_, LLOYD OSBOURNE. + + _Witness_, HAROLD WATTS. + +He died in Samoa in December 1894--not from phthisis or anything directly +connected with it, but from the bursting of a blood-vessel and suffusion +of blood on the brain. He had up to the moment almost of his sudden and +unexpected death been busy on _Weir of Hermiston_ and _St Ives_, which he +left unfinished--the latter having been brought to a conclusion by Mr +Quiller-Couch. + + + + +CHAPTER IX--SOME CHARACTERISTICS + + +In Stevenson we lost one of the most powerful writers of our day, as well +as the most varied in theme and style. When I use the word "powerful," I +do not mean merely the producing of the most striking or sensational +results, nor the facility of weaving a fascinating or blood-curdling +plot; I mean the writer who seemed always to have most in reserve--a +secret fund of power and fascination which always pointed beyond the +printed page, and set before the attentive and careful reader a strange +but fascinating _personality_. Other authors have done that in measure. +There was Hawthorne, behind whose writings there is always the wistful, +cold, far-withdrawn spectator of human nature--eerie, inquisitive, and, I +had almost said, inquisitorial--a little bloodless, eerie, weird, and +cobwebby. There was Dr Wendell Holmes, with his problems of heredity, of +race-mixture and weird inoculation, as in _Elsie Venner_ and _The +Guardian Angel_, and there were Poe and Charles Whitehead. Stevenson, in +a few of his writings--in one of the _Merry Men_ chapters and in _Dr +Jekyll and Mr Hyde_, and, to some extent, in _The Master of +Ballantrae_--showed that he could enter on the obscure and, in a sense, +weird and metaphysical elements in human life; though always there was, +too, a touch at least of gloomy suggestion, from which, as it seemed, he +could not there wholly escape. But always, too, there was a touch that +suggests the universal. + +Even in the stories that would be classed as those of incident and +adventure merely, _Treasure Island_, _Kidnapped_, and the rest, there is +a sense as of some unaffected but fine symbolism that somehow touches +something of possibility in yourself as you read. The simplest narrative +from his hand proclaimed itself a deep study in human nature--its motives +tendencies, and possibilities. In these stories there is promise at once +of the most realistic imagination, the most fantastic romance, keen +insights into some sides of human nature, and weird fancies, as well as +the most delicate and dainty pictures of character. And this is +precisely what we have--always with a vein of the finest autobiography--a +kind of select and indirect self-revelation--often with a touch of +quaintness, a subdued humour, and sweet-blooded vagary, if we may be +allowed the word, which make you feel towards the writer as towards a +friend. He was too much an artist to overdo this, and his strength lies +there, that generally he suggests and turns away at the right point, with +a smile, as you ask for _more_. Look how he sets, half slyly, these +words into the mouth of David Balfour on his first meeting with Catriona +in one of the steep wynds or closes off the High Street of Edinburgh: + + "There is no greater wonder than the way the face of a young woman + fits in a man's mind, and stays there, and he never could tell you + why: it just seems it was the thing he wanted." + +Take this alongside of his remark made to his mother while still a +youth--"that he did not care to understand the strain on a bridge" (when +he tried to study engineering); what he wanted was something with human +nature in it. His style, in his essays, etc., where he writes in his own +person, is most polished, full of phrases finely drawn; when he speaks +through others, as in _Kidnapped_ and _David Balfour_, it is still fine +and effective, and generally it is fairly true to the character, with +cunning glimpses, nevertheless, of his own temper and feeling too. He +makes us feel his confidants and friends, as has been said. One could +almost construct a biography from his essays and his novels--the one +would give us the facts of his life suffused with fancy and ideal colour, +humour and fine observation not wanting; the other would give us the +history of his mental and moral being and development, and of the traits +and determinations which he drew from along a lengthened line of +progenitors. How characteristic it is of him--a man who for so many +years suffered as an invalid--that he should lay it down that the two +great virtues, including all others, were cheerfulness and delight in +labour. + +One writer has very well said on this feature in Stevenson: + + "Other authors have struggled bravely against physical weakness, but + their work has not usually been of a creative order, dependent for its + success on high animal spirits. They have written histories, essays, + contemplative or didactic poems, works which may more or less be + regarded as 'dull narcotics numbing pain.' But who, in so fragile a + frame as Robert Louis Stevenson's, has retained such indomitable + elasticity, such fertility of invention, such unflagging energy, not + merely to collect and arrange, but to project and body forth? Has any + true 'maker' been such an incessant sufferer? From his childhood, as + he himself said apropos of the _Child's Garden_, he could 'speak with + less authority of gardens than of that other "land of counterpane."' + There were, indeed, a few years of adolescence during which his health + was tolerable, but they were years of apprenticeship to life and art + ('pioching,' as he called it), not of serious production. Though he + was a precocious child, his genius ripened slowly, and it was just + reaching maturity when the 'wolverine,' as he called his disease, + fixed its fangs in his flesh. From that time forward not only did he + live with death at his elbow in an almost literal sense (he used to + carry his left arm in a sling lest a too sudden movement should bring + on a haemorrhage), but he had ever-recurring intervals of weeks and + months during which he was totally unfit for work; while even at the + best of times he had to husband his strength most jealously. Add to + all this that he was a slow and laborious writer, who would take more + pains with a phrase than Scott with a chapter--then look at the + stately shelf of his works, brimful of impulse, initiative, and the + joy of life, and say whether it be an exaggeration to call his + tenacity and fortitude unique!" + +Samoa, with its fine climate, prolonged his life--we had fain hoped that +in that air he found so favourable he might have lived for many years, to +add to the precious stock of innocent delight he has given to the +world--to do yet more and greater. It was not to be. They buried him, +with full native honours as to a chief, on the top of Vaea mountain, 1300 +feet high--a road for the coffin to pass being cut through the woods on +the slopes of the hill. There he has a resting-place not all unfit--for +he sought the pure and clearer air on the heights from whence there are +widest prospects; yet not in the spot he would have chosen--for his heart +was at home, and not very long before his death he sang, surely with +pathetic reference now: + + "Spring shall come, come again, calling up the moorfowl, + Spring shall bring the sun and rain, bring the bees and flowers, + Red shall the heather bloom over hill and valley, + Soft flow the stream thro' the even-flowing hours; + Fair the day shine, as it shone upon my childhood-- + Fair shine the day on the house with open door; + Birds come and cry there, and twitter in the chimney-- + But I go for ever and come again no more." + + + + +CHAPTER X--A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON + + +A few weeks after his death, the mail from Samoa, brought to Stevenson's +friends, myself among the number, a precious, if pathetic, memorial of +the master. It is in the form of "A Letter to Mr Stevenson's Friends," +by his stepson, Mr Lloyd Osbourne, and bears the motto from Walt Whitman, +"I have been waiting for you these many years. Give me your hand and +welcome." Mr Osbourne gives a full account of the last hours. + + "He wrote hard all that morning of the last day; his half-finished + book, _Hermiston_, he judged the best he had ever written, and the + sense of successful effort made him buoyant and happy as nothing else + could. In the afternoon the mail fell to be answered--not business + correspondence, for this was left till later--but replies to the long, + kindly letters of distant friends received but two days since, and + still bright in memory. At sunset he came downstairs; rallied his + wife about the forebodings she could not shake off; talked of a + lecturing tour to America that he was eager to make, 'as he was now so + well'; and played a game of cards with her to drive away her + melancholy. He said he was hungry; begged her assistance to help him + make a salad for the evening meal; and, to enhance the little feast he + brought up a bottle of old Burgundy from the cellar. He was helping + his wife on the verandah, and gaily talking, when suddenly he put both + hands to his head and cried out, 'What's that?' Then he asked + quickly, 'Do I look strange?' Even as he did so he fell on his knees + beside her. He was helped into the great hall, between his wife and + his body-servant, Sosimo, losing consciousness instantly as he lay + back in the armchair that had once been his grandfather's. Little + time was lost in bringing the doctors--Anderson of the man-of-war, and + his friend, Dr Funk. They looked at him and shook their heads; they + laboured strenuously, and left nothing undone. But he had passed the + bounds of human skill. He had grown so well and strong, that his + wasted lungs were unable to bear the stress of returning health." + +Then 'tis told how the Rev. Mr Clarke came and prayed by him; and how, +soon after, the chiefs were summoned, and came, bringing their fine mats, +which, laid on the body, almost hid the Union jack in which it had been +wrapped. One of the old Mataafa chiefs, who had been in prison, and who +had been one of those who worked on the making of the "Road of the Loving +Heart" (the road of gratitude which the chiefs had made up to Mr +Stevenson's house as a mark of their appreciation of his efforts on their +behalf), came and crouched beside the body and said: + + "I am only a poor Samoan, and ignorant. Others are rich, and can give + Tusitala {6} the parting presents of rich, fine mats; I am poor, and + can give nothing this last day he receives his friends. Yet I am not + afraid to come and look the last time in my friend's face, never to + see him more till we meet with God. Behold! Tusitala is dead; + Mataafa is also dead. These two great friends have been taken by God. + When Mataafa was taken, who was our support but Tusitala? We were in + prison, and he cared for us. We were sick, and he made us well. We + were hungry, and he fed us. The day was no longer than his kindness. + You are great people, and full of love. Yet who among you is so great + as Tusitala? What is your love to his love? Our clan was Mataafa's + clan, for whom I speak this day; therein was Tusitala also. We mourn + them both." + +A select company of Samoans would not be deterred, and watched by the +body all night, chanting songs, with bits of Catholic prayers; and in the +morning the work began of clearing a path through the wood on the hill to +the spot on the crown where Mr Stevenson had expressed a wish to be +buried. The following prayer, which Mr Stevenson had written and read +aloud to his family only the night before, was read by Mr Clarke in the +service: + + "We beseech thee, Lord, to behold us with favour, folk of many + families and nations, gathered together in the peace of this roof; + weak men and women, subsisting under the covert of Thy patience. Be + patient still; suffer us yet a while longer--with our broken purposes + of good, with our idle endeavours against evil--suffer us a while + longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better. Bless to + us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these must be + taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our friends; be + with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest: if any awake, temper to + them the dark hours of watching; and when the day returns to us, our + Sun and Comforter, call us up with morning faces and with morning + hearts--eager to labour--eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our + portion; and if the day be marked for sorrow, strong to endure it. + + "We thank Thee and praise Thee, and in the words of Him to whom this + day is sacred, close our oblations." + +Mr Bazzet M. Haggard, H.B.M., Land-Commissioner, tells, by way of +reminiscence, the story of "The Road of Good Heart," how it came to be +built, and of the great feast Mr Stevenson gave at the close of the work, +at which, in the course of his speech, he said: + + "You are all aware in some degree of what has happened. You know + those chiefs to have been prisoners; you perhaps know that during the + term of their confinement I had it in my power to do them certain + favours. One thing some of you cannot know, that they were + immediately repaid by answering attentions. They were liberated by + the new Administration. . . . As soon as they were free men--owing no + man anything--instead of going home to their own places and families, + they came to me. They offered to do this work (to make this road) for + me as a free gift, without hire, without supplies, and I was tempted + at first to refuse their offer. I knew the country to be poor; I knew + famine threatening; I knew their families long disorganised for want + of supervision. Yet I accepted, because I thought the lesson of that + road might be more useful to Samoa than a thousand bread-fruit trees, + and because to myself it was an exquisite pleasure to receive that + which was so handsomely offered. It is now done; you have trod it to- + day in coming hither. It has been made for me by chiefs; some of them + old, some sick, all newly delivered from a harassing confinement, and + in spite of weather unusually hot and insalubrious. I have seen these + chiefs labour valiantly with their own hands upon the work, and I have + set up over it, now that it is finished the name of 'The Road of + Gratitude' (the road of loving hearts), and the names of those that + built it. 'In perpetuam memoriam,' we say, and speak idly. At least, + as long as my own life shall be spared it shall be here perpetuated; + partly for my pleasure and in my gratitude; partly for others + continually to publish the lesson of this road." + +And turning to the chiefs, Mr Stevenson said: + + "I will tell you, chiefs, that when I saw you working on that road, my + heart grew warm; not with gratitude only, but with hope. It seemed to + me that I read the promise of something good for Samoa; it seemed to + me as I looked at you that you were a company of warriors in a battle, + fighting for the defence of our common country against all aggression. + For there is a time to fight and a time to dig. You Samoans may + fight, you may conquer twenty times, and thirty times, and all will be + in vain. There is but one way to defend Samoa. Hear it, before it is + too late. It is to make roads and gardens, and care for your trees, + and sell their produce wisely; and, in one word, to occupy and use + your country. If you do not, others will. . . . + + "I love Samoa and her people. I love the land. I have chosen it to + be my home while I live, and my grave after I am dead, and I love the + people, and have chosen them to be my people, to live and die with. + And I see that the day is come now of the great battle; of the great + and the last opportunity by which it shall be decided whether you are + to pass away like those other races of which I have been speaking, or + to stand fast and have your children living on and honouring your + memory in the land you received of your fathers." + +Mr James H. Mulligan, U.S. Consul, told of the feast of Thanksgiving Day +on the 29th November prior to Mr Stevenson's death, and how at great +pains he had procured for it the necessary turkey, and how Mrs Stevenson +had found a fair substitute for the pudding. In the course of his speech +in reply to an unexpected proposal of "The Host," Mr Stevenson said: + + "There on my right sits she who has but lately from our own loved + native land come back to me--she to whom, with no lessening of + affection to those others to whom I cling, I love better than all the + world besides--my mother. From the opposite end of the table, my + wife, who has been all in all to me, when the days were very dark, + looks to-night into my eyes--while we have both grown a bit older--with + undiminished and undiminishing affection. + + "Childless, yet on either side of me sits that good woman, my + daughter, and the stalwart man, my son, and both have been and are + more than son and daughter to me, and have brought into my life mirth + and beauty. Nor is this all. There sits the bright boy dear to my + heart, full of the flow and the spirits of boyhood, so that I can even + know that for a time at least we have still the voice of a child in + the house." + +Mr A. W. Mackay gives an account of the funeral and a description of the +burial-place, ending: + + "Tofa Tusitala! Sleep peacefully! on thy mountain-top, alone in + Nature's sanctity, where the wooddove's note, the moaning of the waves + as they break unceasingly on the distant reef, and the sighing of the + winds in the distant tavai trees chant their requiem." + +The Rev. Mr Clarke tells of the constant and active interest Mr Stevenson +took in the missionaries and their work, often aiding them by his advice +and fine insight into the character of the natives; and a translation +follows of a dirge by one of the chiefs, so fine that we must give it: + + I. + + "Listen, O this world, as I tell of the disaster + That befell in the late afternoon; + That broke like a wave of the sea + Suddenly and swiftly, blinding our eyes. + Alas for Loia who speaks tears in his voice! + + _Refrain_--Groan and weep, O my heart, in its sorrow. + Alas for Tusitala, who rests in the forest! + Aimlessly we wait, and sorrowing. Will he again return? + Lament, O Vailima, waiting and ever waiting! + Let us search and inquire of the captain of ships, + 'Be not angry, but has not Tusitala come?' + + II. + + "Teuila, sorrowing one, come thou hither! + Prepare me a letter, and I will carry it. + Let her Majesty Victoria be told + That Tusitala, the loving one, has been taken hence. + + _Refrain_--Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + + III. + + "Alas! my heart weeps with anxious grief + As I think of the days before us: + Of the white men gathering for the Christmas assembly! + Alas for Aolele! left in her loneliness, + And the men of Vailima, who weep together + Their leader--their leader being taken. + + _Refrain_--Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + + IV. + + "Alas! O my heart! it weeps unceasingly + When I think of his illness + Coming upon him with fatal swiftness. + Would that it waited a glance or a word from him, + Or some token, some token from us of our love. + + _Refrain_--Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + + V. + + "Grieve, O my heart! I cannot bear to look on + All the chiefs who are there now assembling: + Alas, Tusitala! Thou art not here! + I look hither and thither in vain for thee. + + _Refrain_--Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc." + +And the little booklet closes with Mr Stevenson's own lines: + + "REQUIEM. + + Under the wide and starry sky, + Dig the grave and let me lie; + Glad did I live and gladly die, + And I laid me down with a will. + This be the verse you grave for me: + 'Here he lies where he longed to be; + Home is the sailor, home from sea; + And the hunter home from the hill.'" + +Every touch tells here was a man, with heart and head, with soul and mind +intent on the loftiest things; simple, great, + + "Like one of the simple great ones gone + For ever and ever by. + +His character towered after all far above his books; great and beautiful +though they were. Ready for friendship; from all meanness free. So, +too, the Samoans felt. This, surely, was what Goethe meant when he +wrote: + + "The clear head and stout heart, + However far they roam, + Yet in every truth have part, + Are everywhere at home." + +His manliness, his width of sympathy, his practicality, his range of +interests were in nothing more seen than in his contributions to the +history of Samoa, as specially exhibited in _A Footnote to History_ and +his letters to the _Times_. He was, on this side, in no sense a dreamer, +but a man of acute observation and quick eye for passing events and the +characters that were in them with sympathy equal to his discernments. His +portraits of certain Germans and others in these writings, and his power +of tracing effects to remote and underlying causes, show sufficiently +what he might have done in the field of history, had not higher voices +called him. His adaptation to the life in Samoa, and his assumption of +the semi-patriarchal character in his own sphere there, were only tokens +of the presence of the same traits as have just been dwelt on. + + + + +CHAPTER XI--MISS STUBBS' RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE + + +Mrs Strong, in her chapter of _Table Talk in Memories of Vailima_, tells +a story of the natives' love for Stevenson. "The other day the cook was +away," she writes, "and Louis, who was busy writing, took his meals in +his room. Knowing there was no one to cook his lunch, he told Sosimo to +bring him some bread and cheese. To his surprise he was served with an +excellent meal--an omelette, a good salad, and perfect coffee. 'Who +cooked this?' asked Louis in Samoan. 'I did,' said Sosimo. 'Well,' said +Louis, 'great is your wisdom.' Sosimo bowed and corrected him--'Great is +my love!'" + +Miss Stubbs, in her _Stevenson's Shrine_; _the Record of a Pilgrimage_, +illustrates the same devotion. On the top of Mount Vaea, she writes, is +the massive sarcophagus, "not an ideal structure by any means, not even +beautiful, and yet in its massive ruggedness it somehow suited the man +and the place." + +"The wind sighed softly in the branches of the 'Tavau' trees, from out +the green recesses of the 'Toi' came the plaintive coo of the +wood-pigeon. In and out of the branches of the magnificent 'Fau' tree, +which overhangs the grave, a king-fisher, sea-blue, iridescent, flitted +to and fro, whilst a scarlet hibiscus, in full flower, showed up royally +against the gray lichened cement. All around was light and life and +colour, and I said to myself, 'He is made one with nature'; he is now, +body and soul and spirit, commingled with the loveliness around. He who +longed in life to scale the height, he who attained his wish only in +death, has become in himself a parable of fulfilment. No need now for +that heart-sick cry:-- + + "'Sing me a song of a lad that is gone, + Say, could that lad be I?' + +No need now for the despairing finality of: + + "'I have trod the upward and the downward slope, + I have endured and done in the days of yore, + I have longed for all, and bid farewell to hope, + And I have lived, and loved, and closed the door.' + + "Death has set his seal of peace on the unequal conflict of mind and + matter; the All-Mother has gathered him to herself. + + "In years to come, when his grave is perchance forgotten, a rugged + ruin, home of the lizard and the bat, Tusitala--the story-teller--'the + man with a heart of gold' (as I so often heard him designated in the + Islands), will live, when it may be his tales have ceased to interest, + in the tender remembrance of those whose lives he beautified, and + whose hearts he warmed into gratitude." + +The chiefs have prohibited the use of firearms or other weapons on Mount +Vaea, "in order that the birds may live there undisturbed and unafraid, +and build their nests in the trees around Tusitala's grave." + +Miss Stubbs has many records of the impression produced on those he came +in contact with in Samoa--white men and women as well as natives. She +met a certain Austrian Count, who adored Stevenson's memory. Over his +camp bed was a framed photograph of R. L. Stevenson. + + "So," he said, "I keep him there, for he was my saviour, and I wish + 'good-night' and 'good-morning,' every day, both to himself and to his + old home." The Count then told us that when he was stopping at + Vailima he used to have his bath daily on the verandah below his room. + One lovely morning he got up very early, got into the bath, and + splashed and sang, feeling very well and very happy, and at last + beginning to sing very loudly, he forgot Mr Stevenson altogether. All + at once there was Stevenson himself, his hair all ruffled up, his eyes + full of anger. "Man," he said, "you and your infernal row have cost + me more than two hundred pounds in ideas," and with that he was gone, + but he did not address the Count again the whole of that day. Next + morning he had forgotten the Count's offence and was just as friendly + as ever, but--the noise was never repeated! + +Another of the Count's stories greatly amused the visitors: + + "An English lord came all the way to Samoa in his yacht to see Mr + Stevenson, and found him in his cool Kimino sitting with the ladies, + and drinking tea on his verandah; the whole party had their feet bare. + The English lord thought that he must have called at the wrong time, + and offered to go away, but Mr Stevenson called out to him, and + brought him back, and made him stay to dinner. They all went away to + dress, and the guest was left sitting alone in the verandah. Soon + they came back, Mr Osbourne and Mr Stevenson wearing the form of dress + most usual in that hot climate a white mess jacket, and white + trousers, but their feet were still bare. The guest put up his + eyeglass and stared for a bit, then he looked down upon his own + beautifully shod feet, and sighed. They all talked and laughed until + the ladies came in, the ladies in silk dresses, befrilled with lace, + but still with bare feet, and the guest took a covert look through his + eyeglass and gasped, but when he noticed that there were gold bangles + on Mrs Strong's ankles and rings upon her toes, he could bear no more + and dropped his eyeglass on the ground of the verandah breaking it all + to bits." + +Miss Stubbs met on the other side of the island a photographer who told +her this: + + "I had but recently come to Samoa," he said, "and was standing one day + in my shop when Mr Stevenson came in and spoke. 'Man,' he said, 'I + tak ye to be a Scotsman like mysel'.' + + "I would I could have claimed a kinship," deplored the photographer, + "but, alas! I am English to the backbone, with never a drop of Scotch + blood in my veins, and I told him this, regretting the absence of the + blood tie." + + "'I could have sworn your back was the back of a Scotsman,' was his + comment, 'but,' and he held out his hand, 'you look sick, and there is + a fellowship in sickness not to be denied.' I said I was not strong, + and had come to the Island on account of my health. 'Well, then,' + replied Mr Stevenson, 'it shall be my business to help you to get + well; come to Vailima whenever you like, and if I am out, ask for + refreshment, and wait until I come in, you will always find a welcome + there.'" + + At this point my informant turned away, and there was a break in his + voice as he exclaimed, "Ah, the years go on, and I don't miss him + less, but more; next to my mother he was the best friend I ever had: a + man with a heart of gold; his house was a second home to me." + +Stevenson's experience shows how easy it is with a certain type of man, +to restore the old feudal conditions of service and relationship. +Stevenson did this in essentials in Samoa. He tells us how he managed to +get good service out of the Samoans (who are accredited with great +unwillingness to work); and this he _did_ by firm, but generous, kindly, +almost brotherly treatment, reviving, as it were, a kind of clan +life--giving a livery of certain colours--symbol of all this. A little +fellow of eight, he tells, had been taken into the household, made a pet +of by Mrs Strong, his stepdaughter, and had had a dress given to him, +like that of the men; and, when one day he had strolled down by himself +as far as the hotel, and the master of it, seeing him, called out in +Samoan, "Hi, youngster, who are you?" The eight-year-old replied, "Why, +don't you see for yourself? I am one of the Vailima men!" + +The story of the _Road of the Loving Heart_ was but another fine +attestation of it. + + + + +CHAPTER XII--HIS GENIUS AND METHODS + + +To have created a school of idolaters, who will out and out swear by +everything, and as though by necessity, at the same time, a school of +studious detractors, who will suspiciously question everything, or throw +out suggestions of disparagement, is at all events, a proof of greatness, +the countersign of undoubted genius, and an assurance of lasting fame. R. +L. Stevenson has certainly secured this. Time will tell what of virtue +there is with either party. For me, who knew Stevenson, and loved him, +as finding in the sweet-tempered, brave, and in some things, most +generous man, what gave at once tone and elevation to the artist, I would +fain indicate here my impressions of him and his genius--impressions that +remain almost wholly uninfluenced by the vast mass of matter about him +that the press now turns out. Books, not to speak of articles, pour +forth about him--about his style, his art, his humour and his +characters--aye, and even about his religion. + +Miss Simpson follows Mr Bellyse Baildon with the _Edinburgh Days_, Miss +Moyes Black comes on with her picture in the _Famous Scots_, and +Professor Raleigh succeeds her; Mr Graham Balfour follows with his_ +Life_; Mr Kelman's volume about his Religion comes next, and that is +reinforced by more familiar letters and _Table Talk_, by Lloyd Osbourne +and Mrs Strong, his step-children; Mr J. Hammerton then comes on handily +with _Stevensoniana_--fruit lovingly gathered from many and far fields, +and garnered with not a little tact and taste, and catholicity; Miss +Laura Stubbs then presents us with her touching _Stevenson's Shrine_: +_the Record of a Pilgrimage_; and Mr Sidney Colvin is now busily at work +on his _Life of Stevenson_, which must do not a little to enlighten and +to settle many questions. + +Curiosity and interest grow as time passes; and the places connected with +Stevenson, hitherto obscure many of them, are now touched with light if +not with romance, and are known, by name at all events, to every reader +of books. Yes; every place he lived in, or touched at, is worthy of full +description if only on account of its associations with him. If there is +not a land of Stevenson, as there is a land of Scott, or of Burns, it is +due to the fact that he was far-travelled, and in his works painted many +scenes: but there are at home--Edinburgh, and Halkerside and Allermuir, +Caerketton, Swanston, and Colinton, and Maw Moss and Rullion Green and +Tummel, "the _wale_ of Scotland," as he named it to me, and the +Castletown of Braemar--Braemar in his view coming a good second to +Tummel, for starting-points to any curious worshipper who would go the +round in Scotland and miss nothing. Mr Geddie's work on _The Home +Country of Stevenson_ may be found very helpful here. + +1. It is impossible to separate Stevenson from his work, because of the +imperious personal element in it; and so I shall not now strive to gain +the appearance of cleverness by affecting any distinction here. The +first thing I would say is, that he was when I knew him--what pretty much +to the end he remained--a youth. His outlook on life was boyishly genial +and free, despite all his sufferings from ill-health--it was the pride of +action, the joy of endurance, the revelry of high spirits, and the sense +of victory that most fascinated him; and his theory of life was to take +pleasure and give pleasure, without calculation or stint--a kind of +boyish grace and bounty never to be overcome or disturbed by outer +accident or change. If he was sometimes haunted with the thought of +changes through changed conditions or circumstances, as my very old +friend, Mr Charles Lowe, has told even of the College days that he was +always supposing things to undergo some sea-change into something else, +if not "into something rich and strange," this was but to add to his +sense of enjoyment, and the power of conferring delight, and the luxuries +of variety, as boys do when they let fancy loose. And this always had, +with him, an individual reference or return. He was thus constantly, and +latterly, half-consciously, trying to interpret himself somehow through +all the things which engaged him, and which he so transmogrified--things +that especially attracted him and took his fancy. Thus, if it must be +confessed, that even in his highest moments, there lingers a touch--if no +more than a touch--of self-consciousness which will not allow him to +forget manner in matter, it is also true that he is cunningly conveying +traits in himself; and the sense of this is often at the root of his +sweet, gentle, naive humour. There is, therefore, some truth in the +criticisms which assert that even "long John Silver," that fine pirate, +with his one leg, was, after all, a shadow of Stevenson himself--the +genial buccaneer who did his tremendous murdering with a smile on his +face was but Stevenson thrown into new circumstances, or, as one has +said, Stevenson-cum-Henley, so thrown as was also Archer in _Weir of +Hermiston_, and more than this, that his most successful women-folk--like +Miss Grant and Catriona--are studies of himself, and that in all his +heroes, and even heroines, was an unmistakable touch of R. L. Stevenson. +Even Mr Baildon rather maladroitly admits that in Miss Grant, the Lord +Advocate's daughter, _there is a good deal of the author himself +disguised in petticoats_. I have thought of Stevenson in many suits, +beside that which included the velvet jacket, but--petticoats! + +Youth is autocratic, and can show a grand indifferency: it goes for what +it likes, and ignores all else--it fondly magnifies its favourites, and, +after all, to a great extent, it is but analysing, dealing with and +presenting itself to us, if we only watch well. This is the secret of +all prevailing romance: it is the secret of all stories of adventure and +chivalry of the simpler and more primitive order; and in one aspect it is +true that R. L. Stevenson loved and clung to the primitive and elemental, +if it may not be said, as one distinguished writer has said, that he even +loved savagery in itself. But hardly could it be seriously held, as Mr +I. Zangwill held: + + "That women did not cut any figure in his books springs from this same + interest in the elemental. Women are not born, but made. They are a + social product of infinite complexity and delicacy. For a like reason + Stevenson was no interpreter of the modern. . . . A child to the end, + always playing at 'make-believe,' dying young, as those whom the gods + love, and, as he would have died had he achieved his centenary, he was + the natural exponent in literature of the child." + +But there were subtly qualifying elements beyond what Mr Zangwill here +recognises and reinforces. That is just about as correct and true as +this other deliverance: + + "His Scotch romances have been as over-praised by the zealous Scotsmen + who cry 'genius' at the sight of a kilt, and who lose their heads at a + waft from the heather, as his other books have been under-praised. The + best of all, _The Master of Ballantrae_, ends in a bog; and where the + author aspires to exceptional subtlety of character-drawing he befogs + us or himself altogether. We are so long weighing the brothers + Ballantrae in the balance, watching it incline now this way, now that, + scrupulously removing a particle of our sympathy from the one brother + to the other, to restore it again in the next chapter, that we end + with a conception of them as confusing as Mr Gilbert's conception of + Hamlet, who was idiotically sane with lucid intervals of lunacy." + +If Stevenson was, as Mr Zangwill holds, "the child to the end," and the +child only, then if we may not say what Carlyle said of De Quincey: +"_Eccovi_, that child has been in hell," we may say, "_Eccovi_, that +child has been in unchildlike haunts, and can't forget the memory of +them." In a sense every romancer is a child--such was Ludwig Tieck, such +was Scott, such was James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd. But each is +something more--he has been touched with the wand of a fairy, and knows, +at least, some of Elfin Land as well as of childhood's home. + +The sense of Stevenson's youthfulness seems to have struck every one who +had intimacy with him. Mr Baildon writes (p. 21 of his book): + + I would now give much to possess but one of Stevenson's gifts--namely, + that extraordinary vividness of recollection by which he could so + astonishingly recall, not only the doings, but the very thoughts and + emotions of his youth. For, often as we must have communed together, + with all the shameless candour of boys, hardly any remark has stuck to + me except the opinion already alluded to, which struck me--his elder + by some fifteen months--as very amusing, that at sixteen 'we should be + men.' _He of all mortals_, _who was_, _in a sense_, _always still a + boy_!" + +Mr Gosse tells us: + + "He had retained a great deal of the temperament of a child, and it + was his philosophy to encourage it. In his dreary passages of bed, + when his illness was more than commonly heavy on him, he used to + contrive little amusements for himself. He played on the flute, or he + modelled little groups and figures in clay." + +2. One of the qualifying elements unnoted by Mr Zangwill is simply this, +that R. L. Stevenson never lost the strange tint imparted to his youth by +the religious influences to which he was subject, and which left their +impress and colour on him and all that he did. Henley, in his striking +sonnet, hit it when he wrote: + + "A deal of Ariel, just a streak of Puck, + Much Antony, of Hamlet most of all, + _And something of the Shorter Catechist_." + +_Something_! he was a great deal of Shorter Catechist! Scotch Calvinism, +its metaphysic, and all the strange whims, perversities, and questionings +of "Fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute," which it inevitably +awakens, was much with him--the sense of reprobation and the gloom born +of it, as well as the abounding joy in the sense of the elect--the +Covenanters and their wild resolutions, the moss-troopers and their dare- +devilries--Pentland Risings and fights of Rullion Green; he not only +never forgot them, but they mixed themselves as in his very breath of +life, and made him a great questioner. How would I have borne myself in +this or in that? Supposing I had been there, how would it have been--the +same, or different from what it was with those that were there? His work +is throughout at bottom a series of problems that almost all trace to +this root, directly or indirectly. "There, but for the grace of God, +goes John Bradford," said the famous Puritan on seeing a felon led to +execution; so with Stevenson. Hence his fondness for tramps, for scamps +(he even bestowed special attention and pains on Villon, the poet-scamp); +he was rather impatient with poor Thoreau, because he was a purist +solitary, and had too little of vice, and, as Stevenson held, narrow in +sympathy, and too self-satisfied, and bent only on self-improvement. He +held a brief for the honest villain, and leaned to him brotherly. Even +the anecdotes he most prizes have a fine look this way--a hunger for +completion in achievement, even in the violation of fine humane feeling +or morality, and all the time a sense of submission to God's will. +"Doctor," said the dying gravedigger in _Old Mortality_, "I hae laid +three hunner an' fower score in that kirkyaird, an' had it been His +wull," indicating Heaven, "I wad hae likeit weel to hae made oot the +fower hunner." That took Stevenson. Listen to what Mr Edmond Gosse +tells of his talk, when he found him in a private hotel in Finsbury +Circus, London, ready to be put on board a steamer for America, on 21st +August, 1887: + + "It was church time, and there was some talk of my witnessing his + will, which I could not do because there could be found no other + reputable witness, the whole crew of the hotel being at church. + 'This,' he said, 'is the way in which our valuable city hotels--packed + no doubt with gems and jewellery--are deserted on a Sunday morning. + Some bold piratical fellow, defying the spirit of Sabbatarianism, + might make a handsome revenue by sacking the derelict hotels between + the hours of ten and twelve. One hotel a week would enable such a man + to retire in course of a year. A mask might perhaps be worn for the + mere fancy of the thing, and to terrify kitchen-maids, but no real + disguise would be needful.'" + +I would rather agree with Mr Chesterton than with Mr Zangwill here: + + "Stevenson's enormous capacity for joy flowed directly out of his + profoundly religious temperament. He conceived himself as an + unimportant guest at one eternal and uproarious banquet, and instead + of grumbling at the soup, he accepted it with careless gratitude. . . + . His gaiety was neither the gaiety of the pagan, nor the gaiety of + the _bon vivant_. It was the greater gaiety of the mystic. He could + enjoy trifles because there was to him no such thing as a trifle. He + was a child who respected his dolls because they were the images of + the image of God, portraits at only two removes." + +Here, then, we have the child crossed by the dreamer and the mystic, bred +of Calvinism and speculation on human fate and chance, and on the mystery +of temperament and inheritance, and all that flows from +these--reprobation, with its dire shadows, assured Election with its +joys, etc., etc. + +3. If such a combination is in favour of the story-teller up to a certain +point, it is not favourable to the highest flights, and it is alien to +dramatic presentation pure and simple. This implies detachment from +moods and characters, high as well as low, that complete justice in +presentation may be done to all alike, and the one balance that obtains +in life grasped and repeated with emphasis. But towards his leading +characters Stevenson is unconsciously biassed, because they are more or +less shadowy projections of himself, or images through which he would +reveal one or other side or aspect of his own personality. Attwater is a +confessed failure, because it, more than any other, testifies this: he is +but a mouth-piece for one side or tendency in Stevenson. If the same +thing is not more decisively felt in some other cases, it is because +Stevenson there showed the better art o' hidin', and not because he was +any more truly detached or dramatic. "Of Hamlet most of all," wrote +Henley in his sonnet. The Hamlet in Stevenson--the self-questioning, +egotistic, moralising Hamlet--was, and to the end remained, a something +alien to bold, dramatic, creative freedom. He is great as an artist, as +a man bent on giving to all that he did the best and most distinguished +form possible, but not great as a free creator of dramatic power. +"Mother," he said as a mere child, "I've drawed a man. Now, will I draw +his soul?" He was to the end all too fond to essay a picture of the +soul, separate and peculiar. All the Jekyll and Hyde and even Ballantrae +conceptions came out of that--and what is more, he always mixed his own +soul with the other soul, and could not help doing so. + +4. When; therefore, I find Mr Pinero, in lecturing at Edinburgh, deciding +in favour of Stevenson as possessed of rare dramatic power, and wondering +why he did not more effectively employ it, I can't agree with him; and +this because of the presence of a certain atmosphere in the novels, alien +to free play of the individualities presented. Like Hawthorne's, like +the works of our great symbolists, they are restricted by a sense of some +obtaining conception, some weird metaphysical _weird_ or preconception. +This is the ground "Ian MacLaren" has for saying that "his kinship is not +with Boccaccio and Rabelais, but with Dante and Spenser"--the ground for +many remarks by critics to the effect that they still crave from him +"less symbol and more individuality"--the ground for the Rev. W. J. +Dawson's remark that "he has a powerful and persistent sense of the +spiritual forces which move behind the painted shows of life; that he +writes not only as a realist but as a prophet, his meanest stage being +set with eternity as a background." + +Such expressions are fullest justification for what we have here said: it +adds, and can only add, to our admiration of Stevenson, as a thinker, +seer, or mystic, but the asserting sense of such power can only end in +lessening the height to which he could attain as a dramatic artist; and +there is much indeed against Mr Pinero's own view that, in the dramas, he +finds that "fine speeches" are ruinous to them as acting plays. In the +strict sense overfine speeches are yet almost everywhere. David Balfour +could never have writ some speeches attributed to him--they are just R. +L. Stevenson with a very superficial difference that, when once detected, +renders them curious and quaint and interesting, but not dramatic. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII--PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST + + +In reality, Stevenson is always directly or indirectly preaching a +sermon--enforcing a moral--as though he could not help it. "He would +rise from the dead to preach a sermon." He wrote some first-rate fables, +and might indeed have figured to effect as a moralist-fabulist, as truly +he was from beginning to end. There was a bit of Bunyan in him as well +as of AEsop and Rousseau and Thoreau--the mixture that found coherency in +his most peculiarly patient and forbearing temper is what gives at once +the quaintness, the freedom, and yet the odd didactic something that is +never wanting. I remember a fable about the Devil that might well be +brought in to illustrate this here--careful readers who neglect nothing +that Stevenson wrote will remember it also and perhaps bear me out here. + +But for the sake of the young folks who may yet have some leeway to make +up, I shall indulge myself a little by quoting it: and, since I am on +that tack, follow it by another which presents Stevenson in his favourite +guise of quizzing his own characters, if not for his own advantage +certainly for ours, if we would in the least understand the fine moralist- +casuistical qualities of his mind and fancy: + + THE DEVIL AND THE INNKEEPER + + Once upon a time the devil stayed at an inn, where no one knew him, + for they were people whose education had been neglected. He was bent + on mischief, and for a time kept everybody by the ears. But at last + the innkeeper set a watch upon the devil and took him in the act. + + The innkeeper got a rope's end. + + "Now I am going to thrash you," said the inn-keeper. + + "You have no right to be angry with me," said the devil. "I am only + the devil, and it is my nature to do wrong." + + "Is that so?" asked the innkeeper. + + "Fact, I assure you," said the devil. + + "You really cannot help doing ill?" asked the innkeeper. + + "Not in the smallest," said the devil, "it would be useless cruelty to + thrash a thing like me." + + "It would indeed," said the innkeeper. + + And he made a noose and hanged the devil. + + "There!" said the innkeeper. + +The deeper Stevenson goes, the more happily is he inspired. We could +scarcely cite anything more Stevensonian, alike in its humour and its +philosophy, than the dialogue between Captain Smollett and Long John +Silver, entitled _The Persons of the Tale_. After chapter xxxii. of +_Treasure Island_, these two puppets "strolled out to have a pipe before +business should begin again, and met in an open space not far from the +story." After a few preliminaries: + + "You're a damned rogue, my man," said the Captain. + + "Come, come, Cap'n, be just," returned the other. "There's no call to + be angry with me in earnest. I'm on'y a character in a sea story. I + don't really exist." + + "Well, I don't really exist either," says the Captain, "which seems to + meet that." + + "I wouldn't set no limits to what a virtuous character might consider + argument," responded Silver. "But I'm the villain of the tale, I am; + and speaking as one seafaring man to another, what I want to know is, + what's the odds?" + + "Were you never taught your catechism?" said the Captain. "Don't you + know there's such a thing as an Author?" + + "Such a thing as a Author?" returned John, derisively. "And who + better'n me? And the p'int is, if the Author made you, he made Long + John, and he made Hands, and Pew, and George Merry--not that George is + up to much, for he's little more'n a name; and he made Flint, what + there is of him; and he made this here mutiny, you keep such a work + about; and he had Tom Redruth shot; and--well, if that's a Author, + give me Pew!" + + "Don't you believe in a future state?" said Smollett. "Do you think + there's nothing but the present sorty-paper?" + + " I don't rightly know for that," said Silver, "and I don't see what + it's got to do with it, anyway. What I know is this: if there is sich + a thing as a Author, I'm his favourite chara'ter. He does me fathoms + better'n he does you--fathoms, he does. And he likes doing me. He + keeps me on deck mostly all the time, crutch and all; and he leaves + you measling in the hold, where nobody can't see you, nor wants to, + and you may lay to that! If there is a Author, by thunder, but he's + on my side, and you may lay to it!" + + "I see he's giving you a long rope," said the Captain. . . . + +Stevenson's stories--one and all--are too closely the illustrations by +characters of which his essays furnish the texts. You shall not read the +one wholly apart from the other without losing something--without losing +much of the quaint, often childish, and always insinuating personality of +the writer. It is this if fully perceived which would justify one +writer, Mr Zangwill, if I don't forget, in saying, as he did say, that +Stevenson would hold his place by his essays and not by his novels. Hence +there is a unity in all, but a unity found in a root which is ultimately +inimical to what is strictly free dramatic creation--creation, broad, +natural and unmoral in the highest sense just as nature is, as it is to +us, for example, when we speak of Shakespeare, or even Scott, or of +Cervantes or Fielding. If Mr Henley in his irruptive if not spiteful +_Pall Mall Magazine_ article had made this clear from the high critical +ground, then some of his derogatory remarks would not have been quite so +personal and offensive as they are. + +Stevenson's bohemianism was always restrained and coloured by this. He +is a casuistic moralist, if not a Shorter Catechist, as Mr Henley put it +in his clever sonnet. He is constantly asking himself about moral laws +and how they work themselves out in character, especially as these +suggest and involve the casuistries of human nature. He is often a +little like Nathaniel Hawthorne, but he hardly follows them far enough +and rests on his own preconceptions and predilections, only he does not, +like him, get into or remain long in the cobwebby corners--his love of +the open air and exercise derived from generations of active lighthouse +engineers, out at all times on sea or land, or from Scottish ministers +who were fond of composing their sermons and reflecting on the +backwardness of human nature as they walked in their gardens or along the +hillsides even among mists and storms, did something to save him here, +reinforcing natural cheerfulness and the warm desire to give pleasure. +His excessive elaboration of style, which grew upon him more and more, +giving throughout often a sense of extreme artificiality and of the self- +consciousness usually bred of it, is but another incidental proof of +this. And let no reader think that I wish here to decry R. L. Stevenson. +I only desire faithfully to try to understand him, and to indicate the +class or group to which his genius and temperament really belong. He is +from first to last the idealistic dreamy or mystical romancer, and not +the true idealist or dealer direct with life or character for its own +sake. The very beauty and sweetness of his spirit in one way militated +against his dramatic success--he really did not believe in villains, and +always made them better than they should have been, and that, too, on the +very side where wickedness--their natural wickedness--is most +available--on the stage. The dreamer of dreams and the Shorter +Catechist, strangely united together, were here directly at odds with the +creative power, and crossed and misdirected it, and the casuist came in +and manoeuvred the limelight--all too like the old devil of the mediaeval +drama, who was made only to be laughed at and taken lightly, a buffoon +and a laughing-stock indeed. And while he could unveil villainy, as is +the case pre-eminently in Huish in the _Ebb-Tide_, he shrank from +inflicting the punishments for which untutored human nature looks, and +thus he lost one great aid to crude dramatic effect. As to his poems, +they are intimately personal in his happiest moments: he deals with +separate moods and sentiments, and scarcely ever touches those of a type +alien to his own. The defect of his child poems is distinctly that he is +everywhere strictly recalling and reproducing his own quaint and wholly +exceptional childhood; and children, ordinary, normal, healthy children, +will not take to these poems (though grown-ups largely do so), as they +would to, say, the _Lilliput Levee_ of my old friend, W. B. Rands. Rands +showed a great deal of true dramatic play there within his own very +narrow limits, as, at all events, adults must conceive them. + +Even in his greatest works, in _The Master of Ballantrae_ and _Weir of +Hermiston_, the special power in Stevenson really lies in subduing his +characters at the most critical point for action, to make them prove or +sustain his thesis; and in this way the rare effect that he might have +secured _dramatically_ is largely lost and make-believe substituted, as +in the Treasure Search in the end of _The Master of Ballantrae_. The +powerful dramatic effect he might have had in his _denouement_ is thus +completely sacrificed. The essence of the drama for the stage is that +the work is for this and this alone--dialogue and everything being only +worked rightly when it bears on, aids, and finally secures this in happy +completeness. + +In a word, you always, in view of true dramatic effect, see Stevenson +himself too clearly behind his characters. The "fine speeches" Mr Pinero +referred to trace to the intrusion behind the glass of a +part-quicksilvered portion, which cunningly shows, when the glass is +moved about, Stevenson himself behind the character, as we have said +already. For long he shied dealing with women, as though by a true +instinct. Unfortunately for him his image was as clear behind +_Catriona_, with the discerning, as anywhere else; and this, alas! too +far undid her as an independent, individual character, though traits like +those in her author were attractive. The constant effort to relieve the +sense of this affords him the most admirable openings for the display of +his exquisite style, of which he seldom or never fails to make the very +most in this regard; but the necessity laid upon him to aim at securing a +sense of relief by this is precisely the same as led him to write the +overfine speeches in the plays, as Mr Pinero found and pointed out at +Edinburgh: both defeat the true end, but in the written book mere art of +style and a naivete and a certain sweetness of temper conceal the lack of +nature and creative spontaneity; while on the stage the descriptions, +saving reflections and fine asides, are ruthlessly cut away under sheer +stage necessities, or, if left, but hinder the action; and art of this +kind does not there suffice to conceal the lack of nature. + +More clearly to bring out my meaning here and draw aid from comparative +illustration, let me take my old friend of many years, Charles Gibbon. +Gibbon was poor, very poor, in intellectual subtlety compared with +Stevenson; he had none of his sweet, quaint, original fancy; he was no +casuist; he was utterly void of power in the subdued humorous twinkle or +genial by-play in which Stevenson excelled. But he has more of dramatic +power, pure and simple, than Stevenson had--his novels--the best of +them--would far more easily yield themselves to the ordinary purposes of +the ordinary playwright. Along with conscientiousness, perception, +penetration, with the dramatist must go a certain indescribable common- +sense commonplaceness--if I may name it so--protection against vagary and +that over-refined egotism and self-confession which is inimical to the +drama and in which the Stevensonian type all too largely abounds for +successful dramatic production. Mr Henley perhaps put it too strongly +when he said that what was supremely of interest to R. L. Stevenson was +Stevenson himself; but he indicates the tendency, and that tendency is +inimical to strong, broad, effective and varied dramatic presentation. +Water cannot rise above its own level; nor can minds of this type go +freely out of themselves in a grandly healthy, unconscious, and +unaffected way, and this is the secret of the dramatic spirit, if it be +not, as Shelley said, the secret of morals, which Stevenson, when he +passed away, was but on the way to attain. As we shall see, he had risen +so far above it, subdued it, triumphed over it, that we really cannot +guess what he might have attained had but more years been given him. For +the last attainment of the loftiest and truest genius is precisely +this--to gain such insight of the real that all else becomes subsidiary. +True simplicity and the abiding relief and enduring power of true art +with all classes lies here and not elsewhere. Cleverness, refinement, +fancy, and invention, even sublety of intellect, are practically nowhere +in this sphere without this. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV--STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST + + +In opposition to Mr Pinero, therefore, I assert that Stevenson's defect +in spontaneous dramatic presentation is seen clearly in his novels as +well as in his plays proper. + +In writing to my good friend, Mr Thomas M'Kie, Advocate, Edinburgh, +telling him of my work on R. L. Stevenson and the results, I thus +gathered up in little the broad reflections on this point, and I may +perhaps be excused quoting the following passages, as they reinforce by a +new reference or illustration or two what has just been said: + + "Considering his great keenness and force on some sides, I find R. L. + Stevenson markedly deficient in grip on other sides--common sides, + after all, of human nature. This was so far largely due to a dreamy, + mystical, so far perverted and, so to say, often even inverted + casuistical, fatalistic morality, which would not allow him scope in + what Carlyle would have called a healthy hatred of fools and + scoundrels; with both of which classes--vagabonds in strictness--he + had rather too much of a sneaking sympathy. Mr Pinero was + wrong--totally and incomprehensibly wrong--when he told the good folks + of Edinburgh at the Philosophical Institution, and afterwards at the + London Birkbeck Institution, that it was lack of concentration and + care that made R. L. Stevenson a failure as a dramatist. No: it was + here and not elsewhere that the failure lay. R. L. Stevenson was + himself an unconscious paradox--and sometimes he realised it--his + great weakness from this point of view being that he wished to show + strong and original by making the villain the hero of the piece as + well. Now, _that_, if it may, by clever manipulation and dexterity, + be made to do in a novel, most certainly it will not do on the + stage--more especially if it is done consciously and, as it were, of + _malice prepense_; because, for one thing, there is in the theatre a + very varied yet united audience which has to give a simultaneous and + immediate verdict--an audience not inclined to some kinds of + overwrought subtleties and casuistries, however clever the technique. + If _The Master of Ballantrae_ (which has some highly dramatic scenes + and situations, if it is not in itself substantially a drama) were to + be put on the stage, the playwright, if wisely determined for success, + would really have--not in details, but in essential conception--to + kick R. L. Stevenson in his most personal aim out of it, and take and + present a more definite moral view of the two villain-heroes + (brothers, too); improve and elevate the one a bit if he lowered the + other, and not wobble in sympathy and try to make the audience wobble + in sympathy also, as R. L. Stevenson certainly does. As for _Beau + Austin_, it most emphatically, in view of this, should be re-writ--re- + writ especially towards the ending--and the scandalous Beau tarred and + feathered, metaphorically speaking, instead of walking off at the end + in a sneaking, mincing sort of way, with no more than a little + momentary twinge of discomfort at the wreck and ruin he has wrought, + for having acted as a selfish, snivelling poltroon and coward, though + in fine clothes and with fine ways and fine manners, which only, from + our point of view, make matters worse. It is, with variations I + admit, much the same all through: R. L. Stevenson felt it and + confessed it about the _Ebb-Tide_, and Huish, the cockney hero and + villain; but the sense of healthy disgust, even at the vile Huish, is + not emphasised in the book as it would have demanded to be for the + stage--the audience would not have stood it, and the more mixed and + varied, the less would it have stood it--not at all; and his relief of + style and fine or finished speeches would not _there_ in the least + have told. This is demanded of the drama--that at once it satisfies a + certain crude something subsisting under all outward glosses and + veneers that might be in some a lively sense of right and wrong--the + uprisal of a conscience, in fact, or in others a vague instinct of + proper reward or punishment, which will even cover and sanction + certain kinds of revenge or retaliation. The one feeling will emerge + most among the cultured, and the other among the ruder and more + ignorant; but both meet immediately on beholding action and the limits + of action on the demand for some clear leading to what may be called + Providential equity--each man undoubtedly rewarded or punished, + roughly, according to his deserts, if not outwardly then certainly in + the inner torments that so often lead to confessions. There it is--a + radical fact of human nature--as radical as any reading of trait or + determination of character presented--seen in the Greek drama as well + as in Shakespeare and the great Elizabethan dramatists, and in the + drama-transpontine and others of to-day. R. L. Stevenson was all too + casuistical (though not in the exclusively bad sense) for this; and so + he was not dramatic, though _Weir of Hermiston_ promised something + like an advance to it, and _St Ives_ did, in my idea, yet more." + +The one essential of a _dramatic_ piece is that, by the interaction of +character and incident (one or other may be preponderating, according to +the type and intention of the writer) all naturally leads up to a crisis +in which the moral motives, appealed to or awakened by the presentation +of the play, are justified. Where this is wanting the true leading and +the definite justification are wanting. Goethe failed in this in his +_Faust_, resourceful and far-seeing though he was--he failed because a +certain sympathy is awakened for Mephistopheles in being, so to say, +chivied out of his bargain, when he had complied with the terms of the +contract by Faust; and Gounod in his opera does exactly for "immediate +dramatic effect," what we hold it would be necessary to do for R. L. +Stevenson. Goethe, with his casuistries which led him to allegory and +all manner of overdone symbolisms and perversions in the Second Part, is +set aside and a true crisis and close is found by Gounod through simply +sending Marguerite above and Faust below, as, indeed, Faust had agreed by +solemn compact with Mephistopheles that it should be. And to come to +another illustration from our own times, Mr Bernard Shaw's very clever +and all too ingenious and over-subtle _Man and Superman_ would, in my +idea, and for much the same reason, be an utterly ineffective and weak +piece on the stage, however carefully handled and however clever the +setting--the reason lying in the egotistic upsetting of the "personal +equation" and the theory of life that lies behind all--tinting it with +strange and even _outre_ colours. Much the same has to be said of most +of what are problem-plays--several of Ibsen's among the rest. + +Those who remember the Fairy opera of _Hansel and Gretel_ on the stage in +London, will not have forgotten in the witching memory of all the charms +of scenery and setting, how the scene where the witch of the wood, who +was planning out the baking of the little hero and heroine in her oven, +having "fatted" them up well, to make sweet her eating of them, was by +the coolness and cleverness of the heroine locked in her own oven and +baked there, literally brought down the house. She received exactly what +she had planned to give those children, whom their own cruel parents had +unwittingly, by losing the children in the wood, put into her hands. +Quaint, naive, half-grotesque it was in conception, yet the truth of all +drama was there actively exhibited, and all casuistic pleading of excuses +of some sort, even of justification for the witch (that it was her +nature; heredity in her aworking, etc., etc.) would have not only been +out of place, but hotly resented by that audience. Now, Stevenson, if he +could have made up his mind to have the witch locked in her own oven, +would most assuredly have tried some device to get her out by some fairy +witch-device or magic slide at the far end of it, and have proceeded to +paint for us the changed character that she was after she had been so +outwitted by a child, and her witchdom proved after all of little effect. +He would have put probably some of the most effective moralities into her +mouth if indeed he would not after all have made the witch a triumph on +his early principle of bad-heartedness being strength. If this is the +sort of falsification which the play demands, and is of all tastes the +most ungrateful, then, it is clear, that for full effect of the drama it +is essential to it; but what is primary in it is the direct answering to +certain immediate and instinctive demands in common human nature, the +doing of which is far more effective than no end of deep philosophy to +show how much better human nature would be if it were not just quite thus +constituted. "Concentration," says Mr Pinero, "is first, second, and +last in it," and he goes on thus, as reported in the _Scotsman_, to show +Stevenson's defect and mistake and, as is not, of course, unnatural, to +magnify the greatness and grandeur of the style of work in which he has +himself been so successful. + + "If Stevenson had ever mastered that art--and I do not question that + if he had properly conceived it he had it in him to master it--he + might have found the stage a gold mine, but he would have found, too, + that it is a gold mine which cannot be worked in a smiling, sportive, + half-contemptuous spirit, but only in the sweat of the brain, and with + every mental nerve and sinew strained to its uttermost. He would have + known that no ingots are to be got out of this mine, save after + sleepless nights, days of gloom and discouragement, and other days, + again, of feverish toil, the result of which proves in the end to be + misapplied and has to be thrown to the winds. . . . When you take up a + play-book (if ever you do take one up) it strikes you as being a very + trifling thing--a mere insubstantial pamphlet beside the imposing bulk + of the latest six-shilling novel. Little do you guess that every page + of the play has cost more care, severer mental tension, if not more + actual manual labour, than any chapter of a novel, though it be fifty + pages long. It is the height of the author's art, according to the + old maxim, that the ordinary spectator should never be clearly + conscious of the skill and travail that have gone to the making of the + finished product. But the artist who would achieve a like feat must + realise its difficulties, or what are his chances of success?" + +But what I should, in little, be inclined to say, in answer to the +"concentration" idea is that, unless you have first some firm hold on the +broad bed-rock facts of human nature specially appealed to or called +forth by the drama, you may concentrate as much as you please, but you +will not write a successful acting drama, not to speak of a great one. Mr +Pinero's magnifications of the immense effort demanded from him must in +the end come to mean that he himself does not instinctively and with +natural ease and spontaneity secure this, but secures it only after great +conscious effort; and hence, perhaps, it is that he as well as so many +other modern playwrights fall so far behind alike in the amount turned +out, and also in its quality as compared with the products of many +playwrights in the past. + +The problem drama, in every phase and turn of it, endeavours to dispense +with these fundamental demands implied in the common and instinctive +sense or consciousness of the mass of men and women, and to substitute +for that interest something which will artificially supersede it, or, at +any rate, take its place. The interest is transferred from the crises +necessarily worked up to in the one case, with all of situation and +dialogue directed to it, and without which it would not be strictly +explicable, to something abnormal, odd, artificial or inverted, or +exceptional in the characters themselves. Having thus, instead of +natural process and sequence, if we may put it so, the problem dramatist +has a double task--he must gain what unity he can, and reach such crises +as he may by artificial aids and inventions which the more he uses the +more makes natural simplicity unattainable; and next he must reduce and +hide as far as he can the abnormality he has, after all, in the long run, +created and presented. He cannot maintain it to the full, else his work +would become a mere medical or psychological treatise under the poorest +of disguises; and the very necessity for the action and reaction of +characters upon each other is a further element against him. In a word +no one character can stand alone, and cannot escape influencing others, +and also the action. Thus it is that he cannot isolate as a doctor does +his patient for scientific examination. The healthy and normal must come +in to modify on all sides what is presented of unhealthy and abnormal, +and by its very presence expose the other, while at the same time it, by +its very presence, ministers improvement, exactly as the sunlight +disperses mist and all unhealthy vapours, germs, and microbes. + +The problem dramatist, in place of broad effect and truth to nature, must +find it in stress of invention and resource of that kind. Thus care and +concentration must be all in all with him--he must never let himself go, +or get so interested and taken with his characters that _they_, in a +sense, control or direct him. He is all too conscious a "maker" and must +pay for his originality by what in the end is really painful and +overweighted work. This, I take it, is the reason why so many of the +modern dramatists find their work so hard, and are, comparatively, so +slow in the production of it, while they would fain, by many devices, +secure the general impression or appeal made to all classes alike by the +natural or what we may call spontaneous drama, they are yet, by the +necessity of subject matter and methods of dealing with it, limited to +the real interest of a special class--to whom is finally given up what +was meant for mankind--and the troublesome and trying task laid on them, +to try as best they may to reconcile two really conflicting tendencies +which cannot even by art be reconciled but really point different ways +and tend to different ends. As the impressionist and the pre-Raphaelite, +in the sister-art of painting cannot be combined and reconciled in one +painter--so it is here; by conception and methods they go different ways, +and if they _seek_ the same end, it is by opposing processes--the +original conception alike of nature and of art dictating the process. + +As for Stevenson, it was no lack of care or concentration in anything +that he touched; these two were never lacking, but because his subtlety, +mystical bias and dreaminess, and theorising on human nature made this to +him impossible. He might have concentrated as much as he pleased, +concentrated as much as even Mr Pinero desires, but he would not have +made a successful drama, because he was Robert Louis Stevenson, and not +Mr Pinero, and too long, as he himself confessed, had a tendency to think +bad-heartedness was strength; while the only true and enduring joy +attainable in this world--whether by deduction from life itself, or from +_impressions_ of art or of the drama, is simply the steady, unassailable, +and triumphant consciousness that it is not so, but the reverse, that +goodness and self-sacrifice and self-surrender are the only strength in +the universe. Just as Byron had it with patriotism:-- + + "Freedom's battle once begun, + Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son, + Tho' baffled oft is ever won." + +To go consciously either in fiction or in the drama for bad-heartedness +as strength, is to court failure--the broad, healthy, human heart, thank +Heaven, is so made as to resent the doctrine; and if a fiction or a play +based on this idea for the moment succeeds, it can only be because of +strength in other elements, or because of partial blindness and partially +paralysed moral sense in the case of those who accept it and joy in it. +If Mr Pinero directly disputes this, then he and I have no common +standing-ground, and I need not follow the matter any further. Of +course, the dramatist may, under mistaken sympathy and in the midst of +complex and bewildering concatenations, give wrong readings to his +audience, but he must not be always doing even that, or doing it on +principle or system, else his work, however careful and concentrated, +will before long share the fate of the Stevenson-Henley dramas +confessedly wrought when the authors all too definitely held +bad-heartedness was strength. + + + + +CHAPTER XV--THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL + + +We have not hitherto concerned ourselves, in any express sense, with the +ethical elements involved in the tendency now dwelt on, though they are, +of necessity, of a very vital character. We have shown only as yet the +effect of this mood of mind on dramatic intention and effort. The +position is simply that there is, broadly speaking, the endeavour to +eliminate an element which is essential to successful dramatic +presentation. That element is the eternal distinction, speaking broadly, +between good and evil--between right and wrong--between the secret +consciousness of having done right, and the consciousness of mere +strength and force in certain other ways. + +Nothing else will make up for vagueness and cloudiness here--no technical +skill, no apt dialogue nor concentration, any more than "fine speeches," +as Mr Pinero calls them. Now the dramatic demand and the ethical demand +here meet and take each other's hands, and will not be separated. This +is why Mr Stevenson and Mr Henley--young men of great talent, +failed--utterly failed--they thought they could make a hero out of a +shady and dare-devil yet really cowardly villain generally--and failed. + +The spirit of this is of the clever youth type--all too ready to forego +the moral for the sake of the fun any day of the week, and the unthinking +selfishness and self-enjoyment of youth--whose tender mercies are often +cruel, are transcendent in it. As Stevenson himself said, they were +young men then and fancied bad-heartedness was strength. Perhaps it was +a sense of this that made R. L. Stevenson speak as he did of the _Ebb- +Tide_ with Huish the cockney in it, after he was powerless to recall it; +which made him say, as we have seen, that the closing chapters of _The +Master of Ballantrae_ "_shame_, _and perhaps degrade_, _the beginning_." +He himself came to see then the great error; but, alas! it was too late +to remedy it--he could but go forward to essay new tales, not backward to +put right errors in what was done. + +Did Mr William Archer have anything of this in his mind and the +far-reaching effects on this side, when he wrote the following: + + "Let me add that the omission with which, in 1885, I mildly reproached + him--the omission to tell what he knew to be an essential part of the + truth about life--was abundantly made good in his later writings. It + is true that even in his final philosophy he still seems to me to + underrate, or rather to shirk, the significance of that most + compendious parable which he thus relates in a letter to Mr Henry + James:--'Do you know the story of the man who found a button in his + hash, and called the waiter? "What do you call that?" says he. + "Well," said the waiter, "what d'you expect? Expect to find a gold + watch and chain?" Heavenly apologue, is it not?' Heavenly, by all + means; but I think Stevenson relished the humour of it so much that he + 'smiling passed the moral by.' In his enjoyment of the waiter's + effrontery, he forgot to sympathise with the man (even though it was + himself) who had broken his teeth upon the harmful, unnecessary + button. He forgot that all the apologetics in the world are based + upon just this audacious paralogism." + +Many writers have done the same--and not a few critics have hinted at +this: I do not think any writer has got at the radical truth of it more +directly, decisively, and clearly than "J. F. M.," in a monthly magazine, +about the time of Stevenson's death; and the whole is so good and clear +that I must quote it--the writer was not thinking of the drama specially; +only of prose fiction, and this but makes the passage the more effective +and apt to my point. + + "In the outburst of regret which followed the death of Robert Louis + Stevenson, one leading journal dwelt on his too early removal in + middle life 'with only half his message delivered.' Such a phrase may + have been used in the mere cant of modern journalism. Still it set + one questioning what was Stevenson's message, or at least that part of + it which we had time given us to hear. + + "Wonderful as was the popularity of the dead author, we are inclined + to doubt whether the right appreciation of him was half as wide. To a + certain section of the public he seemed a successful writer of boys' + books, which yet held captive older people. Now, undoubtedly there + was an element (not the highest) in his work which fascinated boys. It + gratified their yearning for adventure. To too large a number of his + readers, we suspect, this remains Stevenson's chief charm; though even + of those there were many able to recognise and be thankful for the + literary power and grace which could serve up their sanguinary diet so + daintily. + + "Most of Stevenson's titles, too, like _Treasure Island_, _Kidnapped_, + and_ The Master of Ballantrae_, tended to foster delusion in this + direction. The books were largely bought for gifts by maiden aunts, + and bestowed as school prizes, when it might not have been so had + their titles given more indication of their real scope and tendency. + + "All this, it seems to us, has somewhat obscured Stevenson's true + power, which is surely that of an arch-delineator of 'human nature' + and of the devious ways of men. As we read him we feel that we have + our finger on the pulse of the cruel politics of the world. He has + the Shakespearean gift which makes us recognise that his pirates and + his statesmen, with their violence and their murders and their + perversions of justice, are swayed by the same interests and are + pulling the same strings and playing on the same passions which are at + work in quieter methods around ourselves. The vast crimes and the + reckless bloodshed are nothing more nor less than stage effects used + to accentuate for the common eye what the seer can detect without + them. + + "And reading him from this standpoint, Stevenson's 'message' (so far + as it was delivered) appears to be that of utter gloom--the creed that + good is always overcome by evil. We do not mean in the sense that + good always suffers through evil and is frequently crucified by evil. + That is only the sowing of the martyr's blood, which is, we know, the + seed of the Church. We should not have marvelled in the least that a + genius like Stevenson should rebel against mere external 'happy + endings,' which, being in flat contradiction to the ordinary ways of + Providence, are little short of thoughtless blasphemy against + Providence. But the terrible thing about the Stevenson philosophy of + life is that it seems to make evil overcome good in the sense of + absorbing it, or perverting it, or at best lowering it. When good and + evil come in conflict in one person, Dr Jekyll vanishes into Mr Hyde. + The awful Master of Ballantrae drags down his brother, though he seems + to fight for his soul at every step. The sequel to _Kidnapped_ shows + David Balfour ready at last to be hail-fellow-well-met with the supple + Prestongrange and the other intriguers, even though they had forcibly + made him a partner to their shedding of innocent blood. + + "Is it possible that this was what Stevenson's experience of real life + had brought him? Fortunate himself in so many respects, he was yet + one of those who turn aside from the smooth and sunny paths of life, + to enter into brotherly sympathy and fellowship with the disinherited. + Is this, then, what he found on those darker levels? Did he discover + that triumphant hypocrisy treads down souls as well as lives? + + "We cannot doubt that it often does so; and it is well that we should + see this sometimes, to make us strong to contend with evil before it + works out this, its worst mischief, and to rouse us from the easy + optimist laziness which sits idle while others are being wronged, and + bids them believe 'that all will come right in the end,' when it is + our direct duty to do our utmost to make it 'come right' to-day. + + "But to show us nothing but the gloomy side, nothing but the weakness + of good, nothing but the strength of evil, does not inspire us to + contend for the right, does not inform us of the powers and weapons + with which we might so contend. To gaze at unqualified and inevitable + moral defeat will but leave us to the still worse laziness of + pessimism, uttering its discouraging and blasphemous cry, 'It does not + matter; nothing will ever come right!' + + "Shakespeare has shown us--and never so nobly as in his last great + creation of _The Tempest_--that a man has one stronghold which none + but himself can deliver over to the enemy--that citadel of his own + conduct and character, from which he can smile supreme upon the foe, + who may have conquered all down the line, but must finally make pause + there. + + "We must remember that _The Tempest_ was Shakespeare's last work. The + genuine consciousness of the possible triumph of the moral nature + against every assault is probably reserved for the later years of + life, when, somewhat withdrawn from the passions of its struggle, we + become those lookers-on who see most of the game. Strange fate is it + that so much of our genius vanishes into the great silence before + those later years are reached!" + +Stevenson was too late in awakening fully to the tragic error to which +short-sighted youth is apt to wander that "bad-heartedness is strength." +And so, from this point of view, to our sorrow, he too much verified +Goethe's saw that "simplicity (not artifice) and repose are the acme of +art, and therefore no youth can be a master." In fact, he might very +well from another side, have taken one of Goethe's fine sayings as a +motto for himself: + + "Greatest saints were ever most kindly-hearted to sinners; + Here I'm a saint with the best; sinners I never could hate." {7} + +Stevenson's own verdict on _Deacon Brodie_ given to a _New York Herald_ +reporter on the author's arrival in New York in September 1887, on the +_Ludgate Hill_, is thus very near the precise truth: "The piece has been +all overhauled, and though I have no idea whether it will please an +audience, I don't think either Mr Henley or I are ashamed of it. _But we +were both young men when we did that_, _and I think we had an idea that +bad-heartedness was strength_." + +If Mr Henley in any way confirmed R. L. Stevenson in this perversion, as +I much fear he did, no true admirer of Stevenson has much to thank him +for, whatever claims he may have fancied he had to Stevenson's eternal +gratitude. He did Stevenson about the very worst turn he could have +done, and aided and abetted in robbing us and the world of yet greater +works than we have had from his hands. He was but condemning himself +when he wrote some of the detractory things he did in the _Pall Mall +Magazine_ about the _Edinburgh Edition_, etc. Men are mirrors in which +they see each other: Henley, after all, painted himself much more +effectively in that now notorious _Pall Mall Magazine_ article than he +did R. L. Stevenson. Such is the penalty men too often pay for wreaking +paltry revenges--writing under morbid memories and narrow and petty +grievances--they not only fail in truth and impartiality, but inscribe a +kind of grotesque parody of themselves in their effort to make their +subject ridiculous, as he did, for example, about the name Lewis=Louis, +and various other things. + +R. L. Stevenson's fate was to be a casuistic and mystic moralist at +bottom, and could not help it; while, owing to some kink or twist, due, +perhaps, mainly to his earlier sufferings, and the teachings he then +received, he could not help giving it always a turn to what he himself +called "tail-foremost" or inverted morality; and it was not till near the +close that he fully awakened to the fact that here he was false to the +truest canons at once of morality and life and art, and that if he +pursued this course his doom was, and would be, to make his endings +"disgrace, or perhaps, degrade his beginnings," and that no true and +effective dramatic unity and effect and climax was to be gained. Pity +that he did so much on this perverted view of life and world and art: and +well it is that he came to perceive it, even though almost too +late:--certainly too late for that full presentment of that awful yet +gladdening presence of a God's power and equity in this seeming tangled +web of a world, the idea which inspired Robert Browning as well as +Wordsworth, when he wrote, and gathered it up into a few lines in _Pippa +Passes_: + + "The year's at the spring, + And day's at the morn; + Morning's at seven; + The hillsides dew-pearled; + + The lark's on the wing; + The snail's on the thorn: + God's in His heaven, + All's right with the world. + + . . . . . . . . . . . . + + "All service ranks the same with God, + If now, as formerly he trod + Paradise, His presence fills + Our earth, each only as God wills + Can work--God's puppets best and worst, + Are we; there is no last or first." + +It shows what he might have accomplished, had longer life been but +allowed him. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI--STEVENSON'S GLOOM + + +The problem of Stevenson's gloom cannot be solved by any commonplace cut- +and-dried process. It will remain a problem only unless (1) his original +dreamy tendency crossed, if not warped, by the fatalistic Calvinism which +was drummed into him by father, mother, and nurse in his tender years, is +taken fully into account; then (2) the peculiar action on such a nature +of the unsatisfying and, on the whole, distracting effect of the bohemian +and hail-fellow-well-met sort of ideal to which he yielded, and which has +to be charged with much; and (3) the conflict in him of a keenly social +animus with a very strong egotistical effusiveness, fed by fancy, and +nourished by the enforced solitariness inevitable in the case of one who, +from early years up, suffered from painful, and even crushing, disease. + +His text and his sermon--which may be shortly summed in the following +sentence--be kind, for in kindness to others lies the only true pleasure +to be gained in life; be cheerful, even to the point of egotistic self- +satisfaction, for through cheerfulness only is the flow of this incessant +kindliness of thought and service possible. He was not in harmony with +the actual effect of much of his creative work, though he illustrated +this in his life, as few men have done. He regarded it as the highest +duty of life to give pleasure to others; his art in his own idea thus +became in an unostentatious way consecrated, and while he would not have +claimed to be a seer, any more than he would have claimed to be a saint, +as he would have held in contempt a mere sybarite, most certainly a vein +of unblamable hedonism pervaded his whole philosophy of life. Suffering +constantly, he still was always kindly. He encouraged, as Mr Gosse has +said, this philosophy by every resource open to him. In practical life, +all who knew him declared that he was brightness, naive fancy, and +sunshine personified, and yet he could not help always, somehow, infusing +into his fiction a pronounced, and sometimes almost fatal, element of +gloom. Even in his own case they were not pleasure-giving and failed +thus in essence. Some wise critic has said that no man can ever write +well creatively of that in which in his early youth he had no knowledge. +Always behind Stevenson's latest exercises lies the shadow of this as an +unshifting background, which by art may be relieved, but never refined +away wholly. He cannot escape from it if he would. Here, too, as George +MacDonald has neatly and nicely said: We are the victims of our own past, +and often a hand is put forth upon us from behind and draws us into life +backward. Here was Stevenson, with his half-hedonistic theories of life, +the duty of giving pleasure, of making eyes brighter, and casting +sunshine around one wherever one went, yet the creator of gloom for us, +when all the world was before him where to choose. This fateful shadow +pursued him to the end, often giving us, as it were, the very +justificative ground for his own father's despondency and gloom, which +the son rather too decisively reproved, while he might have sympathised +with it in a stranger, and in that most characteristic letter to his +mother, which we have quoted, said that it made his father often seem, to +him, to be ungrateful--"_Has the man no gratitude_?" Two selves thus +persistently and constantly struggled in Stevenson. He was from this +point of view, indeed, his own Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, the buoyant, self- +enjoying, because pleasure-conferring, man, and at the same time the +helpless yet fascinating "dark interpreter" of the gloomy and +gloom-inspiring side of life, viewed from the point of view of dominating +character and inherited influence. When he reached out his hand with +desire of pleasure-conferring, lo and behold, as he wrote, a hand from +his forefathers was stretched out, and he was pulled backward; so that, +as he has confessed, his endings were apt to shame, perhaps to degrade, +the beginnings. Here is something pointing to the hidden and secret +springs that feed the deeper will and bend it to their service. +Individuality itself is but a mirror, which by its inequalities +transforms things to odd shapes. Hawthorne confessed to something of +this sort. He, like Stevenson, suffered much in youth, if not from +disease then through accident, which kept him long from youthful company. +At a time when he should have been running free with other boys, he had +to be lonely, reading what books he could lay his hands on, mostly +mournful and puritanic, by the borders of lone Sebago Lake. He that hath +once in youth been touched by this Marah-rod of bitterness will not +easily escape from it, when he essays in later years to paint life and +the world as he sees them; nay, the hand, when he deems himself freest, +will be laid upon him from behind, if not to pull him, as MacDonald has +said, into life backward, then to make him a mournful witness of having +once been touched by the Marah-rod, whose bitterness again declares +itself and wells out its bitterness when set even in the rising and the +stirring of the waters. + +Such is our view of the "gloom" of Stevenson--a gloom which well might +have justified something of his father's despondency. He struggles in +vain to escape from it--it narrows, it fatefully hampers and limits the +free field of his art, lays upon it a strange atmosphere, fascinating, +but not favourable to true dramatic breadth and force, and spontaneous +natural simplicity, invariably lending a certain touch of weakness, +inconsistency, and inconclusiveness to his endings; so that he himself +could too often speak of them afterwards as apt to "shame, perhaps to +degrade, the beginnings." This is what true dramatic art should never +do. In the ending all that may raise legitimate question in the +process--all that is confusing, perplexing in the separate parts--is met, +solved, reconciled, at least in a way satisfactory to the general, or +ordinary mind; and thus such unity is by it so gained and sealed, that in +no case can the true artist, whatever faults may lie in portions of the +process-work, say of his endings that "they shame, perhaps degrade, the +beginning." Wherever this is the case there will be "gloom," and there +will also be a sad, tormenting sense of something wanting. "The evening +brings a 'hame';" so should it be here--should it especially be in a +dramatic work. If not, "We start; for soul is wanting there;" or, if not +soul, then the last halo of the soul's serene triumph. From this side, +too, there is another cause for the undramatic character, in the stricter +sense of Stevenson's work generally: it is, after all, distressful, +unsatisfying, egotistic, for fancy is led at the beck of some +pre-established disharmony which throws back an abiding and irremovable +gloom on all that went before; and the free spontaneous grace of natural +creation which ensures natural simplicity is, as said already, not quite +attained. + +It was well pointed out in _Hammerton_, by an unanonymous author there +quoted (pp. 22, 23), that while in the story, Hyde, the worse one, wins, +in Stevenson himself--in his real life--Jekyll won, and not Mr Hyde. This +writer, too, might have added that the Master of Ballantrae also wins as +well as Beau Austin and Deacon Brodie. R. L. Stevenson's dramatic art +and a good deal of his fiction, then, was untrue to his life, and on one +side was a lie--it was not in consonance with his own practice or his +belief as expressed in life. + +In some other matters the test laid down here is not difficult of +application. Stevenson, at the time he wrote _The Foreigner at Home_, +had seen a good deal; he had been abroad; he had already had experiences; +he had had differences with his father about Calvinism and some other +things; and yet just see how he applies the standard of his earlier +knowledge and observation to England--and by doing so, cannot help +exaggerating the outstanding differences, always with an almost +provincial accent of unwavering conviction due to his early associations +and knowledge. He cannot help paying an excessive tribute to the +Calvinism he had formally rejected, in so far as, according to him, it +goes to form character--even national character, at all events, in its +production of types; and he never in any really effective way glances at +what Mr Matthew Arnold called "Scottish manners, Scottish drink" as +elements in any way radically qualifying. It is not, of course, that I, +as a Scotsman, well acquainted with rural life in some parts of England, +as with rural life in many parts of Scotland in my youth, do not heartily +agree with him--the point is that, when he comes to this sort of +comparison and contrast, he writes exactly as his father would or might +have done, with a full consciousness, after all, of the tribute he was +paying to the practical outcome on character of the Calvinism in which he +so thoroughly believed. It is, in its way, a very peculiar thing--and +had I space, and did I believe it would prove interesting to readers in +general, I might write an essay on it, with instances--in which case the +Address to the Scottish Clergy would come in for more notice, citation +and application than it has yet received. But meanwhile just take this +little snippet--very characteristic and very suggestive in its own +way--and tell me whether it does not justify and bear out fully what I +have now said as illustrating a certain side and a strange uncertain +limitation in Stevenson: + + "But it is not alone in scenery and architecture that we count England + foreign. The constitution of society, the very pillars of the empire, + surprise and even pain us. The dull neglected peasant, sunk in + matter, insolent, gross and servile, makes a startling contrast to our + own long-legged, long-headed, thoughtful, Bible-loving ploughman. A + week or two in such a place as Suffolk leaves the Scotsman gasping. It + seems impossible that within the boundaries of his own island a class + should have been thus forgotten. Even the educated and intelligent + who hold our own opinions and speak in our own words, yet seem to hold + them with a difference or from another reason, and to speak on all + things with less interest and conviction. The first shock of English + society is like a cold plunge." {8} + +As there was a great deal of the "John Bull element" {9} in the little +dreamer De Quincey, so there was a great deal, after all, of the rather +conceited Calvinistic Scot in R. L. Stevenson, and it is to be traced as +clearly in certain of his fictions as anywhere, though he himself would +not perhaps have seen it and acknowledged it, as I am here forced now to +see it, and to acknowledge it for him. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII--PROOFS OF GROWTH + + +Once again I quote Goethe: + + "Natural simplicity and repose are the acme of art, and hence it + follows no youth can be a master." + +It has to be confessed that seldom, if ever, does Stevenson naturally and +by sheer enthusiasm for subject and characters attain this natural +simplicity, if he often attained the counterfeit presentment--artistic +and graceful euphony, and new, subtle, and often unexpected +concatenations of phrase. Style is much; but it is not everything. We +often love Scott the more that he shows loosenesses and lapses here, for, +in spite of them, he gains natural simplicity, while not seldom +Stevenson, with all his art and fine sense of verbal music, rather misses +it. _The Sedulous Ape_ sometimes disenchants as well as charms; for +occasionally a word, a touch, a turn, sends us off too directly in search +of the model; and this operates against the interest as introducing a new +and alien series of associations, where, for full effect, it should not +be so. And this distraction will be the more insistent, the more +knowledge the reader has and the more he remembers; and since Stevenson's +first appeal, both by his spirit and his methods, is to the cultured and +well read, rather than to the great mass, his "sedulous apehood" only the +more directly wars against him as regards deep, continuous, and lasting +impression; where he should be most simple, natural and spontaneous; he +also is most artificial and involved. If the story-writer is not so much +in earnest, not so possessed by his matter that this is allowed to him, +how is it to be hoped that we shall be possessed in the reading of it? +More than once in _Catriona_ we must own we had this experience, directly +warring against full possession by the story, and certain passages about +Simon Lovat were especially marked by this; if even the first +introduction to Catriona herself was not so. As for Miss Barbara Grant, +of whom so much has been made by many admirers, she is decidedly clever, +indeed too clever by half, and yet her doom is to be a mere _deus ex +machina_, and never do more than just pay a little tribute to Stevenson's +own power of _persiflage_, or, if you like, to pay a penalty, poor lass, +for the too perfect doing of hat, and really, really, I could not help +saying this much, though, I do believe that she deserved just a wee bit +better fate than that. + +But we have proofs of great growth, and nowhere are they greater than at +the very close. Stevenson died young: in some phases he was but a youth +to the last. To a true critic then, the problem is, having already +attained so much--a grand style, grasp of a limited group of characters, +with fancy, sincerity, and imagination,--what would Stevenson have +attained in another ten years had such been but allotted him? It has +over and over again been said that, for long he _shied_ presenting women +altogether. This is not quite true: _Thrawn Janet_ was an earlier +effort; and if there the problem is persistent, the woman is real. Here +also he was on the right road--the advance road. The sex-question was +coming forward as inevitably a part of life, and could not be left out in +any broad and true picture. This element was effectively revived in +_Weir of Hermiston_, and "Weir" has been well said to be sadder, if it +does not go deeper than _Denis Duval_ or _Edwin Drood_. We know what +Dickens and Thackeray could do there; we can but guess now what Stevenson +would have done. "Weir" is but a fragment; but, to a wisely critical and +unprejudiced mind, it suffices to show not only what the complete work +would have been, but what would have inevitably followed it. It shows +the turning-point, and the way that was to be followed at the +cross-roads--the way into a bigger, realer, grander world, where realism, +freed from the dream, and fancy, and prejudice of youth, would glory in +achieving the more enduring romance of manhood, maturity and humanity. + +Yes; there was growth--undoubted growth. The questioning and severely +moral element mainly due to the Shorter Catechism--the tendency to +casuistry, and to problems, and wistful introspection--which had so +coloured Stevenson's art up to the date of _The Master of Ballantrae_, +and made him a great essayist, was passing in the satisfaction of assured +insight into life itself. The art would gradually have been transformed +also. The problem, pure and simple, would have been subdued in face of +the great facts of life; if not lost, swallowed up in the grandeur, +pathos, and awe of the tragedy clearly realised and presented. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII--EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS + + +Stevenson's earlier determination was so distinctly to the symbolic, the +parabolic, allegoric, dreamy and mystical--to treatment of the world as +an array of weird or half-fanciful existences, witnessing only to certain +dim spiritual facts or abstract moralities, occasionally inverted +moralities--"tail foremost moralities" as later he himself named +them--that a strong Celtic strain in him had been detected and dwelt on +by acute critics long before any attention had been given to his +genealogy on both sides of the house. The strong Celtic strain is now +amply attested by many researches. Such phantasies as _The House of +Eld_, _The Touchstone_, _The Poor Thing_, and _The Song of the Morrow_, +published along with some fables at the end of an edition of _Dr Jekyll +and Mr Hyde_, by Longman's, I think, in 1896, tell to the initiated as +forcibly as anything could tell of the presence of this element, as +though moonshine, disguising and transfiguring, was laid over all real +things and the secret of the world and life was in its glamour: the +shimmering and soft shading rendering all outlines indeterminate, though +a great idea is felt to be present in the mind of the author, for which +he works. The man who would say there is no feeling for symbol--no +phantasy or Celtic glamour in these weird, puzzling, and yet on all sides +suggestive tales would thereby be declared inept, inefficient--blind to +certain qualities that lie near to grandeur in fanciful literature, or +the literature of phantasy, more properly. + +This power in weird and playful phantasy is accompanied with the gift of +impersonating or embodying mere abstract qualities or tendencies in +characters. The little early sketch written in June 1875, titled _Good +Content_, well illustrates this: + + "Pleasure goes by piping: Hope unfurls his purple flag; and meek + Content follows them on a snow-white ass. Here, the broad sunlight + falls on open ways and goodly countries; here, stage by stage, + pleasant old towns and hamlets border the road, now with high sign- + poles, now with high minster spires; the lanes go burrowing under + blossomed banks, green meadows, and deep woods encompass them about; + from wood to wood flock the glad birds; the vane turns in the variable + wind; and as I journey with Hope and Pleasure, and quite a company of + jolly personifications, who but the lady I love is by my side, and + walks with her slim hand upon my arm? + + "Suddenly, at a corner, something beckons; a phantom finger-post, a + will o' the wisp, a foolish challenge writ in big letters on a brand. + And twisting his red moustaches, braggadocio Virtue takes the perilous + way where dim rain falls ever, and sad winds sigh. And after him, on + his white ass, follows simpering Content. + + "Ever since I walk behind these two in the rain. Virtue is all + a-cold; limp are his curling feather and fierce moustache. Sore + besmirched, on his jackass, follows Content." + +The record, entitled _Sunday Thoughts_, which is dated some five days +earlier is naive and most characteristic, touched with the phantastic +moralities and suggestions already indicated in every sentence; and rises +to the fine climax in this respect at the close. + + "A plague o' these Sundays! How the church bells ring up the sleeping + past! I cannot go in to sermon: memories ache too hard; and so I hide + out under the blue heavens, beside the small kirk whelmed in leaves. + Tittering country girls see me as I go past from where they sit in the + pews, and through the open door comes the loud psalm and the fervent + solitary voice of the preacher. To and fro I wander among the graves, + and now look over one side of the platform and see the sunlit meadow + where the grown lambs go bleating and the ewes lie in the shadow under + their heaped fleeces; and now over the other, where the rhododendrons + flower fair among the chestnut boles, and far overhead the chestnut + lifts its thick leaves and spiry blossom into the dark-blue air. Oh, + the height and depth and thickness of the chestnut foliage! Oh, to + have wings like a dove, and dwell in the tree's green heart! + + . . . . . . . . + + "A plague o' these Sundays! How the Church bells ring up the sleeping + past! Here has a maddening memory broken into my brain. To the door, + to the door, with the naked lunatic thought! Once it is forth we may + talk of what we dare not entertain; once the intriguing thought has + been put to the door I can watch it out of the loophole where, with + its fellows, it raves and threatens in dumb show. Years ago when that + thought was young, it was dearer to me than all others, and I would + speak with it always when I had an hour alone. These rags that so + dismally trick forth its madness were once the splendid livery my + favour wrought for it on my bed at night. Can you see the device on + the badge? I dare not read it there myself, yet have a guess--'_bad + ware nicht_'--is not that the humour of it? + + . . . . . . . . . + + "A plague o' these Sundays! How the Church bells ring up the sleeping + past! If I were a dove and dwelt in the monstrous chestnuts, where + the bees murmur all day about the flowers; if I were a sheep and lay + on the field there under my comely fleece; if I were one of the quiet + dead in the kirkyard--some homespun farmer dead for a long age, some + dull hind who followed the plough and handled the sickle for + threescore years and ten in the distant past; if I were anything but + what I am out here, under the sultry noon, between the deep chestnuts, + among the graves, where the fervent voice of the preacher comes to me, + thin and solitary, through the open windows; _if I were what I was + yesterday_, _and what_, _before God_, _I shall be again to-morrow_, + _how should I outface these brazen memories_, _how live down this + unclean resurrection of dead hopes_!" + +Close associated with this always is the moralising faculty, which is +assertive. Take here the cunning sentences on _Selfishness and Egotism_, +very Hawthornian yet quite original: + + "An unconscious, easy, selfish person shocks less, and is more easily + loved, than one who is laboriously and egotistically unselfish. There + is at least no fuss about the first; but the other parades his + sacrifices, and so sells his favours too dear. Selfishness is calm, a + force of nature; you might say the trees were selfish. But egotism is + a piece of vanity; it must always take you into its confidence; it is + uneasy, troublesome, seeking; it can do good, but not handsomely; it + is uglier, because less dignified, than selfishness itself." + +If Mr Henley had but had this clear in his mind he might well have quoted +it in one connection against Stevenson himself in the _Pall Mall +Magazine_ article. He could hardly have quoted anything more apparently +apt to the purpose. + +In the sphere of minor morals there is no more important topic. +Unselfishness is too often only the most exasperating form of +selfishness. Here is another very characteristic bit: + + "You will always do wrong: you must try to get used to that, my son. + It is a small matter to make a work about, when all the world is in + the same case. I meant when I was a young man to write a great poem; + and now I am cobbling little prose articles and in excellent good + spirits. I thank you. . . . Our business in life is not to succeed, + but to continue to fail, in good spirits." + +Again: + + "It is the mark of good action that it appears inevitable in the + retrospect. We should have been cut-throats to do otherwise. And + there's an end. We ought to know distinctly that we are damned for + what we do wrong; but when we have done right, we have only been + gentlemen, after all. There is nothing to make a work about." + +The moral to _The House of Eld_ is incisive writ out of true +experience--phantasy there becomes solemn, if not, for the nonce, +tragic:-- + + "Old is the tree and the fruit good, + Very old and thick the wood. + Woodman, is your courage stout? + Beware! the root is wrapped about + Your mother's heart, your father's bones; + And, like the mandrake, comes with groans." + +The phantastic moralist is supreme, jauntily serious, facetiously +earnest, most gravely funny in the whole series of _Moral Emblems_. + + "Reader, your soul upraise to see, + In yon fair cut designed by me, + The pauper by the highwayside + Vainly soliciting from pride. + Mark how the Beau with easy air + Contemns the anxious rustic's prayer + And casting a disdainful eye + Goes gaily gallivanting by. + He from the poor averts his head . . . + He will regret it when he's dead." + +Now, the man who would trace out step by step and point by point, clearly +and faithfully, the process by which Stevenson worked himself so far free +of this his besetting tendency to moralised symbolism or allegory into +the freer air of life and real character, would do more to throw light on +Stevenson's genius, and the obstacles he had had to contend with in +becoming a novelist eager to interpret definite times and character, than +has yet been done or even faithfully attempted. This would show at once +Stevenson's wonderful growth and the saving grace and elasticity of his +temperament and genius. Few men who have by force of native genius gone +into allegory or moralised phantasy ever depart out of that fateful and +enchanted region. They are as it were at once lost and imprisoned in it +and kept there as by a spell--the more they struggle for freedom the more +surely is the bewitching charm laid upon them--they are but like the fly +in amber. It was so with Ludwig Tieck; it was so with Nathaniel +Hawthorne; it was so with our own George MacDonald, whose professedly +real pictures of life are all informed of this phantasy, which spoils +them for what they profess to be, and yet to the discerning cannot +disguise what they really are--the attempts of a mystic poet and phantasy +writer and allegoristic moralist to walk in the ways of Anthony Trollope +or of Mrs Oliphant, and, like a stranger in a new land always looking +back (at least by a side-glance, an averted or half-averted face which +keeps him from seeing steadily and seeing whole the real world with which +now he is fain to deal), to the country from which he came. + +Stevenson did largely free himself, that is his great achievement--had he +lived, we verily believe, so marked was his progress, he would have been +a great and true realist, a profound interpreter of human life and its +tragic laws and wondrous compensations--he would have shown how to make +the full retreat from fairyland without penalty of too early an escape +from it, as was the case with Thomas the Rymer of Ercildoune, and with +one other told of by him, and proved that to have been a dreamer need not +absolutely close the door to insight into the real world and to art. This +side of the subject, never even glanced at by Mr Henley or Mr Zangwill or +their _confreres_, yet demands, and will well reward the closest and most +careful attention and thought that can be given to it. + +The parabolic element, with the whimsical humour and turn for paradoxical +inversion, comes out fully in such a work as _Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_. +There his humour gives body to his fancy, and reality to the +half-whimsical forms in which he embodies the results of deep and earnest +speculations on human nature and motive. But even when he is professedly +concerned with incident and adventure merely, he manages to communicate +to his pages some touch of universality, as of unconscious parable or +allegory, so that the reader feels now and then as though some thought, +or motive, or aspiration, or weakness of his own were being there +cunningly unveiled or presented; and not seldom you feel he has also +unveiled and presented some of yours, secret and unacknowledged too. + +Hence the interest which young and old alike have felt in _Treasure +Island_, _Kidnapped_, and _The Wrecker_--a something which suffices +decisively to mark off these books from the mass with which superficially +they might be classed. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX--EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN'S ESTIMATE + + +It should be clearly remembered that Stevenson died at a little over +forty--the age at which severity and simplicity and breadth in art but +begin to be attained. If Scott had died at the age when Stevenson was +taken from us, the world would have lacked the _Waverley Novels_; if a +like fate had overtaken Dickens, we should not have had _A Tale of Two +Cities_; and under a similar stroke, Goldsmith could not have written +_Retaliation_, or tasted the bitter-sweet first night of _She Stoops to +Conquer_. At the age of forty-four Mr Thomas Hardy had probably not +dreamt of _Tess of the D'Urbervilles_. But what a man has already done +at forty years is likely, I am afraid, to be a gauge as well as a promise +of what he will do in the future; and from Stevenson we were entitled to +expect perfect form and continued variety of subject, rather than a +measurable dynamic gain. + +This is the point of view which my friend and correspondent of years ago, +Mr Edmund Clarence Stedman, of New York, set out by emphasising in his +address, as President of the meeting under the auspices of the Uncut +Leaves Society in New York, in the beginning of 1895, on the death of +Stevenson, and to honour the memory of the great romancer, as reported in +the _New York Tribune_: + + "We are brought together by tidings, almost from the Antipodes, of the + death of a beloved writer in his early prime. The work of a romancer + and poet, of a man of insight and feeling, which may be said to have + begun but fifteen years ago, has ended, through fortune's sternest + cynicism, just as it seemed entering upon even more splendid + achievement. A star surely rising, as we thought, has suddenly gone + out. A radiant invention shines no more; the voice is hushed of a + creative mind, expressing its fine imagining in this, our peerless + English tongue. His expression was so original and fresh from + Nature's treasure-house, so prodigal and various, its too brief flow + so consummate through an inborn gift made perfect by unsparing toil, + that mastery of the art by which Robert Louis Stevenson conveyed those + imaginings to us so picturesque, yet wisely ordered, his own romantic + life--and now, at last, so pathetic a loss which renews + + "'The Virgilian cry, + The sense of tears in mortal things,' + + that this assemblage has gathered at the first summons, in tribute to + a beautiful genius, and to avow that with the putting out of that + bright intelligence the reading world experiences a more than wonted + grief. + + "Judged by the sum of his interrupted work, Stevenson had his + limitations. But the work was adjusted to the scale of a possibly + long career. As it was, the good fairies brought all gifts, save that + of health, to his cradle, and the gift-spoiler wrapped them in a + shroud. Thinking of what his art seemed leading to--for things that + would be the crowning efforts of other men seemed prentice-work in his + case--it was not safe to bound his limitations. And now it is as if + Sir Walter, for example, had died at forty-four, with the _Waverley + Novels_ just begun! In originality, in the conception of action and + situation, which, however phantastic, are seemingly within reason, + once we breathe the air of his Fancyland; in the union of bracing and + heroic character and adventure; in all that belongs to tale-writing + pure and simple, his gift was exhaustless. No other such charmer, in + this wise, has appeared in his generation. We thought the stories, + the fairy tales, had all been told, but 'Once upon a time' meant for + him our own time, and the grave and gay magic of Prince Florizel in + dingy London or sunny France. All this is but one of his provinces, + however distinctive. Besides, how he buttressed his romance with + apparent truth! Since Defoe, none had a better right to say: 'There + was one thing I determined to do when I began this long story, and + that was to tell out everything as it befell.' + + "I remember delighting in two fascinating stories of Paris in the time + of Francois Villon, anonymously reprinted by a New York paper from a + London magazine. They had all the quality, all the distinction, of + which I speak. Shortly afterward I met Mr Stevenson, then in his + twenty-ninth year, at a London club, where we chanced to be the only + loungers in an upper room. To my surprise he opened a + conversation--you know there could be nothing more unexpected than + that in London--and thereby I guessed that he was as much, if not as + far, away from home as I was. He asked many questions concerning 'the + States'; in fact, this was but a few months before he took his + steerage passage for our shores. I was drawn to the young Scotsman at + once. He seemed more like a New-Englander of Holmes's Brahmin caste, + who might have come from Harvard or Yale. But as he grew animated I + thought, as others have thought, and as one would suspect from his + name, that he must have Scandinavian blood in his veins--that he was + of the heroic, restless, strong and tender Viking strain, and + certainly from that day his works and wanderings have not belied the + surmise. He told me that he was the author of that charming book of + gipsying in the Cevennes which just then had gained for him some + attentions from the literary set. But if I had known that he had + written those two stories of sixteenth-century Paris--as I learned + afterwards when they reappeared in the _New Arabian Nights_--I would + not have bidden him good-bye as to an 'unfledged comrade,' but would + have wished indeed to 'grapple him to my soul with hooks of steel.' + + "Another point is made clear as crystal by his life itself. He had + the instinct, and he had the courage, to make it the servant, and not + the master, of the faculty within him. I say he had the courage, but + so potent was his birth-spell that doubtless he could not otherwise. + Nothing commonplace sufficed him. A regulation stay-at-home life + would have been fatal to his art. The ancient mandate, 'Follow thy + Genius,' was well obeyed. Unshackled freedom of person and habit was + a prerequisite; as an imaginary artist he felt--nature keeps her poets + and story-tellers children to the last--he felt, if he ever reasoned + it out, that he must gang his own gait, whether it seemed promising, + or the reverse, to kith, kin, or alien. So his wanderings were not + only in the most natural but in the wisest consonance with his + creative dreams. Wherever he went, he found something essential for + his use, breathed upon it, and returned it fourfold in beauty and + worth. The longing of the Norseman for the tropic, of the pine for + the palm, took him to the South Seas. There, too, strange secrets + were at once revealed to him, and every island became an 'Isle of + Voices.' Yes, an additional proof of Stevenson's artistic mission lay + in his careless, careful, liberty of life; in that he was an artist no + less than in his work. He trusted to the impulse which possessed + him--that which so many of us have conscientiously disobeyed and too + late have found ourselves in reputable bondage to circumstances. + + "But those whom you are waiting to hear will speak more fully of all + this--some of them with the interest of their personal + remembrance--with the strength of their affection for the man beloved + by young and old. In the strange and sudden intimacy with an author's + record which death makes sure, we realise how notable the list of + Stevenson's works produced since 1878; more than a score of books--not + fiction alone, but also essays, criticism, biography, drama, even + history, and, as I need not remind you, that spontaneous poetry which + comes only from a true poet. None can have failed to observe that, + having recreated the story of adventure, he seemed in his later + fiction to interfuse a subtler purpose--the search for character, the + analysis of mind and soul. Just here his summons came. Between the + sunrise of one day and the sunset of the next he exchanged the forest + study for the mountain grave. There, as he had sung his own wish, he + lies 'under the wide and starry sky.' If there was something of his + own romance, so exquisitely capricious, in the life of Robert Louis + Stevenson, so, also, the poetic conditions are satisfied in his death, + and in the choice of his burial-place upon the top of Pala. As for + the splendour of that maturity upon which we counted, now never to be + fulfilled on sea or land, I say--as once before, when the great New- + England romancer passed in the stillness of the night: + + "'What though his work unfinished lies? Half bent + The rainbow's arch fades out in upper air, + The shining cataract half-way down the height + Breaks into mist; the haunting strain, that fell + On listeners unaware, + Ends incomplete, but through the starry night + The ear still waits for what it did not tell.'" + +Dr Edward Eggleston finely sounded the personal note, and told of having +met Stevenson at a hotel in New York. Stevenson was ill when the +landlord came to Dr Eggleston and asked him if he should like to meet +him. Continuing, he said: + + "He was flat on his back when I entered, but I think I never saw + anybody grow well in so short a time. It was a soul rather than a + body that lay there, ablaze with spiritual fire, good will shining + through everywhere. He did not pay me any compliment about my work, + and I didn't pay him any about his. We did not burn any of the + incense before each other which authors so often think it necessary to + do, but we were friends instantly. I am not given to speedy + intimacies, but I could not help my heart going out to him. It was a + wonderfully invested soul, no hedges or fences across his fields, no + concealment. He was a romanticist; I was--well, I don't know exactly + what. But he let me into the springs of his romanticism then and + there. + + "'You go in your boat every day?' he asked. 'You sail? Oh! to write + a novel a man must take his life in his hands. He must not live in + the town.' And so he spoke, in his broad way, of course, according to + the enthusiasm of the moment. + + "I can't sound any note of pathos here to-night. Some lives are so + brave and sweet and joyous and well-rounded, with such a completeness + about them that death does not leave imperfection. He never had the + air of sitting up with his own reputation. He let his books toss in + the waves of criticism and make their ports if they deserve to. He + had no claptrap, no great cause, none of the disease of pruriency + which came into fashion with Flaubert and Guy de Maupassant. He + simply told his story, with no condescension, taking the readers into + his heart and his confidence." + + + + +CHAPTER XX--EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS + + +From these sources now traced out by us--his youthfulness of spirit, his +mystical bias, and tendency to dream--symbolisms leading to disregard of +common feelings--flows too often the indeterminateness of Stevenson's +work, at the very points where for direct interest there should be +decision. In _The Master of Ballantrae_ this leads him to try to bring +the balances even as regards our interest in the two brothers, in so far +justifying from one point of view what Mr Zangwill said in the quotation +we have given, or, as Sir Leslie Stephen had it in his second series of +the _Studies of a Biographer_: + + "The younger brother in _The Master of Ballantrae_, who is + black-mailed by the utterly reprobate master, ought surely to be + interesting instead of being simply sullen and dogged. In the later + adventures, we are invited to forgive him on the ground that his brain + has been affected: but the impression upon me is that he is sacrificed + throughout to the interests of the story [or more strictly for the + working out of the problem as originally conceived by the author]. The + curious exclusion of women is natural in the purely boyish stories, + since to a boy woman is simply an incumbrance upon reasonable modes of + life. When in _Catriona_ Stevenson introduces a love story, it is + still unsatisfactory, because David Balfour is so much the undeveloped + animal that his passion is clumsy, and his charm for the girl + unintelligible. I cannot feel, to say the truth, that in any of these + stories I am really among living human beings with whom, apart from + their adventures, I can feel any very lively affection or antipathy." + +In the _Ebb-Tide_ it is, in this respect, yet worse: the three heroes +choke each other off all too literally. + +In his excess of impartiality he tones down the points and lines that +would give the attraction of true individuality to his characters, and +instead, would fain have us contented with his liberal, and even over- +sympathetic views of them and allowances for them. But instead of thus +furthering his object, he sacrifices the whole--and his story becomes, +instead of a broad and faithful human record, really a curiosity of +autobiographic perversion, and of overweening, if not extravagant egotism +of the more refined, but yet over-obtrusive kind. + +Mr Baildon thus hits the subjective tendency, out of which mainly this +defect--a serious defect in view of interest--arises. + + "That we can none of us be sure to what crime we might not descend, if + only our temptation were sufficiently acute, lies at the root of his + fondness and toleration for wrong-doers (p. 74). + +Thus he practically declines to do for us what we are unwilling or unable +to do for ourselves. Interest in two characters in fiction can never, in +this artificial way, and if they are real characters truly conceived, be +made equal, nor can one element of claim be balanced against another, +even at the beck of the greatest artist. The common sentiment, as we +have seen, resents it even as it resents lack of guidance elsewhere. +After all, the novelist is bound to give guidance: he is an authority in +his own world, where he is an autocrat indeed; and can work out issues as +he pleases, even as the Pope is an authority in the Roman Catholic world: +he abdicates his functions when he declines to lead: we depend on him +from the human point of view to guide us right, according to the heart, +if not according to any conventional notion or opinion. Stevenson's +pause in individual presentation in the desire now to raise our sympathy +for the one, and then for the other in _The Master of Ballantrae_, admits +us too far into Stevenson's secret or trick of affected self-withdrawal +in order to work his problem and to signify his theories, to the loss and +utter confusion of his aims from the point of common dramatic and human +interest. It is the same in _Catriona_ in much of the treatment of James +Mohr or More; it is still more so in not a little of the treatment of +_Weir of Hermiston_ and his son, though there, happily for him and for +us, there were the direct restrictions of known fact and history, and +clearly an attempt at a truer and broader human conception unburdened by +theory or egotistic conception. + +Everywhere the problem due to the desire to be overjust, so to say, +emerges; and exactly in the measure it does so the source of true +dramatic directness and variety is lost. It is just as though +Shakespeare were to invent a chorus to cry out at intervals about Iago--"a +villain, bad lot, you see, still there's a great deal to be said for +him--victim of inheritance, this, that and the other; and considering +everything how could you really expect anything else now." Thackeray was +often weak from this same tendency--he meant Becky Sharp to be largely +excused by the reader on these grounds, as he tries to excuse several +others of his characters; but his endeavours in this way to gloss over +"wickedness" in a way, do not succeed--the reader does not carry clear in +mind as he goes along, the suggestions Thackeray has ineffectually set +out and the "healthy hatred of scoundrels" Carlyle talked about has its +full play in spite of Thackeray's suggested excuses and palliations, and +all in his own favour, too, as a story-wright. + +Stevenson's constant habit of putting himself in the place of another, +and asking himself how would I have borne myself here or there, thus +limited his field of dramatic interest, where the subject should have +been made pre-eminently in aid of this effect. Even in Long John Silver +we see it, as in various others of his characters, though there, owing to +the demand for adventure, and action contributory to it, the defect is +not so emphasised. The sense as of a projection of certain features of +the writer into all and sundry of his important characters, thus imparts, +if not an air of egotism, then most certainly a somewhat constrained, if +not somewhat artificial, autobiographical air--in the very midst of +action, questions of ethical or casuistical character arise, all +contributing to submerging individual character and its dramatic +interests under a wave of but half-disguised autobiography. Let +Stevenson do his very best--let him adopt all the artificial disguises he +may, as writing narrative in the first person, etc., as in _Kidnapped_ +and _Catriona_, nevertheless, the attentive reader's mind is constantly +called off to the man who is actually writing the story. It is as +though, after all, all the artistic or artificial disguises were a mere +mask, as more than once Thackeray represented himself, the mask partially +moved aside, just enough to show a chubby, childish kind of transformed +Thackeray face below. This belongs, after all, to the order of +self-revelation though under many disguises: it is creation only in its +manner of work, not in its essential being--the spirit does not so to us +go clean forth of itself, it stops at home, and, as if from a remote and +shadowy cave or recess, projects its own colour on all on which it looks. + +This is essentially the character of the _mystic_; and hence the +justification for this word as applied expressly to Stevenson by Mr +Chesterton and others. + + "The inner life like rings of light + Goes forth of us, transfiguring all we see." + +The effect of these early days, with the peculiar tint due to the +questionings raised by religious stress and strain, persists with +Stevenson; he grows, but he never escapes from that peculiar something +which tells of childish influences--of boyish perversions and troubled +self-examinations due to Shorter Catechism--any one who would view +Stevenson without thought of this, would view him only from the +outside--see him merely in dress and outer oddities. Here I see definite +and clear heredity. Much as he differed from his worthy father in many +things, he was like him in this--the old man like the son, bore on him +the marks of early excesses of wistful self-questionings and painful +wrestlings with religious problems, that perpetuated themselves in a +quaint kind of self-revelation often masked by an assumed self-withdrawal +or indifference which to the keen eye only the more revealed the real +case. Stevenson never, any more than his father, ceased to be interested +in the religious questions for which Scotland has always had a +_penchant_--and so much is this the case that I could wish Professor +Sidney Colvin would even yet attempt to show the bearing of certain +things in that _Address to the Scottish Clergy_ written when Stevenson +was yet but a young man, on all that he afterwards said and did. It +starts in the _Edinburgh Edition_ without any note, comment, or +explanation whatever, but in that respect the _Edinburgh Edition_ is not +quite so complete as it might have been made. In view of the point now +before us, it is far more important than many of the other trifles there +given, and wants explanation and its relation to much in the novels +brought out and illustrated. Were this adequately done, only new ground +would be got for holding that Stevenson, instead of, as has been said, +"seeing only the visible world," was, in truth, a mystical moralist, once +and always, whose thoughts ran all too easily into parable and fable, and +who, indeed, never escaped wholly from that atmosphere, even when writing +of things and characters that seemed of themselves to be wholly outside +that sphere. This was the tendency, indeed, that militated against the +complete detachment in his case from moral problems and mystical thought, +so as to enable him to paint, as it were, with a free hand exactly as he +saw; and most certainly not that he saw only the visible world. The +mystical element is not directly favourable to creative art. You see in +Tolstoy how it arrests and perplexes--how it lays a disturbing check on +real presentation--hindering the action, and is not favourable to the +loving and faithful representation, which, as Goethe said, all true and +high art should be. To some extent you see exactly the same thing in +Nathaniel Hawthorne as in Tolstoy. Hawthorne's preoccupations in this +way militated against his character-power; his healthy characters who +would never have been influenced as he describes by morbid ones yet are +not only influenced according to him, but suffer sadly. Phoebe Pyncheon +in _The House of the Seven Gables_, gives sunshine to poor Hepzibah +Clifford, but is herself never merry again, though joyousness was her +natural element. So, doubtless, it would have been with Pansie in +_Doctor Dolliver_, as indeed it was with Zenobia and with the hero in the +_Marble Faun_. "We all go wrong," said Hawthorne, "by a too strenuous +resolution to go right." Lady Byron was to him an intolerably +irreproachable person, just as Stevenson felt a little of the same +towards Thoreau; notwithstanding that he was the "sunnily-ascetic," the +asceticism and its corollary, as he puts it: the passion for individual +self-improvement was alien in a way to Stevenson. This is the position +of the casuistic mystic moralist and not of the man who sees only the +visible world. + +Mr Baildon says: + + "Stevenson has many of the things that are wanting or defective in + Scott. He has his philosophy of life; he is beyond remedy a moralist, + even when his morality is of the kind which he happily calls 'tail + foremost,' or as we may say, inverted morality. Stevenson is, in + fact, much more of a thinker than Scott, and he is also much more of + the conscious artist, questionable advantage as that sometimes is. He + has also a much cleverer, acuter mind than Scott, also a questionable + advantage, as genius has no greater enemy than cleverness, and there + is really no greater descent than to fall from the style of genius to + that of cleverness. But Stevenson was too critical and alive to + misuse his cleverness, and it is generally employed with great effect + as in the diabolical ingenuities of a John Silver, or a Master of + Ballantrae. In one sense Stevenson does not even belong to the school + of Scott, but rather to that of Poe, Hawthorne, and the Brontes, in + that he aims more at concentration and intensity, than at the easy, + quiet breadth of Scott." + +If, indeed, it should not here have been added that Stevenson's theory of +life and conduct was not seldom too insistent for free creativeness, for +dramatic freedom, breadth and reality. + +Now here I humbly think Mr Baldion errs about the cleverness when he +criticises Stevenson for the _faux pas_ artistically of resorting to the +piratic filibustering and the treasure-seeking at the close of _The +Master of Ballantrae_, he only tells and tells plainly how cleverness +took the place of genius there; as indeed it did in not a few +cases--certainly in some points in the Dutch escapade in _Catriona_ and +in not a few in _Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_. The fault of that last story is +simply that we seem to hear Stevenson chuckling to himself, "Ah, now, +won't they all say at last how clever I am." That too mars the _Merry +Men_, whoever wrote them or part wrote them, and _Prince Otto_ would have +been irretrievably spoiled by this self-conscious sense of cleverness had +it not been for style and artifice. In this incessant "see how clever I +am," we have another proof of the abounding youthfulness of R. L. +Stevenson. If, as Mr Baildon says (p. 30), he had true child's horror of +being put in fine clothes in which one must sit still and be good, +_Prince Otto_ remains attractive in spite of some things and because of +his fine clothes. Neither Poe nor Hawthorne could have fallen to the +piracy, and treasure-hunting of _The Master of Ballantrae_. + +"Far behind Scott in the power of instinctive, irreflective, spontaneous +creation of character, Stevenson tells his story with more art and with a +firmer grip on his reader." And that is exactly what I, wishing to do +all I dutifully can for Stevenson, cannot see. His genius is in nearly +all cases pulled up or spoiled by his all too conscious cleverness, and +at last we say, "Oh Heavens! if he could and would but let himself go or +forget himself what he might achieve." But he doesn't--never does, and +therefore remains but a second-rate creator though more and more the +stylist and the artist. This is more especially the case at the very +points where writers like Scott would have risen and roused all the +readers' interest. When Stevenson reaches such points, he is always as +though saying "See now how cleverly I'll clear that old and stereotyped +style of thing and do something _new_." But there are things in life and +human nature, which though they are old are yet ever new, and the true +greatness of a writer can never come from evading or looking askance at +them or trying to make them out something else than what they really are. +No artistic aim or ambition can suffice to stand instead of them or to +refine them away. That way lies only cold artifice and frigid lacework, +and sometimes Stevenson did go a little too much on this line. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI--UNITY IN STEVENSON'S STORIES + + +The unity in Stevenson's stories is generally a unity of subjective +impression and reminiscence due, in the first place, to his quick, almost +abnormal boyish reverence for mere animal courage, audacity, and +doggedness, and, in the second place, to his theory of life, his +philosophy, his moral view. He produces an artificial atmosphere. +Everything then has to be worked up to this--kept really in accordance +with it, and he shows great art in the doing of this. Hence, though, a +quaint sense of sameness, of artificial atmosphere--at once really a lack +of spontaneity and of freedom. He is freest when he pretends to nothing +but adventure--when he aims professedly at nothing save to let his +characters develop themselves by action. In this respect the most +successful of his stories is yet _Treasure Island_, and the least +successful perhaps _Catriona_, when just as the ambitious aim compels him +to pause in incident, the first-person form creates a cold stiffness and +artificiality alien to the full impression he would produce upon the +reader. The two stories he left unfinished promised far greater things +in this respect than he ever accomplished. For it is an indisputable +fact, and indeed very remarkable, that the ordinary types of men and +women have little or no attraction for Stevenson, nor their commonplace +passions either. Yet precisely what his art wanted was due infusion of +this very interest. Nothing else will supply the place. The ordinary +passion of love to the end he _shies_, and must invent no end of +expedients to supply the want. The devotion of the ordinary type, as +Thomas Hardy has over and over exhibited it, is precisely what Stevenson +wants, to impart to his novels the full sense of reality. The secret of +morals, says Shelley, is a going out of self. Stevenson was only on the +way to secure this grand and all-sufficing motive. His characters, in a +way, are all already like himself, romantic, but the highest is when the +ordinary and commonplace is so apprehended that it becomes romantic, and +may even, through the artist's deeper perception and unconscious grasp +and vision, take the hand of tragedy, and lose nothing. The very +atmosphere Stevenson so loved to create was in itself alien to this; and, +so far as he went, his most successful revelations were but records of +his own limitations. It is something that he was to the end so much the +youth, with fine impulses, if sometimes with sympathies misdirected, and +that, too, in such a way as to render his work cold and artificial, else +he might have turned out more of the Swift than of the Sterne or +Fielding. Prince Otto and Seraphina are from this cause mainly complete +failures, alike from the point of view of nature and of art, and the +Countess von Rosen is not a complete failure, and would perhaps have been +a bit of a success, if only she had made Prince Otto come nearer to +losing his virtue. The most perfect in style, perhaps, of all +Stevenson's efforts it is yet most out of nature and truth,--a farce, +felt to be disguised only when read in a certain mood; and this all the +more for its perfections, just as Stevenson would have said it of a human +being too icily perfect whom he had met. + +On this subject, Mr Baildon has some words so decisive, true, and final, +that I cannot refrain from here quoting them: + + "From sheer incapacity to retain it, Prince Otto loses the regard, + affection, and esteem of his wife. He goes eavesdropping among the + peasantry, and has to sit silent while his wife's honour is coarsely + impugned. After that I hold it is impossible for Stevenson to + rehabilitate his hero, and, with all his brilliant effects, he fails. + . . . I cannot help feeling a regret that such fine work is thrown + away on what I must honestly hold to be an unworthy subject. The + music of the spheres is rather too sublime an accompaniment for this + genteel comedy Princess. A touch of Offenbach would seem more + appropriate. Then even in comedy the hero must not be the butt." And + it must reluctantly be confessed that in Prince Otto you see in excess + that to which there is a tendency in almost all the rest--it is to + make up for lack of hold on human nature itself, by resources of style + and mere external technical art. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII--PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED GLOOM + + +Now, it is in its own way surely a very remarkable thing that Stevenson, +who, like a youth, was all for _Heiterkeit_, cheerfulness, taking and +giving of pleasure, for relief, change, variety, new impressions, new +sensations, should, at the time he did, have conceived and written a +story like _The Master of Ballantrae_--all in a grave, grey, sombre tone, +not aiming even generally at what at least indirectly all art is +conceived to aim at--the giving of pleasure: he himself decisively said +that it "lacked all pleasurableness, and hence was imperfect in essence." +A very strange utterance in face of the oft-repeated doctrine of the +essays that the one aim of art, as of true life, is to communicate +pleasure, to cheer and to elevate and improve, and in face of two of his +doctrines that life itself is a monitor to cheerfulness and mirth. This +is true: and it is only explainable on the ground that it is youth alone +which can exult in its power of accumulating shadows and dwelling on the +dark side--it is youth that revels in the possible as a set-off to its +brightness and irresponsibility: it is youth that can delight in its own +excess of shade, and can even dispense with sunshine--hugging to its +heart the memory of its own often self-created distresses and conjuring +up and, with self-satisfaction, brooding over the pain and imagined +horrors of a lifetime. Maturity and age kindly bring their own +relief--rendering this kind of ministry to itself no longer desirable, +even were it possible. _The Master of Ballantrae_ indeed marks the +crisis. It shows, and effectively shows, the other side of the adventure +passion--the desire of escape from its own sombre introspections, which +yet, in all its "go" and glow and glitter, tells by its very excess of +their tendency to pass into this other and apparently opposite. But +here, too, there is nothing single or separate. The device of piracy, +etc., at close of _Ballantrae_, is one of the poorest expedients for +relief in all fiction. + +Will in _Will o' the Mill_ presents another. When at the last moment he +decides that it is not worth while to get married, the author's then +rather incontinent philosophy--which, by-the-bye, he did not himself act +on--spoils his story as it did so much else. Such an ending to such a +romance is worse even than any blundering such as the commonplace +inventor could be guilty of, for he would be in a low sense natural if he +were but commonplace. We need not therefore be surprised to find Mr +Gwynn thus writing: + + "The love scenes in _Weir of Hermiston_ are almost unsurpassable; but + the central interest of the story lies elsewhere--in the relations + between father and son. Whatever the cause, the fact is clear that in + the last years of his life Stevenson recognised in himself an ability + to treat subjects which he had hitherto avoided, and was thus no + longer under the necessity of detaching fragments from life. Before + this, he had largely confined himself to the adventures of roving men + where women had made no entrance; or, if he treated of a settled + family group, the result was what we see in _The Master of + Ballantrae_." + +In a word, between this work and _Weir of Hermiston_ we have the passage +from mere youth to manhood, with its wider, calmer views, and its +patience, inclusiveness, and mild, genial acceptance of types that before +did not come, and could not by any effort of will be brought, within +range or made to adhere consistently with what was already accepted and +workable. He was less the egotist now and more the realist. He was not +so prone to the high lights in which all seems overwrought, exaggerated; +concerned really with effects of a more subdued order, if still the theme +was a wee out of ordinary nature. Enough is left to prove that +Stevenson's life-long devotion to his art anyway was on the point of +being rewarded by such a success as he had always dreamt of: that in the +man's nature there was power to conceive scenes of a tragic beauty and +intensity unsurpassed in our prose literature, and to create characters +not unworthy of his greatest predecessors. The blind stroke of fate had +nothing to say to the lesson of his life, and though we deplore that he +never completed his masterpieces, we may at least be thankful that time +enough was given him to prove to his fellow-craftsmen, that such labour +for the sake of art is not without art's peculiar reward--the triumph of +successful execution. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII--EDINBURGH REVIEWERS' DICTA INAPPLICABLE TO LATER WORK + + +From many different points of view discerning critics have celebrated the +autobiographic vein--the self-revealing turn, the self-portraiture, the +quaint, genial, yet really child-like egotistic and even dreamy element +that lies like an amalgam, behind all Stevenson's work. Some have even +said, that because of this, he will finally live by his essays and not by +his stories. That is extreme, and is not critically based or justified, +because, however true it may be up to a certain point, it is not true of +Stevenson's quite latest fictions where we see a decided breaking through +of the old limits, and an advance upon a new and a fresher and broader +sphere of interest and character altogether. But these ideas set down +truly enough at a certain date, or prior to a certain date, are wrong and +falsely directed in view of Stevenson's latest work and what it promised. +For instance, what a discerning and able writer in the _Edinburgh Review_ +of July 1895 said truly then was in great part utterly inapplicable to +the whole of the work of the last years, for in it there was grasp, wide +and deep, of new possibilities--promise of clear insight, discrimination, +and contrast of character, as well as firm hold of new and great human +interest under which the egotistic or autobiographic vein was submerged +or weakened. The _Edinburgh Reviewer_ wrote: + + "There was irresistible fascination in what it would be unfair to + characterise as egotism, for it came natural to him to talk frankly + and easily of himself. . . . He could never have dreamed, like Pepys, + of locking up his confidence in a diary. From first to last, in + inconsecutive essays, in the records of sentimental touring, in + fiction and in verse, he has embodied the outer and the inner + autobiography. He discourses--he prattles--he almost babbles about + himself. He seems to have taken minute and habitual introspection for + the chief study in his analysis of human nature, as a subject which + was immediately in his reach, and would most surely serve his purpose. + We suspect much of the success of his novels was due to the fact that + as he seized for a substructure on the scenery and situations which + had impressed him forcibly, so in the characters of the most different + types, there was always more or less of self-portraiture. The subtle + touch, eminently and unmistakably realistic, gave life to what might + otherwise have seemed a lay-figure. . . . He hesitated again and again + as to his destination; and under mistakes, advice of friends, doubted + his chances, as a story-writer, even after _Treasure Island_ had + enjoyed its special success. . . . We venture to think that, with his + love of intellectual self-indulgence, had he found novel-writing + really enjoyable, he would never have doubted at all. But there comes + in the difference between him and Scott, whom he condemns for the + slovenliness of hasty workmanship. Scott, in his best days, sat down + to his desk and let the swift pen take its course in inspiration that + seemed to come without an effort. Even when racked with pains, and + groaning in agony, the intellectual machinery was still driven at a + high pressure by something that resembled an irrepressible instinct. + Stevenson can have had little or nothing of that inspiriting afflatus. + He did his painstaking work conscientiously, thoughtfully; he erased, + he revised, and he was hard to satisfy. In short, it was his + weird--and he could not resist it--to set style and form before fire + and spirit." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV--MR HENLEY'S SPITEFUL PERVERSIONS + + +More unfortunate still, as disturbing and prejudicing a sane and true and +disinterested view of Stevenson's claims, was that article of his +erewhile "friend," Mr W. E. Henley, published on the appearance of the +_Memoir_ by Mr Graham Balfour, in the _Pall Mall Magazine_. It was well +that Mr Henley there acknowledged frankly that he wrote under a keen +sense of "grievance"--a most dangerous mood for the most soberly critical +and self-restrained of men to write in, and that most certainly Mr W. E. +Henley was not--and that he owned to having lost contact with, and +recognition of the R. L. Stevenson who went to America in 1887, as he +says, and never came back again. To do bare justice to Stevenson it is +clear that knowledge of that later Stevenson was essential--essential +whether it was calculated to deepen sympathy or the reverse. It goes +without saying that the Louis he knew and hobnobbed with, and nursed near +by the Old Bristo Port in Edinburgh could not be the same exactly as the +Louis of Samoa and later years--to suppose so, or to expect so, would +simply be to deny all room for growth and expansion. It is clear that +the W. E. Henley of those days was not the same as the W. E. Henley who +indited that article, and if growth and further insight are to be allowed +to Mr Henley and be pleaded as his justification _cum_ spite born of +sense of grievance for such an onslaught, then clearly some allowance in +the same direction must be made for Stevenson. One can hardly think that +in his case old affection and friendship had been so completely +submerged, under feelings of grievance and paltry pique, almost always +bred of grievances dwelt on and nursed, which it is especially bad for +men of genius to acknowledge, and to make a basis, as it were, for +clearer knowledge, insight, and judgment. In other cases the pleading +would simply amount to an immediate and complete arrest of judgment. Mr +Henley throughout writes as though whilst he had changed, and changed in +points most essential, his erewhile friend remained exactly where he was +as to literary position and product--the Louis who went away in 1887 and +never returned, had, as Mr W. E. Henley, most unfortunately for himself, +would imply, retained the mastery, and the Louis who never came back had +made no progress, had not added an inch, not to say a cubit, to his +statue, while Mr Henley remained _in statu quo_, and was so only to be +judged. It is an instance of the imperfect sympathy which Charles Lamb +finely celebrated--only here it is acknowledged, and the "imperfect +sympathy" pled as a ground for claiming the full insight which only +sympathy can secure. If Mr Henley was fair to the Louis he knew and +loved, it is clear that he was and could only be unjust to the Louis who +went away in 1887 and never came back. + + "At bottom Stevenson was an excellent fellow. But he was of his + essence what the French call _personnel_. He was, that is, + incessantly and passionately interested in Stevenson. He could not be + in the same room with a mirror but he must invite its confidences + every time he passed it; to him there was nothing obvious in time and + eternity, and the smallest of his discoveries, his most trivial + apprehensions, were all by way of being revelations, and as + revelations must be thrust upon the world; he was never so much in + earnest, never so well pleased (this were he happy or wretched), never + so irresistible as when he wrote about himself. _Withal_, _if he + wanted a thing_, _he went after it with an entire contempt of + consequences_. _For these_, _indeed_, _the Shorter Catechism was ever + prepared to answer_; _so that whether he did well or ill_, _he was + safe to come out unabashed and cheerful_." + +Notice here, how undiscerning the mentor becomes. The words put in +"italics," unqualified as they are, would fit and admirably cover the +character of the greatest criminal. They would do as they stand, for +Wainwright, for Dr Dodd, for Deeming, for Neil Cream, for Canham Read, or +for Dougal of Moat Farm fame. And then the touch that, in the Shorter +Catechism, Stevenson would have found a cover or justification for it +somehow! This comes of writing under a keen sense of grievance; and how +could this be truly said of one who was "at bottom an excellent fellow." +W. Henley's ethics are about as clear-obscure as is his reading of +character. Listen to him once again--more directly on the literary +point. + + "To tell the truth, his books are none of mine; I mean that if I + wanted reading, I do not go for it to the _Edinburgh Edition_. I am + not interested in remarks about morals; in and out of letters. _I + have lived a full and varied life_, and my opinions are my own. _So_, + _if I crave the enchantment of romance_, _I ask it of bigger men than + he_, _and of bigger books than his_: of _Esmond_ (say) and _Great + Expectations_, of _Redgauntlet_ and _Old Mortality_, _of La Reine + Margot_ and _Bragelonne_, of _David Copperfield_ and _A Tale of Two + Cities_; while if good writing and some other things be in my + appetite, are there not always Hazlitt and Lamb--to say nothing of + that globe of miraculous continents; which is known to us as + Shakespeare? There is his style, you will say, and it is a fact that + it is rare, and _in the last_ times better, because much simpler than + in the first. But, after all, his style is so perfectly achieved that + the achievement gets obvious: and when achievement gets obvious, is it + not by way of becoming uninteresting? And is there not something to + be said for the person who wrote that Stevenson always reminded him of + a young man dressed the best he ever saw for the Burlington Arcade? + {10} Stevenson's work in letters does not now take me much, and I + decline to enter on the question of his immortality; since that, + despite what any can say, will get itself settled soon or late, for + all time. No--when I care to think of Stevenson it is not of R. L. + Stevenson--R. L. Stevenson, the renowned, the accomplished--executing + his difficult solo, but of the Lewis that I knew and loved, and + wrought for, and worked with for so long. The successful man of + letters does not greatly interest me. I read his careful prayers and + pass on, with the certainty that, well as they read, they were not + written for print. I learn of his nameless prodigalities, and recall + some instances of conduct in another vein. I remember, rather, the + unmarried and irresponsible Lewis; the friend, the comrade, the + _charmeur_. Truly, that last word, French as it is, is the only one + that is worthy of him. I shall ever remember him as that. The + impression of his writings disappears; the impression of himself and + his talk is ever a possession. . . . Forasmuch as he was primarily a + talker, his printed works, like these of others after his kind, are + but a sop for posterity. A last dying speech and confession (as it + were) to show that not for nothing were they held rare fellows in + their day." + +Just a month or two before Mr Henley's self-revealing article appeared in +the _Pall Mall Magazine_, Mr Chesterton, in the _Daily News_, with almost +prophetic forecast, had said: + + "Mr Henley might write an excellent study of Stevenson, but it would + only be of the Henleyish part of Stevenson, and it would show a + distinct divergence from the finished portrait of Stevenson, which + would be given by Professor Colvin." + +And it were indeed hard to reconcile some things here with what Mr Henley +set down of individual works many times in the _Scots and National +Observer_, and elsewhere, and in literary judgments as in some other +things there should, at least, be general consistency, else the search +for an honest man in the late years would be yet harder than it was when +Diogenes looked out from his tub! + +Mr James Douglas, in the _Star_, in his half-playful and suggestive way, +chose to put it as though he regarded the article in the _Pall Mall +Magazine_ as a hoax, perpetrated by some clever, unscrupulous writer, +intent on provoking both Mr Henley and his friends, and Stevenson's +friends and admirers. This called forth a letter from one signing +himself "A Lover of R. L. Stevenson," which is so good that we must give +it here. + + A LITERARY HOAX. + TO THE EDITOR OF THE _STAR_. + + SIR--I fear that, despite the charitable scepticism of Mr Douglas, + there is no doubt that Mr Henley is the perpetrator of the saddening + Depreciation of Stevenson which has been published over his name. + + What openings there are for reprisals let Mr Henley's conscience tell + him; but permit me to remind him of two or three things which R. L. + Stevenson has written concerning W. E. Henley. + + First this scene in the infirmary at Edinburgh: + + "(Leslie) Stephen and I sat on a couple of chairs, and the poor fellow + (Henley) sat up in his bed with his hair and beard all tangled, and + talked as cheerfully as if he had been in a king's palace, or the + great King's palace of the blue air. He has taught himself two + languages since he has been lying there. _I shall try to be of use to + him_." + + Secondly, this passage from Stevenson's dedication of _Virginibus + Puerisque_ to "My dear William Ernest Henley": + + "These papers are like milestones on the wayside of my life; and as I + look back in memory, there is hardly a stage of that distance but I + see you present with advice, reproof, or praise. Meanwhile, many + things have changed, you and I among the rest; but I hope that our + sympathy, founded on the love of our art, and nourished by mutual + assistance, shall survive these little revolutions, undiminished, and, + with God's help, unite us to the end." + + Thirdly, two scraps from letters from Stevenson to Henley, to show + that the latter was not always a depreciator of R. L. Stevenson's + work: + + "1. I'm glad to think I owe you the review that pleased me best of all + the reviews I ever had. . . . To live reading such reviews and die + eating ortolans--sich is my aspiration. + + "2. Dear lad,--If there was any more praise in what you wrote, I + think--(the editor who had pruned down Mr Henley's review of + Stevenson's _Prince Otto_) has done us both a service; some of it + stops my throat. . . . Whether (considering our intimate relations) + you would not do better to refrain from reviewing me, I will leave to + yourself." + + And, lastly, this extract from the very last of Stevenson's letters to + Henley, published in the two volumes of _Letters_: + + "It is impossible to let your new volume pass in silence. I have not + received the same thrill of poetry since G. M.'s _Joy of Earth_ + volume, and _Love in a Valley_; and I do not know that even that was + so intimate and deep. . . . I thank you for the joy you have given me, + and remain your old friend and present huge admirer, R. L. S." + +It is difficult to decide on which side in this literary friendship lies +the true modesty and magnanimity? I had rather be the author of the last +message of R. L. Stevenson to W. E. Henley, than of the last words of W. +E. Henley concerning R. L. Stevenson. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV--MR CHRISTIE MURRAY'S IMPRESSIONS + + +MR CHRISTIE MURRAY, writing as "Merlin" in our handbook in the _Referee_ +at the time, thus disposed of some of the points just dealt with by us: + + "Here is libel on a large scale, and I have purposely refrained from + approaching it until I could show my readers something of the spirit + in which the whole attack is conceived. 'If he wanted a thing he went + after it with an entire contempt for consequences. For these, indeed, + the Shorter Catechist was ever prepared to answer; so that whether he + did well or ill, he was safe to come out unabashed and cheerful.' Now + if Mr Henley does not mean that for the very express picture of a + rascal without a conscience he has been most strangely infelicitous in + his choice of terms, and he is one of those who make so strong a + profession of duty towards mere vocables that we are obliged to take + him _au pied de la lettre_. A man who goes after whatever he wants + with an entire contempt of consequences is a scoundrel, and the man + who emerges from such an enterprise unabashed and cheerful, whatever + his conduct may have been, and justifies himself on the principles of + the Shorter Catechism, is a hypocrite to boot. This is not the report + we have of Robert Louis Stevenson from most of those who knew him. It + is a most grave and dreadful accusation, and it is not minimised by Mr + Henley's acknowledgment that Stevenson was a good fellow. We all know + the air of false candour which lends a disputant so much advantage in + debate. In Victor Hugo's tremendous indictment of Napoleon le Petit + we remember the telling allowance for fine horsemanship. It spreads + an air of impartiality over the most mordant of Hugo's pages. It is + meant to do that. An insignificant praise is meant to show how a + whole Niagara of blame is poured on the victim of invective in all + sincerity, and even with a touch of reluctance. + + "Mr Henley, despite his absurdities of ''Tis' and 'it were,' is a + fairly competent literary craftsman, and he is quite gifted enough to + make a plain man's plain meaning an evident thing if he chose to do + it. But if for the friend for whom 'first and last he did share' he + can only show us the figure of one 'who was at bottom an excellent + fellow,' and who had 'an entire contempt' for the consequences of his + own acts, he presents a picture which can only purposely be obscured. + . . . + + "All I know of Robert Louis Stevenson I have learned from his books, + and from one unexpected impromptu letter which he wrote to me years + ago in friendly recognition of my own work. I add the testimonies of + friends who may have been of less actual service to him than Mr + Henley, but who surely loved him better and more lastingly. These do + not represent him as the victim of an overweening personal vanity, nor + as a person reckless of the consequences of his own acts, nor as a + Pecksniff who consoled himself for moral failure out of the Shorter + Catechism. The books and the friends amongst them show me an erratic + yet lovable personality, a man of devotion and courage, a loyal, + charming, and rather irresponsible person whose very slight faults + were counter-balanced many times over by very solid virtues. . . . + + "To put the thing flatly, it is not a heroism to cling to mere + existence. The basest of us can do that. But it is a heroism to + maintain an equable and unbroken cheerfulness in the face of death. + For my own part, I never bowed at the literary shrine Mr Henley and + his friends were at so great pains to rear. I am not disposed to + think more loftily than I ever thought of their idol. But the Man--the + Man was made of enduring valour and childlike charm, and these will + keep him alive when his detractors are dead and buried." + +As to the Christian name, it is notorious that he was christened Robert +Lewis--the Lewis being after his maternal grandfather--Dr Lewis Balfour. +Some attempt has been made to show that the Louis was adopted because so +many cousins and relatives had also been so christened; but the most +likely explanation I have ever heard was that his father changed the name +to Louis, that there might be no chance through it of any notion of +association with a very prominent noisy person of the name of Lewis, in +Edinburgh, towards whom Thomas Stevenson felt dislike, if not positive +animosity. Anyhow, it is clear from the entries in the register of +pupils at the Edinburgh Academy, in the two years when Stevenson was +there, that in early youth he was called Robert only; for in the school +list for 1862 the name appears as Robert Stevenson, without the Lewis, +while in the 1883 list it is given as Lewis Robert Stevenson. Clearly if +in earlier years Stevenson was, in his family and elsewhere, called +_Robert_, there could have then arisen no risk of confusion with any of +his relatives who bore the name of Lewis; and all this goes to support +the view which I have given above. Anyhow he ceased to be called Robert +at home, and ceased in 1863 to be Robert on the Edinburgh Academy list, +and became Lewis Robert. Whether my view is right or not, he was +thenceforward called Louis in his family, and the name uniformly spelt +Louis. What blame on Stevenson's part could be attached to this family +determination it is hard to see--people are absolutely free to spell +their names as they please, and the matter would not be worth a moment's +attention, or the waste of one drop of ink, had not Mr Henley chosen to +be very nasty about the name, and in the _Pall Mall Magazine_ article +persisted in printing it Lewis as though that were worthy of him and of +it. That was not quite the unkindest cut of all, but it was as unkind as +it was trumpery. Mr Christie Murray neatly set off the trumpery spite of +this in the following passage: + + "Stevenson, it appears, according to his friend's judgment, was + 'incessantly and passionately interested in Stevenson,' but most of us + are incessantly and passionately interested in ourselves. 'He could + not be in the same room with a mirror but he must invite its + confidences every time he passed it.' I remember that George Sala, + who was certainly under no illusion as to his own personal aspect, + made public confession of an identical foible. Mr Henley may not have + an equal affection for the looking-glass, but he is a very poor and + unimaginative reader who does not see him gloating over the god-like + proportions of the shadow he sends sprawling over his own page. I + make free to say that a more self-conscious person than Mr Henley does + not live. 'The best and most interesting part of Stevenson's life + will never get written--even by me,' says Mr Henley. + + "There is one curious little mark of animus, or one equally curious + affectation--I do not profess to know which, and it is most probably a + compound of the two--in Mr Henley's guardedly spiteful essay which + asks for notice. The dead novelist signed his second name on his + title-pages and his private correspondence 'Louis.' Mr Henley spells + it 'Lewis.' Is this intended to say that Stevenson took an + ornamenting liberty with his own baptismal appellation? If so, why + not say the thing and have done with it? Or is it one of Mr Henley's + wilful ridiculosities? It seems to stand for some sort of meaning, + and to me, at least, it offers a jarring hint of small spitefulness + which might go for nothing if it were not so well borne out by the + general tone of Mr Henley's article. It is a small matter enough, God + knows, but it is precisely because it is so very small that it + irritates." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI--HERO-VILLAINS + + +In truth, it must indeed be here repeated that Stevenson for the reason +he himself gave about _Deacon Brodie_ utterly fails in that healthy +hatred of "fools and scoundrels" on which Carlyle somewhat incontinently +dilated. Nor does he, as we have seen, draw the line between hero and +villain of the piece, as he ought to have done; and, even for his own +artistic purposes, has it too much all on one side, to express it simply. +Art demands relief from any one phase of human nature, more especially of +that phase, and even from what is morbid or exceptional. Admitting that +such natures, say as Huish, the cockney, in the _Ebb-Tide_ on the one +side, and Prince Otto on the other are possible, it is yet absolutely +demanded that they should not stand _alone_, but have their due +complement and balance present in the piece also to deter and finally to +tell on them in the action. If "a knave or villain," as George Eliot +aptly said, is but a fool with a circumbendibus, this not only wants to +be shown, but to have that definite human counterpart and corrective; and +this not in any indirect and perfunctory way, but in a direct and +effective sense. It is here that Stevenson fails--fails absolutely in +most of his work, save the very latest--fails, as has been shown, in _The +Master of Ballantrae_, as it were almost of perverse and set purpose, in +lack of what one might call ethical decision which causes him to waver or +seem to waver and wobble in his judgment of his characters or in his +sympathy with them or for them. Thus he fails to give his readers the +proper cue which was his duty both as man and artist to have given. The +highest art and the lowest are indeed here at one in demanding moral +poise, if we may call it so, that however crudely in the low, and however +artistically and refinedly in the high, vice should not only not be set +forth as absolutely triumphing, nor virtue as being absolutely, +outwardly, and inwardly defeated. It is here the same in the melodrama +of the transpontine theatre as in the tragedies of the Greek dramatists +and Shakespeare. "The evening brings a' 'hame'" and the end ought to +show something to satisfy the innate craving (for it is innate, thank +Heaven! and low and high alike in moments of _elevated impression_, +acknowledge it and bow to it) else there can scarce be true _denouement_ +and the sense of any moral rectitude or law remain as felt or +acknowledged in human nature or in the Universe itself. + +Stevenson's toleration and constant sermonising in the essays--his desire +to make us yield allowances all round is so far, it may be, there in +place; but it will not work out in story or play, and declares the need +for correction and limitation the moment that he essays artistic +presentation--from the point of view of art he lacks at once artistic +clearness and decision, and from the point of view of morality seems +utterly loose and confusing. His artistic quality here rests wholly in +his style--mere style, and he is, alas! a castaway as regards discernment +and reading of human nature in its deepest demands and laws. Herein lies +the false strain that has spoiled much of his earlier work, which renders +really superficial and confusing and undramatic his professedly dramatic +work--which never will and never can commend the hearty suffrages of a +mixed and various theatrical audience in violating the very first rule of +the theatre, and of dramatic creation. + +From another point of view this is my answer to Mr Pinero in regard to +the failure of Stevenson to command theatrical success. He confuses and +so far misdirects the sympathies in issues which strictly are at once +moral and dramatic. + +I am absolutely at one with Mr Baildon, though I reach my results from +somewhat different grounds from what he does, when he says this about +_Beau Austin_, and the reason of its failure--complete failure--on the +stage: + + "I confess I should have liked immensely to have seen [? to see] this + piece on the boards; for only then could one be quite sure whether it + could be made convincing to an audience and carry their sympathies in + the way the author intended. Yet the fact that _Beau Austin_, in + spite of being 'put on' by so eminent an actor-manager as Mr Beerbohm + Tree, was no great success on the stage, is a fair proof that the + piece lacked some of the essentials, good or bad, of dramatic success. + Now a drama, like a picture or a musical composition, must have a + certain unity of key and tone. You can, indeed, mingle comedy with + tragedy as an interlude or relief from the strain and stress of the + serious interest of the piece. But you cannot reverse the process and + mingle tragedy with comedy. Once touch the fine spun-silk of the + pretty fire-balloon of comedy with the tragic dagger, and it falls to + earth a shrivelled nothing. And the reason that no melodrama can be + great art is just that it is a compromise between tragedy and comedy, + a mixture of tragedy with comedy and not comedy with tragedy. So in + drama, the middle course, proverbially the safest, is in reality the + most dangerous. Now I maintain that in _Beau Austin_ we have an + element of tragedy. The betrayal of a beautiful, pure and + noble-minded woman is surely at once the basest act a man can be + capable of, and a more tragic event than death itself to the woman. + Richardson, in _Clarissa Harlowe_, is well aware of this, and is + perfectly right in making his _denouement_ tragic. Stevenson, on the + other hand, patches up the matter into a rather tame comedy. It is + even much tamer than it would have been in the case of Lovelace and + Clarissa Harlowe; for Lovelace is a strong character, a man who could + have been put through some crucial atonement, and come out purged and + ennobled. But Beau Austin we feel is but a frip. He endures a few + minutes of sharp humiliation, it is true, but to the spectator this + cannot but seem a very insufficient expiation, not only of the wrong + he had done one woman, but of the indefinite number of wrongs he had + done others. He is at once the villain and the hero of the piece, and + in the narrow limits of a brief comedy this transformation cannot be + convincingly effected. Wrongly or rightly, a theatrical audience, + like the spectators of a trial, demand a definite verdict and + sentence, and no play can satisfy which does not reasonably meet this + demand. And this arises not from any merely Christian prudery or + Puritanism, for it is as true for Greek tragedy and other high forms + of dramatic art." + +The transformation of villain into hero, if possible at all, could only +be convincingly effected in a piece of wide scope, where there was room +for working out the effect of some great shock, upheaval of the nature, +change due to deep and unprecedented experiences--religious conversion, +witnessing of sudden death, providential rescue from great peril of +death, or circumstance of that kind; but to be effective and convincing +it needs to be marked and _fully justified_ in some such way; and no +cleverness in the writer will absolve him from deference to this great +law in serious work for presentation on the stage; if mere farces or +little comedies may seem sometimes to contravene it, yet this--even +this--is only in appearance. + +True, it is not the dramatists part _of himself_ to condemn, or to +approve, or praise: he has to present, and to present various characters +faithfully in their relation to each other, and their effect upon each +other. But the moral element cannot be expunged or set lightly aside +because it is closely involved in the very working out and presentation +of these relations, and the effect upon each other. Character is vital. +And character, if it tells in life, in influence and affection, must be +made to tell directly also in the drama. There is no escape from +this--none; the dramatist is lopsided if he tries to ignore it; he is a +monster if he is wholly blind to it--like the poet in _In Memoriam_, +"Without a conscience or an aim." Mr Henley, in his notorious, all too +confessional, and yet rather affected article on Stevenson in the _Pall +Mall Magazine_, has a remark which I confess astonished me--a remark I +could never forget as coming from him. He said that he "had lived a very +full and varied life, and had no interest in remarks about morals." +"Remarks about morals" are, nevertheless, in essence, the pith of all the +books to which he referred, as those to which he turned in preference to +the _Edinburgh Edition_ of R. L. Stevenson's works. The moral element is +implicit in the drama, and it is implicit there because it is implicit in +life itself, or so the great common-sense conceives it and demands it. +What we might call the asides proper of the drama, are "remarks about +morals," nothing else--the chorus in the Greek tragedy gathered up +"remarks about morals" as near as might be to the "remarks about morals" +in the streets of that day, only shaped to a certain artistic +consistency. Shakespeare is rich in "remarks about morals," often coming +near, indeed, to personal utterance, and this not only when Polonius +addresses his son before his going forth on his travels. Mr Henley here +only too plainly confessed, indeed, to lack of that conviction and +insight which, had he but possessed them, might have done a little to +relieve _Beau Austin_ and the other plays in which he collaborated with +R. L. Stevenson, from their besetting and fatal weakness. The two +youths, alas! thought they could be grandly original by despising, or +worse, contemning "remarks about morals" in the loftier as in the lower +sense. To "live a full and varied life," if the experience derived from +it is to have expression in the drama, is only to have the richer +resource in "remarks about morals." If this is perverted under any self- +conscious notion of doing something spick-and-span new in the way of +character and plot, alien to all the old conceptions, then we know our +writers set themselves boldly at loggerheads with certain old-fashioned +and yet older new-fashioned laws, which forbid the violation of certain +common demands of the ordinary nature and common-sense; and for the lack +of this, as said already, no cleverness, no resource, no style or graft, +will any way make up. So long as this is tried, with whatever +concentration of mind and purpose, failure is yet inevitable, and the +more inevitable the more concentration and less of humorous by-play, +because genius itself, if it despises the general moral sentiment and +instinct for moral proportion--an ethnic reward and punishment, so to +say--is all astray, working outside the line; and this, if Mr Pinero will +kindly excuse me, is the secret of the failure of these plays, and not +want of concentration, etc., in the sense he meant, or as he has put it. + +Stevenson rather affected what he called "tail-foremost morality," a kind +of inversion in the field of morals, as De Quincey mixed it up with tail- +foremost humour in _Murder as a Fine Art_, etc., etc., but for all such +perversions as these the stage is a grand test and corrector, and such +perversions, and not "remarks about morals," are most strictly prohibited +there. Perverted subtleties of the sort Stevenson in earlier times +especially much affected are not only amiss but ruinous on the stage; and +what genius itself would maybe sanction, common-sense must reject and +rigidly cut away. Final success and triumph come largely by _this_ kind +of condensation and concentration, and the stern and severe lopping off +of the indulgence of the _egotistical_ genius, which is human discipline, +and the best exponent of the doctrine of unity also. This is the +straight and the narrow way along which genius, if it walk but +faithfully, sows as it goes in the dramatic pathway all the flowers of +human passion, hope, love, terror, and triumph. + +I find it advisable, if not needful, here to reinforce my own +impressions, at some points, by another quotation from Mr Baildon, if he +will allow me, in which Stevenson's dependence in certain respects on the +dream-faculty is emphasised, and to it is traced a certain tendency to a +moral callousness or indifference which is one of the things in which the +waking Stevenson transparently suffered now and then invasions from the +dream-Stevenson--the result, a kind of spot, as we may call it, on the +eye of the moral sense; it is a small spot; but we know how a very small +object held close before the eye will wholly shut out the most lovely +natural prospects, interposing distressful phantasmagoria, due to the +strained and, for the time, morbid condition of the organ itself. So, it +must be confessed, it is to a great extent here. + +But listen to Mr Baildon: + +"In _A Chapter on Dreams_, Stevenson confesses his indebtedness to this +still mysterious agency. From a child he had been a great and vivid +dreamer, his dreams often taking such frightful shape that he used to +awake 'clinging in terror to the bedpost.' Later in life his dreams +continued to be frequent and vivid, but less terrifying in character and +more continuous and systematic. 'The Brownies,' as he picturesquely +names that 'sub-conscious imagination,' as the scientist would call it, +that works with such surprising freedom and ingenuity in our dreams, +became, as it were, _collaborateurs_ in his work of authorship. He +declares that they invented plots and even elaborated whole novels, and +that, not in a single night or single dream, but continuously, and from +one night to another, like a story in serial parts. Long before this +essay was written or published, I had been struck by this phantasmal +dream-like quality in some of Stevenson's works, which I was puzzled to +account for, until I read this extraordinary explanation, for explanation +it undoubtedly affords. Anything imagined in a dream would have a +tendency, when retold, to retain something of its dream-like character, +and I have on doubt one could trace in many instances and distinguish the +dreaming and the waking Stevenson, though in others they may be blended +beyond recognition. The trouble with the Brownies or the dream-Stevenson +_was his or their want of moral sense_, so that they sometimes presented +the waking author with plots which he could not make use of. Of this +Stevenson gives an instance in which a complete story of marked ingenuity +is vetoed through the moral impossibility of its presentment by a writer +so scrupulous (and in some directions he is extremely scrupulous) as +Stevenson was. But Stevenson admits that his most famous story, _The +Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_, was not only suggested by a +dream, but that some of the most important and most criticised points, +such as the matter of the powder, were taken direct from the dream. It +had been extremely instructive and interesting had he gone more into +detail and mentioned some of the other stories into which the +dream-element entered largely and pointed out its influence, and would +have given us a better clue than we have or now ever can have. + +"Even in _The Suicide Club_ and the _Rajah's Diamond_, I seem to feel +strongly the presence of the dream-Stevenson. . . . _At certain points +one feels conscious of a certain moral callousness_, _such as marks the +dream state_, _as in the murder of Colonel Geraldine's brother_, _the +horror of which never seems to come fully home to us_. But let no one +suppose these stories are lacking in vividness and in strangely realistic +detail; for this is of the very nature of dreaming at its height. . . . +While the _dramatis personae_ play their parts with the utmost spirit +while the story proceeds, they do not, as the past creations do, seem to +survive this first contact and live in our minds. This is particularly +true of the women. They are well drawn, and play the assigned parts well +enough, but they do not, as a rule, make a place for themselves either in +our hearts or memories. If there is an exception it is Elvira, in +_Providence and the Guitar_; but we remember her chiefly by the one +picture of her falling asleep, after the misadventures of the night, at +the supper-table, with her head on her husband's shoulder, and her hand +locked in his with instinctive, almost unconscious tenderness." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII--MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON AND OTHERS + + +From our point of view it will therefore be seen that we could not have +read Mr George Moore's wonderfully uncritical and misdirected diatribe +against Stevenson in _The Daily Chronicle_ of 24th April 1897, without +amusement, if not without laughter--indeed, we confess we may here quote +Shakespeare's words, we "laughed so consumedly" that, unless for Mr +Moore's high position and his assured self-confidence, we should not +trust ourselves to refer to it, not to speak of writing about it. It was +a review of _The Secret Rose_ by W. B. Yeats, but it passed after one +single touch to belittling abuse of Stevenson--an abuse that was +justified the more, in Mr Moore's idea, because Stevenson was dead. Had +he been alive he might have had something to say to it, in the way, at +least, of fable and moral. And when towards the close Mr Moore again +quotes from Mr Yeats, it is still "harping on my daughter" to undo +Stevenson, as though a rat was behind the arras, as in _Hamlet_. +"Stevenson," says he, "is the leader of these countless writers who +perceive nothing but the visible world," and these are antagonistic to +the great literature, of which Mr Yeats's _Secret Rose_ is a survival or +a renaissance, a literature whose watchword should be Mr Yeats's +significant phrase, "When one looks into the darkness there is always +something there." No doubt Mr Yeats's product all along the line ranks +with the great literature--unlike Homer, according to Mr Moore, he never +nods, though in the light of great literature, poor Stevenson is always +at his noddings, and more than that, in the words of Leland's Hans +Breitmann, he has "nodings on." He is poor, naked, miserable--a mere +pretender--and has no share in the makings of great literature. Mr Moore +has stripped him to the skin, and leaves him to the mercy of rain and +storm, like Lear, though Lear had a solid ground to go on in self-aid, +which Stevenson had not; he had daughters, and one of them was Cordelia, +after all. This comes of painting all boldly in black and white: Mr +Yeats is white, R. L. Stevenson is black, and I am sure neither one nor +other, because simply of their self-devotion to their art, could have +subscribed heartily to Mr Moore's black art and white art theory. Mr +Yeats is hardly the truest modern Celtic artist I take him for, if he can +fully subscribe to all this. + +Mr Marriott Watson has a little unadvisedly, in my view, too like +ambition, fallen on 'tother side, and celebrated Stevenson as the master +of the horrifying. {11} He even finds the _Ebb-Tide_, and Huish, the +cockney, in it richly illustrative and grand. "There never was a more +magnificent cad in literature, and never a more foul-hearted little +ruffian. His picture glitters (!) with life, and when he curls up on the +island beach with the bullet in his body, amid the flames of the vitriol +he had intended for another, the reader's shudder conveys something also, +even (!) of regret." + +And well it may! Individual taste and opinion are but individual taste +and opinion, but the _Ebb-Tide_ and the cockney I should be inclined to +cite as a specimen of Stevenson's all too facile make-believe, in which +there is too definite a machinery set agoing for horrors for the horrors +to be quite genuine. The process is often too forced with Stevenson, and +the incidents too much of the manufactured order, for the triumph of that +simplicity which is of inspiration and unassailable. Here Stevenson, +alas! all too often, _pace_ Mr Marriott Watson, treads on the skirts of +E. A. Poe, and that in his least composed and elevated artistic moments. +And though, it is true, that "genius will not follow rules laid down by +desultory critics," yet when it is averred that "this piece of work +fulfils Aristotle's definition of true tragedy, in accomplishing upon the +reader a certain purification of the emotions by means of terror and +pity," expectations will be raised in many of the new generation, doomed +in the cases of the more sensitive and discerning, at all events, not to +be gratified. There is a distinction, very bold and very essential, +between melodrama, however carefully worked and staged, and that tragedy +to which Aristotle was there referring. Stevenson's "horrifying," to my +mind, too often touches the trying borders of melodrama, and nowhere more +so than in the very forced and unequal _Ebb-Tide_, which, with its rather +doubtful moral and forced incident when it is good, seems merely to +borrow from what had gone before, if not a very little even from some of +what came after. No service is done to an author like Stevenson by +fatefully praising him for precisely the wrong thing. + + "Romance attracted Stevenson, at least during the earlier part of his + life, as a lodestone attracts the magnet. To romance he brought the + highest gifts, and he has left us not only essays of delicate humour" + (should this not be "essays _full of_" _or_ "characterised by"?) "and + sensitive imagination, but stories also which thrill with the + realities of life, which are faithful pictures of the times and + tempers he dealt with, and which, I firmly believe, will live so" + (should it not be "as"?) "long as our noble English language." + +Mr Marriott Watson sees very clearly in some things; but occasionally he +misses the point. The problem is here raised how two honest, far-seeing +critics could see so very differently on so simple a subject. + +Mr Baildon says about the _Ebb-Tide_: + + "I can compare his next book, the _Ebb-Tide_ (in collaboration with + Osbourne) to little better than a mud-bath, for we find ourselves, as + it were, unrelieved by dredging among the scum and dregs of humanity, + the 'white trash' of the Pacific. Here we have Stevenson's masterly + but utterly revolting incarnation of the lowest, vilest, vulgarest + villainy in the cockney, Huish. Stevenson's other villains shock us + by their cruel and wicked conduct; but there is a kind of fallen + satanic glory about them, some shining threads of possible virtue. + They might have been good, even great in goodness, but for the malady + of not wanting. But Huish is a creature hatched in slime, his soul + has no true humanity: it is squat and toad-like, and can only spit + venom. . . . He himself felt a sort of revulsive after-sickness for + the story, and calls it in one passage of his _Vailima Letters_ 'the + ever-to-be-execrated _Ebb-Tide_' (pp. 178 and 184). . . . He repented + of it like a debauch, and, as with some men after a debauch, felt + cleared and strengthened instead of wrecked. So, after what in one + sense was his lowest plunge, Stevenson rose to the greatest height. + That is the tribute to his virtue and strength indeed, but it does not + change the character of the _Ebb-Tide_ as 'the ever-to-be-execrated.'" + +Mr Baildon truly says (p. 49): + + "The curious point is that Stevenson's own great fault, that tendency + to what has been called the 'Twopence-coloured' style, is always at + its worst in books over which he collaborated." + +"Verax," in one of his "Occasional Papers" in the _Daily News_ on "The +Average Reader" has this passage: + + "We should not object to a writer who could repeat Barrie in _A Window + in Thrums_, nor to one who would paint a scene as Louis Stevenson + paints Attwater alone on his South Sea island, the approach of the + pirates to the harbour, and their subsequent reception and fate. All + these are surely specimens of brilliant writing, and they are + brilliant because, in the first place, they give truth. The events + described must, in the supposed circumstances, and with the given + characters, have happened in the way stated. Only in none of the + specimens have we a mere photograph of the outside of what took place. + We have great pictures by genius of the--to the prosaic eye--invisible + realities, as well as of the outward form of the actions. We behold + and are made to feel the solemnity, the wildness, the pathos, the + earnestness, the agony, the pity, the moral squalor, the grotesque + fun, the delicate and minute beauty, the natural loveliness and + loneliness, the quiet desperate bravery, or whatever else any of these + wonderful pictures disclose to our view. Had we been lookers-on, we, + the average readers, could not have seen these qualities for + ourselves. But they are there, and genius enables us to see them. + Genius makes truth shine. + + "Is it not, therefore, probable that the brilliancy which we average + readers do not want, and only laugh at when we get it, is something + altogether different? I think I know what it is. It is an attempt to + describe with words without thoughts, an effort to make readers see + something the writer has never seen himself in his mind's eye. He has + no revelation, no vision, nothing to disclose, and to produce an + impression uses words, words, words, makes daub, daub, daub, without + any definite purpose, and certainly without any real, or artistic, or + definite effect. To describe, one must first of all see, and if we + see anything the description of it will, as far as it is in us, come + as effortless and natural as the leaves on trees, or as 'the tender + greening of April meadows.' I, therefore, more than suspect that the + brilliancy which the average reader laughs at is not brilliancy. A + pot of flaming red paint thrown at a canvas does not make a picture." + +Now there is vision for outward picture or separate incident, which may +exist quite apart from what may be called moral, spiritual, or even +loftily imaginative conception, at once commanding unity and commanding +it. There can be no doubt of Stevenson's power in the former line--the +earliest as the latest of his works are witnesses to it. _The Master of +Ballantrae_ abounds in picture and incident and dramatic situations and +touches; but it lacks true unity, and the reason simply is given by +Stevenson himself--that the "ending shames, perhaps degrades, the +beginning," as it is in the _Ebb-Tide_, with the cockney Huish, +"execrable." "We have great pictures by genius of the--to the prosaic +eye--invisible realities, as well as the outward form of the action." +True, but the "invisible realities" form that from which true unity is +derived, else their partial presence but makes the whole the more +incomplete and lop-sided, if not indeed, top-heavy, from light weight +beneath; and it is in the unity derived from this higher pervading, yet +not too assertive "invisible reality," that Stevenson most often fails, +and is, in his own words, "execrable"; the ending shaming, if not +degrading, the beginning--"and without the true sense of pleasurableness; +and therefore really imperfect _in essence_." Ah, it is to be feared +that Stevenson, viewing it in retrospect, was a far truer critic of his +own work, than many or most of his all too effusive and admiring +critics--from Lord Rosebery to Mr Marriott Watson. + +Amid the too extreme deliverances of detractors and especially of +erewhile friends, become detractors or panegyrists, who disturb judgment +by overzeal, which is often but half-blindness, it is pleasant to come on +one who bears the balances in his hand, and will report faithfully as he +has seen and felt, neither more nor less than what he holds is true. Mr +Andrew Lang wrote an article in the _Morning Post_ of 16th December 1901, +under the title "Literary Quarrels," in which, as I think, he fulfilled +his part in midst of the talk about Mr Henley's regrettable attack on +Stevenson. + + "Without defending the character of a friend whom even now I almost + daily miss, as that character was displayed in circumstances unknown + to me, I think that I ought to speak of him as I found him. Perhaps + our sympathy was mainly intellectual. Constantly do those who knew + him desire to turn to him, to communicate with him, to share with him + the pleasure of some idea, some little discovery about men or things + in which he would have taken pleasure, increasing our own by the + gaiety of his enjoyment, the brilliance of his appreciation. We may + say, as Scott said at the grave of John Ballantyne, that he has taken + with him half the sunlight out of our lives. That he was sympathetic + and interested in the work of others (which I understand has been + denied) I have reason to know. His work and mine lay far apart: mine, + I think, we never discussed, I did not expect it to interest him. But + in a fragmentary manuscript of his after his death I found the + unlooked for and touching evidence of his kindness. Again, he once + wrote to me from Samoa about the work of a friend of mine whom he had + never met. His remarks were ideally judicious, a model of serviceable + criticism. I found him chivalrous as an honest boy; brave, with an + indomitable gaiety of courage; on the point of honour, a Sydney or a + Bayard (so he seemed to me); that he was open-handed I have reason to + believe; he took life 'with a frolic welcome.' That he was + self-conscious, and saw himself as it were, from without; that he was + fond of attitude (like his own brave admirals) he himself knew well, + and I doubt not that he would laugh at himself and his habit of + 'playing at' things after the fashion of childhood. Genius is the + survival into maturity of the inspiration of childhood, and Stevenson + is not the only genius who has retained from childhood something more + than its inspiration. Other examples readily occur to the memory--in + one way Byron, in another Tennyson. None of us is perfect: I do not + want to erect an immaculate clay-cold image of a man, in marble or in + sugar-candy. But I will say that I do not remember ever to have heard + Mr Stevenson utter a word against any mortal, friend or foe. Even in + a case where he had, or believed himself to have, received some wrong, + his comment was merely humorous. Especially when very young, his + dislike of respectability and of the _bourgeois_ (a literary + tradition) led him to show a kind of contempt for virtues which, + though certainly respectable, are no less certainly virtuous. He was + then more or less seduced by the Bohemian legend, but he was + intolerant of the fudge about the rights and privileges of genius. A + man's first business, he thought, was 'keep his end up' by his work. + If, what he reckoned his inspired work would not serve, then by + something else. Of many virtues he was an ensample and an inspiring + force. One foible I admit: the tendency to inopportune benevolence. + Mr Graham Balfour says that if he fell into ill terms with a man he + would try to do him good by stealth. Though he had seen much of the + world and of men, this practice showed an invincible ignorance of + mankind. It is improbable, on the doctrine of chances, that he was + always in the wrong; and it is probable, as he was human, that he + always thought himself in the right. But as the other party to the + misunderstanding, being also human, would necessarily think himself in + the right, such secret benefits would be, as Sophocles says, 'the + gifts of foeman and unprofitable.' The secret would leak out, the + benefits would be rejected, the misunderstanding would be embittered. + This reminds me of an anecdote which is not given in Mr Graham + Balfour's biography. As a little delicate, lonely boy in Edinburgh, + Mr Stevenson read a book called _Ministering Children_. I have a + faint recollection of this work concerning a small Lord and Lady + Bountiful. Children, we know, like to 'play at' the events and + characters they have read about, and the boy wanted to play at being a + ministering child. He 'scanned his whole horizon' for somebody to + play with, and thought he had found his playmate. From the window he + observed street boys (in Scots 'keelies') enjoying themselves. But + one child was out of the sports, a little lame fellow, the son of a + baker. Here was a chance! After some misgivings Louis hardened his + heart, put on his cap, walked out--a refined little figure--approached + the object of his sympathy, and said, 'Will you let me play with you?' + 'Go to hell!' said the democratic offspring of the baker. This lesson + against doing good by stealth to persons of unknown or hostile + disposition was, it seems, thrown away. Such endeavours are apt to be + misconstrued." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII--UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS + + +The complete artist should not be mystical-moralist any more than the man +who "perceives only the visible world"--he should not engage himself with +problems in the direct sense any more than he should blind himself to +their effect upon others, whom he should study, and under certain +conditions represent, though he should not commit himself to any form of +zealot faith, yet should he not be, as Lord Tennyson puts it in the +Palace of Art: + + "As God holding no form of creed, + But contemplating all," + +because his power lies in the broadness of his humanity touched to fine +issues whenever there is the seal at once of truth, reality, and passion, +and the tragedy bred of their contact and conflict. + +All these things are to him real and clamant in the measure that they aid +appeal to heart and emotion--in the measure that they may, in his hands, +be made to tell for sympathy and general effect. He creates an +atmosphere in which each and all may be seen the more effectively, but +never seen alone or separate, but only in strict relation to each other +that they may heighten the sense of some supreme controlling power in the +destinies of men, which with the ancients was figured as Fate, and for +which the moderns have hardly yet found an enduring and exhaustive name. +Character revealed in reference to that, is the ideal and the aim of all +high creative art. Stevenson's narrowness, allied to a quaint and +occasionally just a wee pedantic finickiness, as we may call it--an over- +elaborate, almost tricky play with mere words and phrases, was in so far +alien to the very highest--he was too often like a man magnetised and +moving at the dictates of some outside influence rather than according to +his own freewill and as he would. + +Action in creative literary art is a _sine qua non_; keeping all the +characters and parts in unison, that a true _denouement_, determined by +their own tendencies and temperaments, may appear; dialogue and all +asides, if we may call them so, being supererogatory and weak really +unless they aid this and are constantly contributory to it. Egotistical +predeterminations, however artfully intruded, are, alien to the full +result, the unity which is finally craved: Stevenson fails, when he does +fail, distinctly from excess of egotistic regards; he is, as Henley has +said, in the French sense, too _personnel_, and cannot escape from it. +And though these personal regards are exceedingly interesting and indeed +fascinating from the point of view of autobiographical study, they are, +and cannot but be, a drawback on fiction or the disinterested revelation +of life and reality. Instead, therefore, of "the visible world," as the +only thing seen, Stevenson's defect is, that between it and him lies a +cloud strictly self-projected, like breath on a mirror, which dims the +lines of reality and confuses the character marks, in fact melting them +into each other; and in his sympathetic regards, causing them all to +become too much alike. Scott had more of the power of healthy +self-withdrawal, creating more of a free atmosphere, in which his +characters could freely move--though in this, it must be confessed, he +failed far more with women than with men. The very defects poor Carlyle +found in Scott, and for which he dealt so severely with him, as sounding +no depth, are really the basis of his strength, precisely as the absence +of them were the defects of Goethe, who invariably ran his characters +finally into the mere moods of his own mind and the mould of his errant +philosophy, so that they became merely erratic symbols without hold in +the common sympathy. Whether _Walverwandschaften_, _Wilhelm Meister_, or +_Faust_, it is still the same--the company before all is done are +translated into misty shapes that he actually needs to label for our +identification and for his own. Even Mr G. H. Lewes saw this and could +not help declaring his own lack of interest in the latter parts of +Goethe's greatest efforts. Stevenson, too, tends to run his characters +into symbols--his moralist-fabulist determinations are too much for +him--he would translate them into a kind of chessmen, moved or moving on +a board. The essence of romance strictly is, that as the characters will +not submit themselves to the check of reality, the romancer may +consciously, if it suits him, touch them at any point with the magic wand +of symbol, and if he finds a consistency in mere fanciful invention it is +enough. Tieck's _Phantasus_ and George MacDonald's _Phantastes_ are +ready instances illustrative of this. But it is very different with the +story of real life, where there is a definite check in the common-sense +and knowledge of the reader, and where the highest victory always lies in +drawing from the reader the admission--"that is life--life exactly as I +have seen and known it. Though I could never have put it so, still it +only realises my own conception and observation. That is something +lovingly remembered and re-presented, and this master makes me lovingly +remember too, though 'twas his to represent and reproduce with such +vigor, vividness and truth that he carried me with him, exactly as though +I had been looking on real men and women playing their part or their game +in the great world." + +Mr Zangwill, in his own style, wrote: + + "He seeks to combine the novel of character with the novel of + adventure; to develop character through romantic action, and to bring + out your hero at the end of the episode, not the fixed character he + was at the beginning, as is the way of adventure books, but a modified + creature. . . . It is his essays and his personality, rather than his + novels, that will count with posterity. On the whole, a great + provincial writer. Whether he has that inherent grip which makes a + man's provinciality the very source of his strength . . . only the + centuries can show. + +The romanticist to the end pursued Stevenson--he could not, wholly or at +once, shake off the bonds in which he had bound himself to his first +love, and it was the romanticist crossed by the casuist, and the +mystic--Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Markheim and Will of the Mill, insisted on +his acknowledging them in his work up to the end. _The modified +creature_ at the end of Mr Zangwill was modified too directly by the +egotistic element as well as through the romantic action, and this point +missed the great defect was missed, and Mr Zangwill spoke only in +generals. + +M. Schwob, after having related how unreal a real sheep's heart looked +when introduced on the end of Giovanni's dagger in a French performance +of John Ford's _Annabella and Giovanni_, and how at the next performance +the audience was duly thrilled when Annabella's bleeding heart, made of a +bit of red flannel, was borne upon the stage, goes on to say +significantly: + + "Il me semble que les personnages de Stevenson ont justement cette + espece de realisme irreal. La large figure luisante de Long John, la + couleur bleme du crane de Thevenin Pensete s'attachent a la memoire de + nos yeux en vertue de leur irrealite meme. Ce sont des fantomes de la + verite, hallucinants comme de vrais fantomes. Notez en passant que + les traits de John Silver hallucinent Jim Hawkins, et que Francois + Villon est hante par l'aspect de Thevenin Pensete." + +Perhaps the most notable fact arising here, and one that well deserves +celebration, is this, that Stevenson's development towards a broader and +more natural creation was coincident with a definite return on the +religious views which had so powerfully prevailed with his father--a +circumstance which it is to be feared did not, any more than some other +changes in him, at all commend itself to Mr Henley, though he had +deliberately dubbed him even in the times of nursing nigh to the Old +Bristo Port in Edinburgh--something of "Shorter Catechist." Anyway Miss +Simpson deliberately wrote: + + "Mr Henley takes exception to Stevenson's later phase in life--what he + calls his 'Shorter Catechism phase.' It should be remembered that Mr + Henley is not a Scotsman, and in some things has little sympathy with + Scotch characteristics. Stevenson, in his Samoan days, harked back to + the teaching of his youth; the tenets of the Shorter Catechism, which + his mother and nurse had dinned into his head, were not forgotten. Mr + Henley knew him best, as Stevenson says in the preface to _Virginibus + Puerisque_ dedicated to Henley, 'when he lived his life at + twenty-five.' In these days he had [in some degree] forgotten about + the Shorter Catechism, but the 'solemn pause' between Saturday and + Monday came back in full force to R. L. Stevenson in Samoa." + +Now to me that is a most suggestive and significant fact. It will be the +business of future critics to show in how far such falling back would of +necessity modify what Mr Baildon has set down as his corner-stone of +morality, and how far it was bound to modify the atmosphere--the purely +egotistic, hedonistic, and artistic atmosphere, in which, in his earlier +life as a novelist, at all events, he had been, on the whole, for long +whiles content to work. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX--LOVE OF VAGABONDS + + +What is very remarkable in Stevenson is that a man who was so much the +dreamer of dreams--the mystic moralist, the constant questioner and +speculator on human destiny and human perversity, and the riddles that +arise on the search for the threads of motive and incentives to human +action--moreover, a man, who constantly suffered from one of the most +trying and weakening forms of ill-health--should have been so +full-blooded, as it were, so keen for contact with all forms of human +life and character, what is called the rougher and coarser being by no +means excluded. Not only this: he was himself a rover--seeking daily +adventure and contact with men and women of alien habit and taste and +liking. His patience is supported by his humour. He was a bit of a +vagabond in the good sense of the word, and always going round in search +of "honest men," like Diogenes, and with no tub to retire into or the +desire for it. He thus on this side touches the Chaucers and their +kindred, as well as the Spensers and Dantes and their often illusive +_confreres_. His voyage as a steerage passenger across the Atlantic is +only one out of a whole chapter of such episodes, and is more significant +and characteristic even than the _Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes_ +or the _Inland Voyage_. These might be ranked with the "Sentimental +Journeys" that have sometimes been the fashion--that was truly of a +prosaic and risky order. The appeal thus made to an element deep in the +English nature will do much to keep his memory green in the hearts that +could not rise to appreciation of his style and literary gifts at all. He +loves the roadways and the by-ways, and those to be met with there--like +him in this, though unlike him in most else. The love of the roadsides +and the greenwood--and the queer miscellany of life there unfolded and +ever changing--a kind of gipsy-like longing for the tent and familiar +contact with nature and rude human-nature in the open dates from beyond +Chaucer, and remains and will have gratification--the longing for novelty +and all the accidents, as it were, of pilgrimage and rude social travel. +You see it bubble up, like a true and new nature-spring, through all the +surface coatings of culture and artificiality, in Stevenson. He anew, +without pretence, enlivens it--makes it first a part of himself, and then +a part of literature once more. Listen to him, as he sincerely sings +this passion for the pilgrimage--or the modern phase of it--innocent +vagabond roving: + + "Give to me the life I love, + Let the lave go by me; + Give the jolly heaven above, + And the by-way nigh me: + Bed in the bush, with stars to see; + Bread I dip in the river-- + Here's the life for a man like me, + Here's the life for ever. . . . + + "Let the blow fall soon or late; + Let what will be o'er me; + Give the face of earth around + And the road before me. + Health I ask not, hope nor love, + Nor a friend to know me: + All I ask the heaven above, + And the road below me." + +True; this is put in the mouth of another, but Stevenson could not have +so voiced it, had he not been the born rover that he was, with longing +for the roadside, the high hills, and forests and newcomers and varied +miscellaneous company. Here he does more directly speak in his own +person and quite to the same effect: + + "I will make you brooches and toys for your delight + Of bird song at morning, and star shine at night, + I will make a palace fit for you and me, + Of green days in forests and blue days at sea. + + "I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your room, + Where white flows the river, and bright blows the broom, + And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white, + In rainfall at morning and dew-fall at night. + + "And this shall be for music when no one else is near, + The fine song for singing, the rare song to hear! + That only I remember, that only you admire, + Of the broad road that stretches, and the roadside fire." + +Here Stevenson, though original in his vein and way, but follows a great +and gracious company in which Fielding and Sterne and so many others +stand as pleasant proctors. Scott and Dickens have each in their way +essayed it, and made much of it beyond what mere sentiment would have +reached. _Pickwick_ itself--and we must always regard Dickens as having +himself gone already over every bit of road, described every nook and +corner, and tried every resource--is a vagrant fellow, in a group of +erratic and most quaint wanderers or pilgrims. This is but a return +phase of it; Vincent Crummles and Mrs Crummles and the "Infant +Phenomenon," yet another. The whole interest lies in the roadways, and +the little inns, and the odd and unexpected _rencontres_ with +oddly-assorted fellows there experienced: glimpses of grim or grimy, or +forbidding, or happy, smiling smirking vagrants, and out-at-elbows fellow- +passengers and guests, with jests and quips and cranks, and hanky-panky +even. On high roads and in inns, and alehouses, with travelling players, +rogues and tramps, Dickens was quite at home; and what is yet more, he +made us all quite at home with them: and he did it as Chaucer did it by +thorough good spirits and "hail-fellow-well-met." And, with all his +faults, he has this merit as well as some others, that he went willingly +on pilgrimage always, and took others, promoting always love of comrades, +fun, and humorous by-play. The latest great romancer, too, took his +side: like Dickens, he was here full brother of Dan Chaucer, and followed +him. How characteristic it is when he tells Mr Trigg that he preferred +Samoa to Honolulu because it was more savage, and therefore yielded more +_fun_. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX--LORD ROSEBERY'S CASE + + +Immediately on reading Lord Rosebery's address as Chairman of the meeting +in Edinburgh to promote the erection of a monument to R. L. Stevenson, I +wrote to him politely asking him whether, since he quoted a passage from +a somewhat early essay by Stevenson naming the authors who had chiefly +influenced him in point of style, his Lordship should not, merely in +justice and for the sake of balance, have referred to Thoreau. I also +remarked that Stevenson's later style sometimes showed too much +self-conscious conflict of his various models in his mind while he was in +the act of writing, and that this now and then imparted too much an air +of artifice to his later compositions, and that those who knew most would +be most troubled by it. Of that letter, I much regret now that I did not +keep any copy; but I think I did incidentally refer to the friendship +with which Stevenson had for so many years honoured me. This is a copy +of the letter received in reply: + + "38 BERKELEY SQUARE, W., + 17_th_ _December_ 1896. + + "DEAR SIR,--I am much obliged for your letter, and can only state that + the name of Thoreau was not mentioned by Stevenson himself, and + therefore I could not cite it in my quotation. + + "With regard to the style of Stevenson's later works, I am inclined to + agree with you.-Believe me, yours very faithfully, + + ROSEBERY. + + "Dr ALEXANDER H. JAPP." + +This I at once replied to as follows: + + "NATIONAL LIBERAL CLUB, + WHITEHALL PLACE, S.W., + 19_th_ _December_ 1896. + + "MY LORD,--It is true R. L. Stevenson did not refer to Thoreau in the + passage to which you allude, for the good reason that he could not, + since he did not know Thoreau till after it was written; but if you + will oblige me and be so good as to turn to p. xix. of Preface, _By + Way of Criticism_, to _Familiar Studies of Men and Books_ you will + read: + + "'Upon me this pure, narrow, sunnily-ascetic Thoreau had exercised a + wondrous charm. _I have scarce written ten sentences since I was + introduced to him_, _but his influence might be somewhere detected by + a close observer_.' + + "It is very detectable in many passages of nature-description and of + reflection. I write, my Lord, merely that, in case opportunity should + arise, you might notice this fact. I am sure R. L. Stevenson would + have liked it recognised.--I remain, my Lord, always yours faithfully, + etc., + + ALEXANDER H. JAPP." + +{Manuscript letter by R.L.S.: p262.jpg} + +In reply to this Lord Rosebery sent me only the most formal +acknowledgment, not in the least encouraging me in any way to further aid +him in the matter with regard to suggestions of any kind; so that I was +helpless to press on his lordship the need for some corrections on other +points which I would most willingly have tendered to him had he shown +himself inclined or ready to receive them. + +I might also have referred Lord Rosebery to the article in _The British +Weekly_ (_1887_), "Books that have Influenced Me," where, after having +spoken of Shakespeare, the _Vicomte de Bragelonne_, Bunyan, Montaigne, +Goethe, Martial, Marcus Aurelius's _Meditations_, and Wordsworth, he +proceeds: + + "I suppose, when I am done, I shall find that I have forgotten much + that is influential, as I see already I have forgotten Thoreau." + +I need but to add to what has been said already that, had Lord Rosebery +written and told me the result of his references and encouraged me to +such an exercise, I should by-and-by have been very pleased to point out +to him that he blundered, proving himself no master in Burns' literature, +precisely as Mr Henley blundered about Burns' ancestry, when he gives +confirmation to the idea that Burns came of a race of peasants on both +sides, and was himself nothing but a peasant. + +When the opportunity came to correct such blunders, corrections which I +had even implored him to make, Lord Rosebery (who by several London +papers had been spoken of as "knowing more than all the experts about all +his themes"), that is, when his volume was being prepared for press, did +not act on my good advice given him "_free_, _gratis_, _for nothing_"; +no; he contented himself with simply slicing out columns from the +_Times_, or allowing another man to do so for him, and reprinting them +_literatim et verbatim_, all imperfect and misleading, as they stood. +_Scripta manet_ alas! only too truly exemplified to his disadvantage. But +with that note of mine in his hand, protesting against an ominous and +fatal omission as regards the confessed influences that had operated on +Stevenson, he goes on, or allows Mr Geake to go on, quite as though he +had verified matters and found that I was wrong as regards the facts on +which I based my appeal to him for recognition of Thoreau as having +influenced Stevenson in style. Had he attended to correcting his serious +errors about Stevenson, and some at least of those about Burns, thus +adding, say, a dozen or twenty pages to his book wholly fresh and new and +accurate, then the _Times_ could not have got, even if it had sought, an +injunction against his publishers and him; and there would have been no +necessity that he should pad out other and later speeches by just a +little whining over what was entirely due to his own disregard of good +advice, his own neglect--his own fault--a neglect and a fault showing +determination not to revise where revision in justice to his subject's +own free and frank acknowledgments made it most essential and necessary. + +Mr Justice North gave his decision against Lord Rosebery and his +publishers, while the Lords of Appeal went in his favour; but the House +of Lords reaffirmed the decision of Mr Justice North and granted a +perpetual injunction against this book. The copyright in his speech is +Lord Rosebery's, but the copyright in the _Times_' report is the +_Times_'. You see one of the ideas underlying the law is that no manner +of speech is quite perfect as the man speaks it, or is beyond revision, +improvement, or extension, and, if there is but one _verbatim_ report, as +was the case of some of these speeches and addresses, then it is +incumbent on the author, if he wishes to preserve his copyright, to +revise and correct his speeches and addresses, so as to make them at +least in details so far differ from the reported form. This thing ought +Lord Rosebery to have done, on ethical and literary _grounds_, not to +speak of legal and self-interested grounds; and I, for one, who from the +first held exactly the view the House of Lords has affirmed, do confess +that I have no sympathy for Lord Rosebery, since he had before him the +suggestion and the materials for as substantial alterations and additions +from my own hands, with as much more for other portions of his book, had +he informed me of his appreciation, as would have saved him and his book +from such a sadly ironical fate as has overtaken him and it. + +From the whole business--since "free, gratis, for nothing," I offered him +as good advice as any lawyer in the three kingdoms could have done for +large payment, and since he never deemed it worth while, even to tell me +the results of his reference to _Familiar Studies_, I here and now say +deliberately that his conduct to me was scarcely so courteous and +grateful and graceful as it might have been. How different--very +different--the way in which the late R. L. Stevenson rewarded me for a +literary service no whit greater or more essentially valuable to him than +this service rendered to Lord Rosebery might have been to him. + +This chapter would most probably not have been printed, had not Mr Coates +re-issued the inadequate and most misleading paragraph about Mr Stevenson +and style in his Lord Rosebery's _Life and Speeches_ exactly as it was +before, thus perpetuating at once the error and the wrong, in spite of +all my trouble, warnings, and protests. It is a tragicomedy, if not a +farce altogether, considering who are the principal actors in it. And +let those who have copies of the queer prohibited book cherish them and +thank me; for that I do by this give a new interest and value to it as a +curiosity, law-inhibited, if not as high and conscientious +literature--which it is not. + +I remember very well about the time Lord Rosebery spoke on Burns, and +Stevenson, and London, that certain London papers spoke of his +deliverances as indicating more knowledge--fuller and exacter +knowledge--of all these subjects than the greatest professed experts +possessed. That is their extravagant and most reckless way, especially +if the person spoken about is a "great politician" or a man of rank. They +think they are safe with such superlatives applied to a brilliant and +clever peer (with large estates and many interests), and an ex-Prime +Minister! But literature is a republic, and it must here be said, though +all unwillingly, that Lord Rosebery is but an amateur--a superficial +though a clever amateur after all, and their extravagances do not change +the fact. I declare him an amateur in Burns' literature and study +because of what I have said elsewhere, and there are many points to add +to that if need were. I have proved above from his own words that he was +crassly and unpardonably ignorant of some of the most important points in +R. L. Stevenson's development when he delivered that address in Edinburgh +on Stevenson--a thing very, very pardonable--seeing that he is run after +to do "speakings" of this sort; but to go on, in face of such warning and +protest, printing his most misleading errors is not pardonable, and the +legal recorded result is my justification and his condemnation, the more +surely that even that would not awaken him so far as to cause him to +restrain Mr Coates from reproducing in his _Life and Speeches_, just as +it was originally, that peccant passage. I am fully ready to prove also +that, though Chairman of the London County Council for a period, and +though he made a very clever address at one of Sir W. Besant's lectures, +there is much yet--very much--he might learn from Sir W. Besant's +writings on London. It isn't so easy to outshine all the experts--even +for a clever peer who has been Prime Minister, though it is very, very +easy to flatter Lord Rosebery, with a purpose or purposes, as did at +least once also with rarest tact, at Glasgow, indicating so many other +things and possibilities, a certain very courtly ex-Moderator of the +Church of Scotland. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI--MR GOSSE AND MS. OF _TREASURE ISLAND_ + + +Mr Edmund Gosse has been so good as to set down, with rather an air of +too much authority, that both R. L. Stevenson and I deceived ourselves +completely in the matter of my little share in the _Treasure Island_ +business, and that too much credit was sought by me or given to me, for +the little service I rendered to R. L. Stevenson, and to the world, say, +in helping to secure for it an element of pleasure through many +generations. I have not _sought_ any recognition from the world in this +matter, and even the mention of it became so intolerable to me that I +eschewed all writing about it, in the face of the most stupid and +misleading statements, till Mr Sidney Colvin wrote and asked me to set +down my account of the matter in my own words. This I did, as it would +have been really rude to refuse a request so graciously made, and the +reader has it in the _Academy_ of 10th March 1900. Nevertheless, Mr +Gosse's statements were revived and quoted, and the thing seemed ever to +revolve again in a round of controversy. + +Now, with regard to the reliability in this matter of Mr Edmund Gosse, +let me copy here a little note made at request some time ago, dealing +with two points. The first is this: + +1. _Most assuredly_ I carried away from Braemar in my portmanteau, as R. +L. Stevenson says in _Idler's_ article and in chapter of _My First Book_ +reprinted in _Edinburgh Edition_, several chapters of _Treasure Island_. +On that point R. L. Stevenson, myself, and Mr James Henderson, to whom I +took these, could not all be wrong and co-operating to mislead the +public. These chapters, at least vii. or viii., as Mr Henderson +remembers, would include the _first three_, that is, _finally revised +versions for press_. Mr Gosse could not then _have heard R. L. Stevenson +read from these final versions but from first draughts_ ONLY, and I am +positively certain that with some of the later chapters R. L. Stevenson +wrote them off-hand, and with great ease, and did not revise them to the +extent of at all needing to re-write them, as I remember he was proud to +tell me, being then fully in the vein, as he put it, and pleased to +credit me with a share in this good result, and saying "my enthusiasm +over it had set him up steep." There was then, in my idea, a necessity +that Stevenson should fill up a gap by verbal summary to Mr Gosse (which +Mr Gosse has forgotten), bringing the incident up to a further point than +Mr Gosse now thinks. I am certain of my facts under this head; and as Mr +Gosse clearly fancies he heard R. L. Stevenson read all from final +versions and is mistaken--_completely_ mistaken there--he may be just as +wrong and the victim of error or bad memory elsewhere after the lapse of +more than twenty years. + +2. I gave the pencilled outline of incident and plot to Mr Henderson--a +fact he distinctly remembers. This fact completely meets and disposes of +Mr Robert Leighton's quite imaginative _Billy Bo'sun_ notion, and is +absolute as to R. L. Stevenson before he left Braemar on the 21st +September 1881, or even before I left it on 26th August 1881, having +clear in his mind the whole scheme of the work, though we know very well +that the absolute re-writing out finally for press of the concluding part +of the book was done at Davos. Mr Henderson has always made it the +strictest rule in his editorship that the complete outline of the plot +and incident of the latter part of a story must be supplied to him, if +the whole story is not submitted to him in MS.; and the agreement, if I +am not much mistaken, was entered into days before R. L. Stevenson left +Braemar, and when he came up to London some short time after to go to +Weybridge, the only arrangement then needed to be made was about the +forwarding of proofs to him. + +The publication of _Treasure Island_ in _Young Folks_ began on the 1st +October 1881, No. 565 and ran on in the following order: + + _October_ 1, 1881. + THE PROLOGUE + + No. 565. + I. The Old Sea Dog at the Admiral Benbow. + II. Black Dog Appears and Disappears. + + No. 566. + Dated _October_ 8, 1881. + III. The Black Spot. + + No. 567. + Dated _October_ 15, 1881. + IV. The Sea Chart. + V. The Last of the Blind Man. + VI. The Captain's Papers. + + No. 568. + Dated _October_ 22, 1881. + THE STORY + I. I go to Bristol. + II. The Sea-Cook. + Ill. Powder and Arms. + +Now, as the numbers of _Young Folks_ were printed about a fortnight in +advance of the date they bear under the title, it is clear that not only +must the contract have been executed days before the middle of September, +but that a large proportion of the _copy_ must have been in Mr +Henderson's hands at that date too, as he must have been entirely +satisfied that the story would go on and be finished in a definite time. +On no other terms would he have begun the publication of it. He was not +in the least likely to have accepted a story from a man who, though known +as an essayist, had not yet published anything in the way of a long +story, on the ground merely of three chapters of prologue. Mr Gosse left +Braemar on 5th September, when he says nine chapters were written, and Mr +Henderson had offered terms for the story before the last of these could +have reached him. That is on seeing, say six chapters of prologue. But +when Mr Gosse speaks about three chapters only written, does he mean +three of the prologue or three of the story, in addition to prologue, or +what does he mean? The facts are clear. I took away in my portmanteau a +large portion of the MS., together with a very full outline of the rest +of the story, so that Mr Stevenson was, despite Mr Gosse's cavillings, +_substantially_ right when he wrote in _My First Book_ in the _Idler_, +etc., that "when he (Dr Japp) left us he carried away the manuscript in +his portmanteau." There was nothing of the nature of an abandonment of +the story at any point, nor any difficulty whatever arose in this respect +in regard to it. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII--STEVENSON PORTRAITS + + +Of the portraits of Stevenson a word or two may be said. There is a very +good early photograph of him, taken not very long before the date of my +visit to him at Braemar in 1881, and is an admirable +likeness--characteristic not only in expression, but in pose and +attitude, for it fixes him in a favourite position of his; and is, at the +same time, very easy and natural. The velvet jacket, as I have remarked, +was then his habitual wear, and the thin fingers holding the constant +cigarette an inseparable associate and accompaniment. + +He acknowledged himself that he was a difficult subject to paint--not at +all a good sitter--impatient and apt to rebel at posing and time spent in +arrangement of details--a fact he has himself, as we shall see, set on +record in his funny verses to Count Nerli, who painted as successful a +portrait as any. The little miniature, full-length, by Mr J. S. Sarjent, +A.R.A., which was painted at Bournemouth in 1885, is confessedly a mere +sketch and much of a caricature: it is in America. Sir W. B. Richmond +has an unfinished portrait, painted in 1885 or 1886--it has never passed +out of the hands of the artist,--a photogravure from it is our +frontispiece. + +There is a medallion done by St Gauden's, representing Stevenson in bed +propped up by pillows. It is thought to be a pretty good likeness, and +it is now in Mr Sidney Colvin's possession. Others, drawings, etc., are +not of much account. + +And now we come to the Nerli portrait, of which so much has been written. +Stevenson himself regarded it as the best portrait of him ever painted, +and certainly it also is characteristic and effective, and though not +what may be called a pleasant likeness, is probably a good representation +of him in the later years of his life. Count Nerli actually undertook a +voyage to Samoa in 1892, mainly with the idea of painting this portrait. +He and Stevenson became great friends, as Stevenson naively tells in the +verses we have already referred to, but even this did not quite overcome +Stevenson's restlessness. He avenged himself by composing these verses +as he sat: + + Did ever mortal man hear tell o' sic a ticklin' ferlie + As the comin' on to Apia here o' the painter Mr Nerli? + He cam'; and, O, for o' human freen's o' a' he was the pearlie-- + The pearl o' a' the painter folk was surely Mr Nerli. + He took a thraw to paint mysel'; he painted late and early; + O wow! the many a yawn I've yawned i' the beard o' Mr Nerli. + Whiles I wad sleep and whiles wad wake, an' whiles was mair than + surly; + I wondered sair as I sat there fornent the eyes o' Nerli. + O will he paint me the way I want, as bonnie as a girlie? + O will he paint me an ugly tyke?--and be d-d to Mr Nerli. + But still an' on whichever it be, he is a canty kerlie, + The Lord protect the back an' neck o' honest Mr Nerli. + +Mr Hammerton gives this account of the Nerli portrait: + + "The history of the Nerli portrait is peculiar. After being exhibited + for some time in New Zealand it was bought, in the course of this + year, by a lady who was travelling there, for a hundred guineas. She + then offered it for that sum to the Scottish National Portrait + Gallery; but the Trustees of the Board of Manufactures--that oddly + named body to which is entrusted the fostering care of Art in + Scotland, and, in consequence, the superintendence of the National + Portrait Gallery--did not see their way to accept the offer. Some + surprise has been expressed at the action of the Trustees in thus + declining to avail themselves of the opportunity of obtaining the + portrait of one of the most distinguished Scotsmen of recent times. It + can hardly have been for want of money, for though the funds at their + disposal for the purchase of ordinary works of art are but limited, no + longer ago than last year they were the recipients of a very handsome + legacy from the late Mr J. M. Gray, the accomplished and much lamented + Curator of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery--a legacy left them + for the express purpose of acquiring portraits of distinguished + Scotsmen, and the income of which was amply sufficient to have enabled + them to purchase this portrait. One is therefore almost shut up to + the conclusion that the Trustees were influenced in their decision by + one of the two following reasons: + + "1. That they did not consider Stevenson worthy of a place in the + gallery. This is a position so incomprehensible and so utterly + opposed to public sentiment that one can hardly credit it having been + the cause of this refusal. Whatever may be the place which Stevenson + may ultimately take as an author, and however opinions may differ as + to the merits of his work, no one can deny that he was one of the most + popular writers of his day, and that as a mere master of style, if for + nothing else, his works will be read so long as there are students of + English Literature. Surely the portrait of one for whom such a claim + may legitimately be made cannot be considered altogether unworthy of a + place in the National Collection, as one of Scotland's most + distinguished sons. + + "2. The only other reason which can be suggested as having weighed + with the Trustees in their decision is one which in some cases might + be held to be worthy of consideration. It is conceivable that in the + case of some men the Trustees might be of opinion that there was + plenty of time to consider the matter, and that in the meantime there + was always the chance of some generous donor presenting them with a + portrait. But, as has been shown above, the portraits of Stevenson + are practically confined to two: one of these is in America, and there + is not the least chance of its ever coming here; and the other they + have refused. And, as it is understood that the Trustees have a rule + that they do not accept any portrait which has not been painted from + the life, they preclude themselves from acquiring a copy of any + existing picture or even a portrait done from memory. + + "It is rumoured that the Nerli portrait may ultimately find a resting- + place in the National Collection of Portraits in London. If this + should prove to be the case, what a commentary on the old saying: 'A + prophet is not without honour save in his own country.'" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII--LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM + + +Nothing could perhaps be more wearisome than to travel o'er the wide +sandy area of Stevenson criticism and commentary, and expose the many and +sad and grotesque errors that meet one there. Mr Baildon's slip is +innocent, compared with many when he says (p. 106) _Treasure Island_ +appeared in _Young Folks_ as _The Sea-Cook_. It did nothing of the kind; +it is on plain record in print, even in the pages of the _Edinburgh +Edition_, that Mr James Henderson would not have the title _The +Sea-Cook_, as he did not like it, and insisted on its being _Treasure +Island_. To him, therefore, the vastly better title is due. Mr Henley +was in doubt if Mr Henderson was still alive when he wrote the brilliant +and elevated article on "Some Novels" in the _North American_, and as a +certain dark bird killed Cock Robin, so he killed off Dr Japp, and not to +be outdone, got in an ideal "Colonel" _Jack_; so Mr Baildon there follows +Henley, unaware that Mr Henderson did not like _The Sea-Cook_, and was +still alive, and that a certain Jack in the fatal _North American_ has +Japp's credit. + +Mr Baildon's words are: + + "This was the famous book of adventure, _Treasure Island_, appearing + first as _The Sea-Cook_ in a boy's paper, where it made no great stir. + But, on its publication in volume form, with the vastly better title, + the book at once 'boomed,' as the phrase goes, to an extent then, in + 1882, almost unprecedented. The secret of its immense success may + almost be expressed in a phrase by saying that it is a book like + _Gulliver's Travels_, _The Pilgrim's Progress_, and _Robinson Crusoe_ + itself for all ages--boys, men, and women." + +Which just shows how far lapse as to a fact may lead to critical +misreadings also. + +Mr Hammerton sometimes lets good folks say in his pages, without +correction, what is certainly not correct. Thus at one place we are told +that Stevenson was only known as Louis in print, whereas that was the +only name by which he was known in his own family. Then Mr Gosse, at p. +34, is allowed to write: + + "Professor Blackie was among them on the steamer from the Hebrides, a + famous figure that calls for no description, and a voluble shaggy man, + clad in homespun, with spectacles forward upon his nose, who it was + whispered to us, was Mr Sam Bough, the Scottish Academician, _a water- + colour painter of some repute_, who was to die in 1878." + +Mr Sam Bough _was_ "a water-colour painter of some repute," but a painter +in oils of yet greater repute--a man of rare strength, resource, and +facility--never, perhaps, wholly escaping from some traces of his early +experiences in scene-painting, but a true genius in his art. Ah, well I +remember him, though an older man, yet youthful in the band of young +Scotch artists among whom as a youngster I was privileged to move in +Edinburgh--Pettie, Chalmers, M'Whirter, Peter Graham, MacTaggart, +MacDonald, John Burr, and Bough. Bough could be voluble on art; and many +a talk I had with him as with the others named, especially with John +Burr. Bough and he both could talk as well as paint, and talk right +well. Bough had a slight cast in the eye; when he got a _wee_ excited on +his subject he would come close to you with head shaking, and spectacles +displaced, and forelock wagging, and the cast would seem to die away. Was +this a fact, or was it an illusion on my part? I have often asked myself +that question, and now I ask it of others. Can any of my good friends in +Edinburgh say; can Mr Caw help me here, either to confirm or to correct +me? I venture to insert here an anecdote, with which my friend of old +days, Mr Wm. MacTaggart, R.S.A., in a letter kindly favours me: + + "Sam Bough was a very sociable man; and, when on a sketching tour, + liked to have a young artist or two with him. Jack Nisbett played the + violin, and Sam the 'cello, etc. Jack was fond of telling that Sam + used to let them all choose the best views, and then he would take + what was left; and Jack, with mild astonishment, would say, that 'it + generally turned out to be the best--on the canvas!'" + +In Mr Hammerton's copy of the verses in reply to Mr Crockett's dedication +of _The Stickit Minister_ to Stevenson, in which occurred the fine phrase +"The grey Galloway lands, where about the graves of the martyrs the +whaups are crying, his heart remembers how": + + "Blows the wind to-day and the sun and the rain are flying: + Blows the wind on the moors to-day and now, + Where about the graves of the martyrs the whaups are crying, + My heart remembers how. + + "Grey recumbent tombs of the dead in desert places, + Standing stones on the vacant wine-red moor, + Hills of sheep, and the _homes_ of the silent vanished races, + And winds austere and pure. + + "Be it granted me to behold you again in dying, + Hills of home! and to hear again the call-- + Hear about the graves of the martyrs the pee-weet crying, + And hear no more at all." + +Mr Hammerton prints _howes_ instead of _homes_, which I have italicised +above. And I may note, though it does not affect the poetry, if it does +a little affect the natural history, that the _pee-weets_ and the whaups +are not the same--the one is the curlew, and the other is the lapwing--the +one most frequenting wild, heathery or peaty moorland, and the other +pasture or even ploughed land--so that it is a great pity for unity and +simplicity alike that Stevenson did not repeat the "whaup," but wrote +rather as though pee-weet or pee-weets were the same as whaups--the +common call of the one is _Ker-lee_, _ker-lee_, and of the other _pee- +weet_, _pee-weet_, hence its common name. + +It is a pity, too, that Mr Hammerton has no records of some portions of +the life at Davos Platz. Not only was Stevenson ill there in April 1892, +but his wife collapsed, and the tender concern for her made havoc with +some details of his literary work. It is good to know this. Such errata +or omissions throw a finer light on his character than controlling +perfection would do. Ah, I remember how my old friend W. B. Rands +("Matthew Browne" and "Henry Holbeach") was wont to declare that were men +perfect they would be isolated, if not idiotic, that we are united to +each other by our defects--that even physical beauty would be dead like +later Greek statues, were these not departures from the perfect lines. +The letter given by me at p. 28 transfigures in its light, some of his +work at that time. + +And then what an opportunity, we deeply regret to say, Mr Hammerton +wholly missed, when he passed over without due explanation or commentary +that most significant pamphlet--the _Address to the Scottish Clergy_. If +Mr Hammerton had but duly and closely studied that and its bearings and +suggestions in many directions, then he would have written such a chapter +for true enlightenment and for interest as exactly his book--attractive +though it is in much--yet specially lacks. It is to be hoped that Mr +Sidney Colvin will not once more miss the chance which is thus still left +open to him to perfect his _Life of Stevenson_, and make it more +interpretive than anything yet published. If he does this, then, a +dreadful _lacuna_ in the _Edinburgh Edition_ will also be supplied. + +Carefully reading over again Mr Arthur Symons' _Studies in Two +Literatures_--published some years ago--I have come across instances of +apparent contradiction which, so far as I can see, he does not critically +altogether reconcile, despite his ingenuity and great charm of style. One +relates to Thoreau, who, while still "sturdy" as Emerson says, "and like +an elm tree," as his sister Sophia says, showed exactly the same love of +nature and power of interpreting her as he did after in his later +comparatively short period of "invalidity," while Mr Symons says his view +of Nature absolutely was that of the invalid, classing him unqualifiedly +with Jefferies and Stevenson, as invalid. Thoreau's mark even in the +short later period of "invalidity" was complete and robust independence +and triumph over it--a thing which I have no doubt wholly captivated +Stevenson, as scarce anything else would have done, as a victory in the +exact _role_ he himself was most ambitious to fill. For did not he too +wrestle well with the "wolverine" he carried on his back--in this like +Addington Symonds and Alexander Pope? Surely I cannot be wrong here to +reinforce my statement by a passage from a letter written by Sophia +Thoreau to her good friend Daniel Ricketson, after her brother's death, +the more that R. L. Stevenson would have greatly exulted too in its +cheery and invincible stoicism: + + "Profound joy mingles with my grief. I feel as if something very + beautiful had happened--not death; although Henry is with us no + longer, yet the memory of his sweet and virtuous soul must ever cheer + and comfort me. My heart is filled with praise to God for the gift of + such a brother, and may I never distrust the love and wisdom of Him + who made him and who has now called him to labour in more glorious + fields than earth affords. You ask for some particulars relating to + Henry's illness. I feel like saying that Henry was never affected, + never reached by it. I never before saw such a manifestation of the + power of spirit over matter. Very often I heard him tell his visitors + that he enjoyed existence as well as ever. The thought of death, he + said, did not trouble him. His thoughts had entertained him all his + life and did still. . . . He considered occupation as necessary for + the sick as for those in health, and accomplished a vast amount of + labour in those last few months." + +A rare "invalidity" this--a little confusing easy classifications. I +think Stevenson would have felt and said that brother and sister were +well worthy of each other; and that the sister was almost as grand and +cheery a stoic, with no literary profession of it, as was the brother. + +The other thing relates to Stevenson's _human soul_. I find Mr Symons +says, at p. 243, that Stevenson "had something a trifle elfish and +uncanny about him, as of a bewitched being who was not actually human--had +not actually a human soul"--in which there may be a glimmer of truth +viewed from his revelation of artistic curiosities in some aspects, but +is hardly true of him otherwise; and this Mr Symons himself seems to have +felt, when, at p. 246, he writes: "He is one of those writers who speak +_to us on easy terms_, with whom we _may exchange affections_." How +"affections" could be exchanged on easy terms between the normal human +being and an elfish creature actually _without a human soul_ (seeing that +affections are, as Mr Matthew Arnold might have said, at least, three- +fourths of soul) is more, I confess, than I can quite see at present; but +in this rather _maladroit_ contradiction Mr Symons does point at one +phase of the problem of Stevenson--this, namely that to all the ordinary +happy or pleasure-endings he opposes, as it were of set purpose, gloom, +as though to certain things he was quite indifferent, and though, as we +have seen, his actual life and practice were quite opposed to this. + +I am sorry I _cannot_ find the link in Mr Symons' essay, which would +quite make these two statements consistently coincide critically. As an +enthusiastic, though I hope still a discriminating, Stevensonian, I do +wish Mr Symons would help us to it somehow hereafter. It would be well +worth his doing, in my opinion. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV--LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY + + +Among many letters received by me in acknowledgment of, or in commentary +on, my little tributes to R. L. Stevenson, in various journals and +magazines, I find the following, which I give here for reasons purely +personal, and because my readers may with me, join in admiration of the +fancy, grace and beauty of the poems. I must preface the first poem by a +letter, which explains the genesis of the poem, and relates a striking +and very touching incident: + + "37 ST DONATT'S ROAD, + LEWISHAM HIGH ROAD, S.E., + 1_st_ _March_ 1895. + + "DEAR SIR,--As you have written so much about your friend, the late + Robert Louis Stevenson, and quoted many tributes to his genius from + contemporary writers, I take the liberty of sending you herewith some + verses of mine which appeared in _The Weekly Sun_ of November last. I + sent a copy of these verses to Samoa, but unfortunately the great + novelist died before they reached it. I have, however, this week, + received a little note from Mrs Strong, which runs as follows: + + "'Your poem of "Greeting" came too late. I can only thank you by + sending a little moss that I plucked from a tree overhanging his grave + on Vaea Mountain.' + + "I trust you will appreciate my motive in sending you the poem. I do + not wish to obtrude my claims as a verse-writer upon your notice, but + I thought the incident I have recited would be interesting to one who + is so devoted a collector of Stevensoniana.--Respectfully yours, + + F. J. COX." + + + +GREETING + + +(TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, IN SAMOA) + +We, pent in cities, prisoned in the mart, +Can know you only as a man apart, +But ever-present through your matchless art. + +You have exchanged the old, familiar ways +For isles, where, through the range of splendid days, +Her treasure Nature lavishly displays. + +There, by the gracious sweep of ampler seas, +That swell responsive to the odorous breeze. +You have the wine of Life, and we the lees! + +You mark, perchance, within your island bowers, +The slow departure of the languorous hours, +And breathe the sweetness of the strange wild-flowers. + +And everything your soul and sense delights-- +But in the solemn wonder of your nights, +When Peace her message on the landscape writes; + +When Ocean scarcely flecks her marge with foam-- +Your thoughts must sometimes from your island roam, +To centre on the sober face of Home. + +Though many a league of water rolls between +The simple beauty of an English scene, +From all these wilder charms your love may wean. + +Some kindly sprite may bring you as a boon +Sweets from the rose that crowns imperial June, +Or reminiscence of the throstle's tune; + +Yea, gladly grant you, with a generous hand, +Far glimpses of the winding, wind-swept strand, +The glens and mountains of your native land, + +Until you hear the pipes upon the breeze-- +But wake unto the wild realities +The tangled forests and the boundless seas! + +For lo! the moonless night has passed away, +A sudden dawn dispels the shadows grey, +The glad sea moves and hails the quickening day. + +New life within the arbours of your fief +Awakes the blossom, quivers in the leaf, +And splendour flames upon the coral reef. + +If such a prospect stimulate your art, +More than our meadows where the shadows dart, +More than the life which throbs in London's heart, + +Then stay, encircled by your Southern bowers, +And weave, amid the incense of the flowers, +The skein of fair romance--the gain is ours! + +F. J. COX. + +_Weekly Sun_, 11_th_ November 1904. + + + +R. L. S., IN MEMORIAM. + + +An elfin wight as e'er from faeryland + Came to us straight with favour in his eyes, + Of wondrous seed that led him to the prize +Of fancy, with the magic rod in hand. +Ah, there in faeryland we saw him stand, + As for a while he walked with smiles and sighs, + Amongst us, finding still the gem that buys +Delight and joy at genius's command. + +And now thy place is empty: fare thee well; + Thou livest still in hearts that owe thee more + Than gold can reckon; for thy richer store +Is of the good that with us aye most dwell. + Farewell; sleep sound on Vaea's windy shrine, + While round the songsters join their song to thine. + +A. C. R. + + + + +APPENDIX + + +The following appeared some time ago in one of the London evening papers, +and I make bold, because of its truth and vigour, to insert it here: + + + +THE LAND OF STEVENSON, +_ON AN AFTERNOON'S WALK_ + + +Will there be a "Land of Stevenson," as there is already a "Land of +Burns," or a "Land of Scott," known to the tourist, bescribbled by the +guide-book maker? This the future must tell. Yet will it be easy to +mark out the bounds of "Robert Louis Stevenson's Country"; and, taking +his native and well-loved city for a starting-point, a stout walker may +visit all its principal sites in an afternoon. The house where he was +born is within a bowshot of the Water of Leith; some five miles to the +south are Caerketton and Allermuir, and other crests of the Pentlands, +and below them Swanston Farm, where year after year, in his father's +time, he spent the summer days basking on the hill slopes; two or three +miles to the westward of Swanston is Colinton, where his mother's father, +Dr Balfour, was minister; and here again you are back to the Water of +Leith, which you can follow down to the New Town. In this triangular +space Stevenson's memories and affections were firmly rooted; the fibres +could not be withdrawn from the soil, and "the voice of the blood" and +the longing for this little piece of earth make themselves plaintively +heard in his last notes. By Lothian Road, after which Stevenson quaintly +thought of naming the new edition of his works, and past Boroughmuirhead +and the "Bore Stane," where James FitzJames set up his standard before +Flodden, wends your southward way to the hills. The builder of suburban +villas has pushed his handiwork far into the fields since Stevenson was +wont to tramp between the city and the Pentlands; and you may look in +vain for the flat stone whereon, as the marvelling child was told, there +once rose a "crow-haunted gibbet." Three-quarters of an hour of easy +walking, after you have cleared the last of the houses will bring you to +Swanston; and half an hour more will take the stiff climber, a little +breathless, to + + +THE TOP OF CAERKETTON CRAGS. + + +You may follow the high road--indeed there is a choice of two, drawn at +different levels--athwart the western skirts of the Braid Hills, now +tenanted, crown and sides of them, by golf; then to the crossroads of +Fairmilehead, whence the road dips down, to rise again and circumvent the +most easterly wing of the Pentlands. You would like to pursue this +route, were it only to look down on Bow Bridge and recall how the last- +century gauger used to put together his flute and play "Over the hills +and far away" as a signal to his friend in the distillery below, now +converted into a dairy farm, to stow away his barrels. Better it is, +however, to climb the stile just past the poor-house gate, and follow the +footpath along the smoothly scooped banks of the Braid Burn to +"Cockmylane" and to Comiston. The wind has been busy all the morning +spreading the snow over a glittering world. The drifts are piled +shoulder-high in the lane as it approaches Comiston, and each old tree +grouped around the historic mansion is outlined in snow so virgin pure +that were the Ghost--"a lady in white, with the most beautiful clear +shoes on her feet"--to step out through the back gate, she would be +invisible, unless, indeed, she were between you and the ivy-draped +dovecot wall. Near by, at the corner of the Dreghorn Woods, is the +Hunters' Tryst, on the roof of which, when it was still a wayside inn, +the Devil was wont to dance on windy nights. In the field through which +you trudge knee-deep in drift rises the "Kay Stane," looking to-day like +a tall monolith of whitest marble. Stevenson was mistaken when he said +that it was from its top a neighbouring laird, on pain of losing his +lands, had to "wind a blast of bugle horn" each time the King + + +VISITED HIS FOREST OF PENTLAND. + + +That honour belongs to another on the adjacent farm of Buckstane. The +ancient monument carries you further back, and there are Celtic +authorities that translate its name the "Stone of Victory." The +"Pechtland Hills"--their elder name--were once a refuge for the Picts; +and Caerketton--probably Caer-etin, the giant's strong-hold--is one of +them. Darkly its cliffs frown down upon you, while all else is flashing +white in the winter sunlight. For once, in this last buttress thrown out +into the plain of Lothian towards the royal city, the outer folds of the +Pentlands loses its boldly-rounded curves, and drops an almost sheer +descent of black rock to the little glen below. In a wrinkle of the +foothills Swanston farm and hamlet are snugly tucked away. The spirit +that breathes about it in summer time is gently pastoral. It is +sheltered from the rougher blasts; it is set about with trees and green +hills. It was with this aspect of the place that Stevenson, coming +hither on holiday, was best acquainted. The village green, whereon the +windows of the neat white cottages turn a kindly gaze under low brows of +thatch, is then a perfect place in which to rest, and, watching the smoke +rising and listening to "the leaves ruffling in the breeze," to muse on +men and things; especially on Sabbath mornings, when the ploughman or +shepherd, "perplext wi' leisure," it is time to set forth on the three- +mile walk along the hill-skirts to Colinton kirk. But Swanston in winter +time must also + + +HAVE BEEN FAMILIAR TO STEVENSON. + + +Snow-wreathed Pentlands, the ribbed and furrowed front of Caerketton, the +low sun striking athwart the sloping fields of white, the shadows +creeping out from the hills, and the frosty yellow fog drawing in from +the Firth--must often have flashed back on the thoughts of the exile of +Samoa. Against this wintry background the white farmhouse, old and crow- +stepped, looks dingy enough; the garden is heaped with the fantastic +treasures of the snow; and when you toil heavily up the waterside to the +clump of pines and beeches you find yourself in a fairy forest. One need +not search to-day for the pool where the lynx-eyed John Todd, "the oldest +herd on the Pentlands," watched from behind the low scrag of wood the +stranger collie come furtively to wash away the tell-tale stains of +lamb's blood. The effacing hand of the snow has smothered it over. +Higher you mount, mid leg-deep in drift, up the steep and slippery hill- +face, to the summit. Edinburgh has been creeping nearer since +Stevenson's musing fancy began to draw on the memories of the climbs up +"steep Caerketton." But this light gives it a mystic distance; and it is +all glitter and shadow. Arthur Seat is like some great sea monster +stranded near a city of dreams; from the fog-swathed Firth gleams the +white walls of Inchkeith lighthouse, a mark never missed by Stevenson's +father's son; above Fife rise the twin breasts of the Lomonds. Or turn +round and look across the Esk valley to the Moorfoots; or more westerly, +where the back range of the Pentlands--Caernethy, the Scald, and the +knife-edged Kips--draw a sharp silhouette of Arctic peaks against the +sky. In the cloven hollow between is Glencarse Loch, an ancient chapel +and burying ground hidden under its waters; on the slope above it, not a +couple miles away, is Rullion Green, where, as Stevenson told in _The +Pentland Rising_ (his first printed work) + + +THE WESTLAND WHIGS WERE SCATTERED + + +as chaff on the hills. Were "topmost Allermuir," that rises close beside +you, removed from his place, we might see the gap in the range through +which Tom Dalyell and his troopers spurred from Currie to the fray. The +air on these heights is invigorating as wine; but it is also keen as a +razor. Without delaying long yon plunge down to the "Windy Door Nick"; +follow the "nameless trickle that springs from the green bosom of +Allermuir," past the rock and pool, where, on summer evenings, the poet +"loved to sit and make bad verses"; and cross Halkerside and the +Shearers' Knowe, those "adjacent cantons on a single shoulder of a hill," +sometimes floundering to the neck in the loose snow of a drain, sometimes +scaring the sheep huddling in the wreaths, or putting up a covey of +moorfowl that circle back without a cry to cover in the ling. In an hour +you are at Colinton, whose dell has on one side the manse garden, where a +bright-eyed boy, who was to become famous, spent so much of his time when +he came thither on visits to his stern Presbyterian grandfather; on the +other the old churchyard. The snow has drawn its cloak of ermine over +the sleepers, it has run its fingers over the worn lettering; and records +almost effaced start out from the stone. In vain these "voices of +generations dead" summon their wandering child, though you might deem +that his spirit would rest more quietly where the cold breeze from +Pentland shakes the ghostly trees in Colinton Dell than "under the +flailing fans and shadows of the palm." + + + + +Footnotes: + + +{1} Professor Charles Warren Stoddard, Professor of English Literature +at the Catholic University of Washington, in _Kate Field's Washington_. + +{2} In his portrait-sketch of his father, Stevenson speaks of him as a +"man of somewhat antique strain, and with a blended sternness and +softness that was wholly Scottish, and at first sight somewhat +bewildering," as melancholy, and with a keen sense of his unworthiness, +yet humorous in company; shrewd and childish; a capital adviser. + +{3} _Inferno_, Canto XV. + +{4} Alas, I never was told that remark--when I saw my friend afterwards +there was always too much to talk of else, and I forgot to ask. + +{5} Quoted by Hammerton, pp. 2 and 3. + +{6} Tusitala, as the reader must know, is the Samoan for Teller of +Tales. + +{7} _Wisdom of Goethe_, p. 38. + +{8} _The Foreigner at Home_, in _Memories and Portraits_. + +{9} A great deal has been made of the "John Bull element" in De Quincey +since his _Memoir_ was written by me (see _Masson's Condensation_, p. +95); so now perhaps a little more may be made of the rather conceited +Calvinistic Scot element in R. L. Stevenson! + +{10} It was Mr George Moore who said this. + +{11} _Fortnightly Review_, October, 1903. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON*** + + +******* This file should be named 590.txt or 590.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/5/9/590 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + Binary files differdiff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bdf8024 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #590 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/590) diff --git a/old/rlsjp10.txt b/old/rlsjp10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c5822d1 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/rlsjp10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7240 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of: +Robert Louis Stevenson, A Record, An Estimate, A Memorial by A.H. Japp + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. We need your donations. + + +Robert Louis Stevenson, A Record, An Estimate, A Memorial + +by A. H. Japp + +July, 1996 [Etext #590] + + +Robert Louis Stevenson, A Record, An Estimate, A Memorial by A.H. Japp +*****This file should be named rlsjp10.txt or rlsjp10.zip****** + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, rlsjp11.txt. +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, rlsjp10a.txt. + + +We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance +of the official release dates, for time for better editing. + +Please note: neither this list nor its contents are final till +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. To be sure you have an +up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes +in the first week of the next month. Since our ftp program has +a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a +look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a +new copy has at least one byte more or less. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +fifty hours is one conservative estimate for how long it we take +to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-two text +files per month: or 400 more Etexts in 1996 for a total of 800. +If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the +total should reach 80 billion Etexts. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext +Files by the December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000=Trillion] +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only 10% of the present number of computer users. 2001 +should have at least twice as many computer users as that, so it +will require us reaching less than 5% of the users in 2001. + + +We need your donations more than ever! + + +All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/BU": and are +tax deductible to the extent allowable by law. (BU = Benedictine +University). (Subscriptions to our paper newsletter go to BU.) + +For these and other matters, please mail to: + +Project Gutenberg +P. O. Box 2782 +Champaign, IL 61825 + +When all other email fails try our Executive Director: +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +We would prefer to send you this information by email +(Internet, Bitnet, Compuserve, ATTMAIL or MCImail). + +****** +If you have an FTP program (or emulator), please +FTP directly to the Project Gutenberg archives: +[Mac users, do NOT point and click. . .type] + +ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu +login: anonymous +password: your@login +cd etext/etext90 through /etext96 +or cd etext/articles [get suggest gut for more information] +dir [to see files] +get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files] +GET INDEX?00.GUT +for a list of books +and +GET NEW GUT for general information +and +MGET GUT* for newsletters. + +**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor** +(Three Pages) + + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG- +tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor +Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at +Benedictine University (the "Project"). Among other +things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext +under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this +etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors, +officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost +and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or +indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause: +[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification, +or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word pro- + cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the etext (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the + net profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Association / Benedictine + University" within the 60 days following each + date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) + your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, +scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty +free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution +you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg +Association / Benedictine University". + +*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +Robert Louis Stevenson, A Record, An Estimate, A Memorial by A.H. Japp + +Scanned and proofed by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, BY A. H. JAPP + + + + +PREFACE + + + +A FEW words may here be allowed me to explain one or two points. +First, about the facsimile of last page of Preface to FAMILIAR +STUDIES OF MEN AND BOOKS. Stevenson was in Davos when the greater +portion of that work went through the press. He felt so much the +disadvantage of being there in the circumstances (both himself and +his wife ill) that he begged me to read the proofs of the Preface +for him. This illness has record in the letter from him (pp. 28- +29). The printers, of course, had directions to send the copy and +proofs of the Preface to me. Hence I am able now to give this +facsimile. + +With regard to the letter at p. 19, of which facsimile is also +given, what Stevenson there meant is not the "three last" of that +batch, but the three last sent to me before - though that was an +error on his part - he only then sent two chapters, making the +"eleven chapters now" - sent to me by post. + +Another point on which I might have dwelt and illustrated by many +instances is this, that though Stevenson was fond of hob-nobbing +with all sorts and conditions of men, this desire of wide contact +and intercourse has little show in his novels - the ordinary fibre +of commonplace human beings not receiving much celebration from him +there; another case in which his private bent and sympathies +received little illustration in his novels. But the fact lies +implicit in much I have written. + +I have to thank many authors for permission to quote extracts I +have used. + +ALEXANDER H. JAPP. + + + + CONTENTS + +I. INTRODUCTION AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS +II. TREASURE ISLAND AND SOME REMINISCENCES +III. THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN +IV. HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED +V. TRAVELS +VI. SOME EARLIER LETTERS +VII. THE VAILIMA LETTERS +VIII. WORK OF LATER YEARS +IX. SOME CHARACTERISTICS +X. A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON +XI. MISS STUBBS' RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE +XII. HIS GENIUS AND METHODS +XIII. PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST +XIV. STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST +XV. THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL +XVI. STEVENSON'S GLOOM +XVII. PROOFS OF GROWTH +XVIII. EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS +XIX. MR EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN'S ESTIMATE +XX. EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS +XXI. UNITY IN STEVENSON'S STORIES +XXII. PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED GLOOM +XXIII. EDINBURGH REVIEWERS' DICTA INAPPLICABLE TO LATER WORK +XXIV. MR HENLEY'S SPITEFUL PERVERSIONS +XXV. MR CHRISTIE MURRAY'S IMPRESSIONS +XXVI. HERO-VILLAINS +XXVII. MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON, AND OTHERS +XXVIII. UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS +XXIX. LOVE OF VAGABONDS +XXX. LORD ROSEBERY'S CASE +XXXI. MR GOSSE AND MS. OF TREASURE ISLAND +XXXII. STEVENSON PORTRAITS +XXXIII. LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM +XXXIV. LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY +APPENDIX + + + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON + + + + +CHAPTER I - INTRODUCTION AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS + + + +MY little effort to make Thoreau better known in England had one +result that I am pleased to think of. It brought me into personal +association with R. L. Stevenson, who had written and published in +THE CORNHILL MAGAZINE an essay on Thoreau, in whom he had for some +time taken an interest. He found in Thoreau not only a rare +character for originality, courage, and indefatigable independence, +but also a master of style, to whom, on this account, as much as +any, he was inclined to play the part of the "sedulous ape," as he +had acknowledged doing to many others - a later exercise, perhaps +in some ways as fruitful as any that had gone before. A recent +poet, having had some seeds of plants sent to him from Northern +Scotland to the South, celebrated his setting of them beside those +native to the Surrey slope on which he dwelt, with the lines - + + +"And when the Northern seeds are growing, +Another beauty then bestowing, +We shall be fine, and North to South +Be giving kisses, mouth to mouth." + + +So the Thoreau influence on Stevenson was as if a tart American +wild-apple had been grafted on an English pippin, and produced a +wholly new kind with the flavours of both; and here wild America +and England kissed each other mouth to mouth. + +The direct result was the essay in THE CORNHILL, but the indirect +results were many and less easily assessed, as Stevenson himself, +as we shall see, was ever ready to admit. The essay on Thoreau was +written in America, which further, perhaps, bears out my point. + +One of the authorities, quoted by Mr Hammerton, in STEVENSONIANA +says of the circumstances in which he found our author, when he was +busily engaged on that bit of work: + + +"I have visited him in a lonely lodging in California, it was +previous to his happy marriage, and found him submerged in billows +of bed-clothes; about him floated the scattered volumes of a +complete set of Thoreau; he was preparing an essay on that worthy, +and he looked at the moment like a half-drowned man, yet he was not +cast down. His work, an endless task, was better than a straw to +him. It was to become his life-preserver and to prolong his years. +I feel convinced that without it he must have surrendered long +since. I found Stevenson a man of the frailest physique, though +most unaccountably tenacious of life; a man whose pen was +indefatigable, whose brain was never at rest, who, as far as I am +able to judge, looked upon everybody and everything from a +supremely intellectual point of view." (1) + +We remember the common belief in Yorkshire and other parts that a +man could not die so long as he could stand up - a belief on which +poor Branwell Bronte was fain to act and to illustrate, but R. L. +Stevenson illustrated it, as this writer shows, in a better, +calmer, and healthier way, despite his lack of health. + +On some little points of fact, however, Stevenson was wrong; and I +wrote to the Editor of THE SPECTATOR a letter, titled, I think, +"Thoreau's Pity and Humour," which he inserted. This brought me a +private letter from Stevenson, who expressed the wish to see me, +and have some talk with me on that and other matters. To this +letter I at once replied, directing to 17 Heriot Row, Edinburgh, +saying that, as I was soon to be in that City, it might be possible +for me to see him there. In reply to this letter Mr Stevenson +wrote: + + +"THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR, +SUNDAY, AUGUST (? TH), 1881. + + +"MY DEAR SIR, - I should long ago have written to thank you for +your kind and frank letter; but, in my state of health, papers are +apt to get mislaid, and your letter has been vainly hunted for +until this (Sunday) morning. + +"I must first say a word as to not quoting your book by name. It +was the consciousness that we disagreed which led me, I daresay, +wrongly, to suppress ALL references throughout the paper. But you +may be certain a proper reference will now be introduced. + +"I regret I shall not be able to see you in Edinburgh: one visit +to Edinburgh has already cost me too dear in that invaluable +particular, health; but if it should be at all possible for you to +pass by Braemar, I believe you would find an attentive listener, +and I can offer you a bed, a drive, and necessary food. + +"If, however, you should not be able to come thus far, I can +promise two things. First, I shall religiously revise what I have +written, and bring out more clearly the point of view from which I +regarded Thoreau. Second, I shall in the preface record your +objection. + +"The point of view (and I must ask you not to forget that any such +short paper is essentially only a SECTION THROUGH a man) was this: +I desired to look at the man through his books. Thus, for +instance, when I mentioned his return to the pencil-making, I did +it only in passing (perhaps I was wrong), because it seemed to me +not an illustration of his principles, but a brave departure from +them. Thousands of such there were I do not doubt; still they +might be hardly to my purpose; though, as you say so, I suppose +some of them would be. + +"Our difference as to 'pity,' I suspect, was a logomachy of my +making. No pitiful acts, on his part, would surprise me: I know +he would be more pitiful in practice than most of the whiners; but +the spirit of that practice would still seem to me to be unjustly +described by the word pity. + +"When I try to be measured, I find myself usually suspected of a +sneaking unkindness for my subject, but you may be sure, sir, I +would give up most other things to be as good a man as Thoreau. +Even my knowledge of him leads me thus far. + +"Should you find yourself able to push on so far - it may even lie +on your way - believe me your visit will be very welcome. The +weather is cruel, but the place is, as I daresay you know, the very +WALE of Scotland - bar Tummelside. - Yours very sincerely, + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + + +Some delay took place in my leaving London for Scotland, and hence +what seemed a hitch. I wrote mentioning the reason of my delay, +and expressing the fear that I might have to forego the prospect of +seeing him in Braemar, as his circumstances might have altered in +the meantime. In answer came this note, like so many, if not most +of his, indeed, without date:- + + +THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR. (NO DATE.) + +"MY DEAR SIR, - I am here as yet a fixture, and beg you to come our +way. Would Tuesday or Wednesday suit you by any chance? We shall +then, I believe, be empty: a thing favourable to talks. You get +here in time for dinner. I stay till near the end of September, +unless, as may very well be, the weather drive me forth. - Yours +very sincerely, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + + +I accordingly went to Braemar, where he and his wife and her son +were staying with his father and mother. + +These were red-letter days in my calendar alike on account of +pleasant intercourse with his honoured father and himself. Here is +my pen-and-ink portrait of R. L. Stevenson, thrown down at the +time: + +Mr Stevenson's is, indeed, a very picturesque and striking figure. +Not so tall probably as he seems at first sight from his extreme +thinness, but the pose and air could not be otherwise described +than as distinguished. Head of fine type, carried well on the +shoulders and in walking with the impression of being a little +thrown back; long brown hair, falling from under a broadish-brimmed +Spanish form of soft felt hat, Rembrandtesque; loose kind of +Inverness cape when walking, and invariable velvet jacket inside +the house. You would say at first sight, wherever you saw him, +that he was a man of intellect, artistic and individual, wholly out +of the common. His face is sensitive, full of expression, though +it could not be called strictly beautiful. It is longish, +especially seen in profile, and features a little irregular; the +brow at once high and broad. A hint of vagary, and just a hint in +the expression, is qualified by the eyes, which are set rather far +apart from each other as seems, and with a most wistful, and at the +same time possibly a merry impish expression arising over that, yet +frank and clear, piercing, but at the same time steady, and fall on +you with a gentle radiance and animation as he speaks. Romance, if +with an indescribable SOUPCON of whimsicality, is marked upon him; +sometimes he has the look as of the Ancient Mariner, and could fix +you with his glittering e'e, and he would, as he points his +sentences with a movement of his thin white forefinger, when this +is not monopolised with the almost incessant cigarette. There is a +faint suggestion of a hair-brained sentimental trace on his +countenance, but controlled, after all, by good Scotch sense and +shrewdness. In conversation he is very animated, and likes to ask +questions. A favourite and characteristic attitude with him was to +put his foot on a chair or stool and rest his elbow on his knee, +with his chin on his hand; or to sit, or rather to half sit, half +lean, on the corner of a table or desk, one of his legs swinging +freely, and when anything that tickled him was said he would laugh +in the heartiest manner, even at the risk of bringing on his cough, +which at that time was troublesome. Often when he got animated he +rose and walked about as he spoke, as if movement aided thought and +expression. Though he loved Edinburgh, which was full of +associations for him, he had no good word for its east winds, which +to him were as death. Yet he passed one winter as a "Silverado +squatter," the story of which he has inimitably told in the volume +titled THE SILVERADO SQUATTERS; and he afterwards spent several +winters at Davos Platz, where, as he said to me, he not only +breathed good air, but learned to know with closest intimacy John +Addington Symonds, who "though his books were good, was far finer +and more interesting than any of his books." He needed a good deal +of nursery attentions, but his invalidism was never obtrusively +brought before one in any sympathy-seeking way by himself; on the +contrary, a very manly, self-sustaining spirit was evident; and the +amount of work which he managed to turn out even when at his worst +was truly surprising. + +His wife, an American lady, is highly cultured, and is herself an +author. In her speech there is just the slightest suggestion of +the American accent, which only made it the more pleasing to my +ear. She is heart and soul devoted to her husband, proud of his +achievements, and her delight is the consciousness of substantially +aiding him in his enterprises. + +They then had with them a boy of eleven or twelve, Samuel Lloyd +Osbourne, to be much referred to later (a son of Mrs Stevenson by a +former marriage), whose delight was to draw the oddest, but perhaps +half intentional or unintentional caricatures, funny, in some +cases, beyond expression. His room was designated the picture- +gallery, and on entering I could scarce refrain from bursting into +laughter, even at the general effect, and, noticing this, and that +I was putting some restraint on myself out of respect for the +host's feelings, Stevenson said to me with a sly wink and a gentle +dig in the ribs, "It's laugh and be thankful here." On Lloyd's +account simple engraving materials, types, and a small printing- +press had been procured; and it was Stevenson's delight to make +funny poems, stories, and morals for the engravings executed, and +all would be duly printed together. Stevenson's thorough enjoyment +of the picture-gallery, and his goodness to Lloyd, becoming himself +a very boy for the nonce, were delightful to witness and in degree +to share. Wherever they were - at Braemar, in Edinburgh, at Davos +Platz, or even at Silverado - the engraving and printing went on. +The mention of the picture-gallery suggests that it was out of his +interest in the colour-drawing and the picture-gallery that his +first published story, TREASURE ISLAND, grew, as we shall see. + +I have some copies of the rude printing-press productions, +inexpressibly quaint, grotesque, a kind of literary horse-play, yet +with a certain squint-eyed, sprawling genius in it, and innocent +childish Rabelaisian mirth of a sort. At all events I cannot look +at the slight memorials of that time, which I still possess, +without laughing afresh till my eyes are dewy. Stevenson, as I +understood, began TREASURE ISLAND more to entertain Lloyd Osbourne +than anything else; the chapters being regularly read to the family +circle as they were written, and with scarcely a purpose beyond. +The lad became Stevenson's trusted companion and collaborator - +clearly with a touch of genius. + +I have before me as I write some of these funny momentoes of that +time, carefully kept, often looked at. One of them is, "THE BLACK +CANYON; OR, WILD ADVENTURES IN THE FAR WEST: a Tale of Instruction +and Amusement for the Young, by Samuel L. Osbourne, printed by the +author; Davos Platz," with the most remarkable cuts. It would not +do some of the sensationalists anything but good to read it even at +this day, since many points in their art are absurdly caricatured. +Another is "MORAL EMBLEMS; A COLLECTION OF CUTS AND VERSES, by R. +L. Stevenson, author of the BLUE SCALPER, etc., etc. Printers, S. +L. Osbourne and Company, Davos Platz." Here are the lines to a +rare piece of grotesque, titled A PEAK IN DARIEN - + + +'Broad-gazing on untrodden lands, +See where adventurous Cortez stands, +While in the heavens above his head, +The eagle seeks its daily bread. +How aptly fact to fact replies, +Heroes and eagles, hills and skies. +Ye, who contemn the fatted slave, +Look on this emblem and be brave." + + +Another, THE ELEPHANT, has these lines - + + +"See in the print how, moved by whim, +Trumpeting Jumbo, great and grim, +Adjusts his trunk, like a cravat, +To noose that individual's hat; +The Sacred Ibis in the distance, +Joys to observe his bold resistance." + + +R. L. Stevenson wrote from Davos Platz, in sending me THE BLACK +CANYON: + + +"Sam sends as a present a work of his own. I hope you feel +flattered, for THIS IS SIMPLY THE FIRST TIME HE HAS EVER GIVEN ONE +AWAY. I have to buy my own works, I can tell you." + + +Later he said, in sending a second: + + +"I own I have delayed this letter till I could forward the +enclosed. Remembering the night at Braemar, when we visited the +picture-gallery, I hope it may amuse you: you see we do some +publishing hereaway." + + +Delightfully suggestive and highly enjoyable, too, were the +meetings in the little drawing-room after dinner, when the +contrasted traits of father and son came into full play - when R. +L. Stevenson would sometimes draw out a new view by bold, half- +paradoxical assertion, or compel advance on the point from a new +quarter by a searching question couched in the simplest language, +or reveal his own latest conviction finally, by a few sentences as +nicely rounded off as though they had been written, while he rose +and gently moved about, as his habit was, in the course of those +more extended remarks. Then a chapter or two of THE SEA-COOK would +be read, with due pronouncement on the main points by one or other +of the family audience. + +The reading of the book is one thing. It was quite another thing +to hear Stevenson as he stood reading it aloud, with his hand +stretched out holding the manuscript, and his body gently swaying +as a kind of rhythmical commentary on the story. His fine voice, +clear and keen it some of its tones, had a wonderful power of +inflection and variation, and when he came to stand in the place of +Silver you could almost have imagined you saw the great one-legged +John Silver, joyous-eyed, on the rolling sea. Yes, to read it in +print was good, but better yet to hear Stevenson read it. + + + +CHAPTER II - TREASURE ISLAND AND SOME REMINISCENCES + + + +WHEN I left Braemar, I carried with me a considerable portion of +the MS. of TREASURE ISLAND, with an outline of the rest of the +story. It originally bore the odd title of THE SEA-COOK, and, as I +have told before, I showed it to Mr Henderson, the proprietor of +the YOUNG FOLKS' PAPER, who came to an arrangement with Mr +Stevenson, and the story duly appeared in its pages, as well as the +two which succeeded it. + +Stevenson himself in his article in THE IDLER for August 1894 +(reprinted in MY FIRST BOOK volume and in a late volume of the +EDINBURGH EDITION) has recalled some of the circumstances connected +with this visit of mine to Braemar, as it bore on the destination +of TREASURE ISLAND: + + +"And now, who should come dropping in, EX MACHINA, but Dr Japp, +like the disguised prince, who is to bring down the curtain upon +peace and happiness in the last act; for he carried in his pocket, +not a horn or a talisman, but a publisher, in fact, ready to +unearth new writers for my old friend Mr Henderson's YOUNG FOLKS. +Even the ruthlessness of a united family recoiled before the +extreme measure of inflicting on our guest the mutilated members of +THE SEA-COOK; at the same time, we would by no means stop our +readings, and accordingly the tale was begun again at the +beginning, and solemnly redelivered for the benefit of Dr Japp. +From that moment on, I have thought highly of his critical faculty; +for when he left us, he carried away the manuscript in his +portmanteau. + +"TREASURE ISLAND - it was Mr Henderson who deleted the first title, +THE SEA-COOK - appeared duly in YOUNG FOLKS, where it figured in +the ignoble midst without woodcuts, and attracted not the least +attention. I did not care. I liked the tale myself, for much the +same reason as my father liked the beginning: it was my kind of +picturesque. I was not a little proud of John Silver also; and to +this day rather admire that smooth and formidable adventurer. What +was infinitely more exhilarating, I had passed a landmark. I had +finished a tale and written The End upon my manuscript, as I had +not done since THE PENTLAND RISING, when I was a boy of sixteen, +not yet at college. In truth, it was so by a lucky set of +accidents: had not Dr Japp come on his visit, had not the tale +flowed from me with singular ease, it must have been laid aside, +like its predecessors, and found a circuitous and unlamented way to +the fire. Purists may suggest it would have been better so. I am +not of that mind. The tale seems to have given much pleasure, and +it brought (or was the means of bringing) fire, food, and wine to a +deserving family in which I took an interest. I need scarcely say +I mean my own." + + +He himself gives a goodly list of the predecessors which had found +a circuitous and unlamented way to the fire + + +"As soon as I was able to write, I became a good friend to the +paper-makers. Reams upon reams must have gone to the making of +RATHILLET, THE PENTLAND RISING, THE KING'S PARDON (otherwise PARK +WHITEHEAD), EDWARD DAVEN, A COUNTRY DANCE, and A VENDETTA IN THE +WEST. RATHILLET was attempted before fifteen, THE VENDETTA at +twenty-nine, and the succession of defeats lasted unbroken till I +was thirty-one." + + +Another thing I carried from Braemar with me which I greatly prize +- this was a copy of CHRISTIANITY CONFIRMED BY JEWISH AND HEATHEN +TESTIMONY, by Mr Stevenson's father, with his autograph signature +and many of his own marginal notes. He had thought deeply on many +subjects - theological, scientific, and social - and had recorded, +I am afraid, but the smaller half of his thoughts and speculations. +Several days in the mornings, before R. L. Stevenson was able to +face the somewhat "snell" air of the hills, I had long walks with +the old gentleman, when we also had long talks on many subjects - +the liberalising of the Scottish Church, educational reform, etc.; +and, on one occasion, a statement of his reason, because of the +subscription, for never having become an elder. That he had in +some small measure enjoyed my society, as I certainly had much +enjoyed his, was borne out by a letter which I received from the +son in reply to one I had written, saying that surely his father +had never meant to present me at the last moment on my leaving by +coach with that volume, with his name on it, and with pencilled +notes here and there, but had merely given it me to read and +return. In the circumstances I may perhaps be excused quoting from +a letter dated Castleton of Braemar, September 1881, in +illustration of what I have said - + + +"MY DEAR DR JAPP, - My father has gone, but I think I may take it +upon me to ask you to keep the book. Of all things you could do to +endear yourself to me you have done the best, for, from your +letter, you have taken a fancy to my father. + +"I do not know how to thank you for your kind trouble in the matter +of THE SEA-COOK, but I am not unmindful. My health is still +poorly, and I have added intercostal rheumatism - a new attraction, +which sewed me up nearly double for two days, and still gives me 'a +list to starboard' - let us be ever nautical. . . . I do not think +with the start I have, there will be any difficulty in letting Mr +Henderson go ahead whenever he likes. I will write my story up to +its legitimate conclusion, and then we shall be in a position to +judge whether a sequel would be desirable, and I myself would then +know better about its practicability from the story-telling point +of view. - Yours very sincerely, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + + +A little later came the following:- + + +"THE COTTAGE, CASTLETON OF BRAEMAR. (NO DATE.) + +"MY DEAR DR JAPP, - Herewith go nine chapters. I have been a +little seedy; and the two last that I have written seem to me on a +false venue; hence the smallness of the batch. I have now, I hope, +in the three last sent, turned the corner, with no great amount of +dulness. + +"The map, with all its names, notes, soundings, and things, should +make, I believe, an admirable advertisement for the story. Eh? + +"I hope you got a telegram and letter I forwarded after you to +Dinnat. - Believe me, yours very sincerely, ROBERT LOUIS +STEVENSON." + + +In the afternoon, if fine and dry, we went walking, and Stevenson +would sometimes tell us stories of his short experience at the +Scottish Bar, and of his first and only brief. I remember him +contrasting that with his experiences as an engineer with Bob Bain, +who, as manager, was then superintending the building of a +breakwater. Of that time, too, he told the choicest stories, and +especially of how, against all orders, he bribed Bob with five +shillings to let him go down in the diver's dress. He gave us a +splendid description - finer, I think, than even that in his +MEMORIES - of his sensations on the sea-bottom, which seems to have +interested him as deeply, and suggested as many strange fancies, as +anything which he ever came across on the surface. But the +possibility of enterprises of this sort ended - Stevenson lost his +interest in engineering. + +Stevenson's father had, indeed, been much exercised in his day by +theological questions and difficulties, and though he remained a +staunch adherent of the Established Church of Scotland he knew well +and practically what is meant by the term "accommodation," as it is +used by theologians in reference to creeds and formulas; for he had +over and over again, because of the strict character of the +subscription required from elders of the Scottish Church declined, +as I have said, to accept the office. In a very express sense you +could see that he bore the marks of his past in many ways - a +quick, sensitive, in some ways even a fantastic-minded man, yet +with a strange solidity and common-sense amid it all, just as +though ferns with the veritable fairies' seed were to grow out of a +common stone wall. He looked like a man who had not been without +sleepless nights - without troubles, sorrows, and perplexities, and +even yet, had not wholly risen above some of them, or the results +of them. His voice was "low and sweet" - with just a possibility +in it of rising to a shrillish key. A sincere and faithful man, +who had walked very demurely through life, though with a touch of +sudden, bright, quiet humour and fancy, every now and then crossing +the grey of his characteristic pensiveness or melancholy, and +drawing effect from it. He was most frank and genial with me, and +I greatly honour his memory. (2) + +Thomas Stevenson, with a strange, sad smile, told me how much of a +disappointment, in the first stage, at all events, Louis (he always +called his son Louis at home), had caused him, by failing to follow +up his profession at the Scottish Bar. How much he had looked +forward, after the engineering was abandoned, to his devoting +himself to the work of the Parliament House (as the Hall of the +Chief Court is called in Scotland, from the building having been +while yet there was a Scottish Parliament the place where it sat), +though truly one cannot help feeling how much Stevenson's very air +and figure would have been out of keeping among the bewigged, +pushing, sharp-set, hard-featured, and even red-faced and red-nosed +(some of them, at any rate) company, who daily walked the +Parliament House, and talked and gossiped there, often of other +things than law and equity. "Well, yes, perhaps it was all for the +best," he said, with a sigh, on my having interjected the remark +that R. L. Stevenson was wielding far more influence than he ever +could have done as a Scottish counsel, even though he had risen +rapidly in his profession, and become Lord-Advocate or even a +judge. + +There was, indeed, a very pathetic kind of harking back on the +might-have-beens when I talked with him on this subject. He had +reconciled himself in a way to the inevitable, and, like a sensible +man, was now inclined to make the most and the best of it. The +marriage, which, on the report of it, had been but a new +disappointment to him, had, as if by magic, been transformed into a +blessing in his mind and his wife's by personal contact with Fanny +Van der Griff Stevenson, which no one who ever met her could wonder +at; but, nevertheless, his dream of seeing his only son walking in +the pathways of the Stevensons, and adorning a profession in +Edinburgh, and so winning new and welcome laurels for the family +and the name, was still present with him constantly, and by +contrast, he was depressed with contemplation of the real state of +the case, when, as I have said, I pointed out to him, as more than +once I did, what an influence his son was wielding now, not only +over those near to him, but throughout the world, compared with +what could have come to him as a lighthouse engineer, however +successful, or it may be as a briefless advocate or barrister, +walking, hardly in glory and in joy, the Hall of the Edinburgh +Parliament House. And when I pictured the yet greater influence +that was sure to come to him, he only shook his head with that +smile which tells of hopes long-cherished and lost at last, and of +resignation gained, as though at stern duty's call and an honest +desire for the good of those near and dear to him. It moved me +more than I can say, and always in the midst of it he adroitly, and +somewhat abruptly, changed the subject. Such penalties do parents +often pay for the honour of giving geniuses to the world. Here, +again, it may be true, "the individual withers but the world is +more and more." + +The impression of a kind of tragic fatality was but added to when +Stevenson would speak of his father in such terms of love and +admiration as quite moved one, of his desire to please him, of his +highest respect and gratitude to him, and pride in having such a +father. It was most characteristic that when, in his travels in +America, he met a gentleman who expressed plainly his keen +disappointment on learning that he had but been introduced to the +son and not to the father - to the as yet but budding author - and +not to the builder of the great lighthouse beacons that constantly +saved mariners from shipwreck round many stormy coasts, he should +record the incident, as his readers will remember, with such a +strange mixture of a pride and filial gratitude, and half humorous +humiliation. Such is the penalty a son of genius often pays in +heart-throbs for the inability to do aught else but follow his +destiny - follow his star, even though as Dante says:- + + +"Se tu segui tua stella +Non puoi fallire a glorioso porto." (3) + + +What added a keen thrill as of quivering flesh exposed, was that +Thomas Stevenson on one side was exactly the man to appreciate such +attainments and work in another, and I often wondered how far the +sense of Edinburgh propriety and worldly estimates did weigh with +him here. + +Mr Stevenson mentioned to me a peculiar fact which has since been +noted by his son, that, notwithstanding the kind of work he had so +successfully engaged in, he was no mathematician, and had to submit +his calculations to another to be worked out in definite +mathematical formulae. Thomas Stevenson gave one the impression of +a remarkably sweet, great personality, grave, anxious, almost +morbidly forecasting, yet full of childlike hope and ready +affection, but, perhaps, so earnestly taken up with some points as +to exaggerate their importance and be too self-conscious and easily +offended in respect to them. But there was no affectation in him. +He was simple-minded, sincere to the core; most kindly, homely, +hospitable, much intent on brotherly offices. He had the Scottish +PERFERVIDUM too - he could tolerate nothing mean or creeping; and +his eye would lighten and glance in a striking manner when such was +spoken of. I have since heard that his charities were very +extensive, and dispensed in the most hidden and secret ways. He +acted here on the Scripture direction, "Let not thy left hand know +what thy right hand doeth." He was much exercised when I saw him +about some defects, as he held, in the methods of Scotch education +(for he was a true lover of youth, and cared more for character +being formed than for heads being merely crammed). Sagacious, with +fine forecast, with a high ideal, and yet up to a certain point a +most tolerant temper, he was a fine specimen of the Scottish +gentleman. His son tells that, as he was engaged in work +calculated to benefit the world and to save life, he would not for +long take out a patent for his inventions, and thus lost immense +sums. I can well believe that: it seems quite in keeping with my +impressions of the man. There was nothing stolid or selfishly +absorbed in him. He bore the marks of deep, true, honest feeling, +true benevolence, and open-handed generosity, and despite the son's +great pen-craft, and inventive power, would have forgiven my saying +that sometimes I have had a doubt whether the father was not, after +all, the greater man of the two, though certainly not, like the +hero of IN MEMORIAM, moulded "in colossal calm." + +In theological matters, in which Thomas Stevenson had been much and +deeply exercised, he held very strong views, leading decisively to +ultra-Calvinism; but, as I myself could well sympathise with such +views, if I did not hold them, knowing well the strange ways in +which they had gone to form grand, if sometimes sternly forbidding +characters, there were no cross-purposes as there might have been +with some on that subject. And always I felt I had an original +character and a most interesting one to study. + +This is another very characteristic letter to me from Davos Platz: + + +"CHALET BUOL, DAVOS, GRISONS, +SWITZERLAND. (NO DATE.) + +"MY DEAR DR JAPP, - You must think me a forgetful rogue, as indeed +I am; for I have but now told my publisher to send you a copy of +the FAMILIAR STUDIES. However, I own I have delayed this letter +till I could send you the enclosed. Remembering the night at +Braemar, when we visited the picture-gallery, I hoped they might +amuse you. + +"You see we do some publishing hereaway. + +"With kind regards, believe me, always yours faithfully, +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + +"I shall hope to see you in town in May." + + +The enclosed was the second series of MORAL EMBLEMS, by R. L. +Stevenson, printed by Samuel Osbourne. My answer to this letter +brought the following: + + +"CHALET-BUOL, DAVOS, +APRIL 1st, 1882. + +"MY DEAR DR JAPP, - A good day to date this letter, which is, in +fact, a confession of incapacity. During my wife's wretched +illness - or I should say the worst of it, for she is not yet +rightly well - I somewhat lost my head, and entirely lost a great +quire of corrected proofs. This is one of the results: I hope +there are none more serious. I was never so sick of any volume as +I was of that; I was continually receiving fresh proofs with fresh +infinitesimal difficulties. I was ill; I did really fear, for my +wife was worse than ill. Well, 'tis out now; and though I have +already observed several carelessnesses myself, and now here is +another of your finding - of which indeed, I ought to be ashamed - +it will only justify the sweeping humility of the preface. + +"Symonds was actually dining with us when your letter came, and I +communicated your remarks, which pleased him. He is a far better +and more interesting thing than his books. + +"The elephant was my wife's, so she is proportionately elate you +should have picked it out for praise from a collection, let us add, +so replete with the highest qualities of art. + +"My wicked carcass, as John Knox calls it, holds together +wonderfully. In addition to many other things, and a volume of +travel, I find I have written since December ninety Cornhill pp. of +Magazine work - essays and stories - 40,000 words; and I am none +the worse - I am better. I begin to hope I may, if not outlive +this wolverine upon my shoulders, at least carry him bravely like +Symonds or Alexander Pope. I begin to take a pride in that hope. + +"I shall be much interested to see your criticisms: you might +perhaps send them on to me. I believe you know that I am not +dangerous - one folly I have not - I am not touchy under criticism. + +"Sam and my wife both beg to be remembered, and Sam also sends as a +present a work of his own. - Yours very sincerely, +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON." + + +As indicating the estimate of many of the good Edinburgh people of +Stevenson and the Stevensons that still held sway up to so late a +date as 1893, I will here extract two characteristic passages from +the letters of the friend and correspondent of these days just +referred to, and to whom I had sent a copy of the ATALANTA +Magazine, with an article of mine on Stevenson. + + +"If you can excuse the garrulity of age, I can tell you one or two +things about Louis Stevenson, his father and even his grandfather, +which you may work up some other day, as you have so deftly +embedded in the ATALANTA article that small remark on his acting. +Your paper is pleasant and modest: most of R. L. Stevenson's +admirers are inclined to lay it on far too thick. That he is a +genius we all admit; but his genius, if fine, is limited. For +example, he cannot paint (or at least he never has painted) a +woman. No more could Fettes Douglas, skilful artist though he was +in his own special line, and I shall tell you a remark of Russel's +thereon some day. (4) There are women in his books, but there is +none of the beauty and subtlety of womanhood in them. + +"R. L. Stevenson I knew well as a lad and often met him and talked +with him. He acted in private theatricals got up by the late +Professor Fleeming Jenkin. But he had then, as always, a pretty +guid conceit o' himsel' - which his clique have done nothing to +check. His father and his grandfather (I have danced with his +mother before her marriage) I knew better; but 'the family +theologian,' as some of R. L. Stevenson's friends dabbed his +father, was a very touchy theologian, and denounced any one who in +the least differed from his extreme Calvinistic views. I came +under his lash most unwittingly in this way myself. But for this +twist, he was a good fellow - kind and hospitable - and a really +able man in his profession. His father-in-law, R. L. Stevenson's +maternal grandfather, was the Rev. Dr Balfour, minister of Colinton +- one of the finest-looking old men I ever saw - tall, upright, and +ruddy at eighty. But he was marvellously feeble as a preacher, and +often said things that were deliciously, unconsciously, +unintentionally laughable, if not witty. We were near Colinton for +some years; and Mr Russell (of the SCOTSMAN), who once attended the +Parish Church with us, was greatly tickled by Balfour discoursing +on the story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife, remarking that Mrs P-'s +conduct was 'highly improper'!" + +The estimate of R. L. Stevenson was not and could not be final in +this case, for WEIR OF HERMISTON and CATRIONA were yet unwritten, +not to speak of others, but the passages reflect a certain side of +Edinburgh opinion, illustrating the old Scripture doctrine that a +prophet has honour everywhere but in his own country. And the +passages themselves bear evidence that I violate no confidence +then, for they were given to me to be worked into any after-effort +I might make on Stevenson. My friend was a good and an acute +critic who had done some acceptable literary work in his day. + + + +CHAPTER III - THE CHILD FATHER OF THE MAN + + + +R. L. STEVENSON was born on 13th November 1850, the very year of +the death of his grandfather, Robert Stevenson, whom he has so +finely celebrated. As a mere child he gave token of his character. +As soon as he could read, he was keen for books, and, before very +long, had read all the story-books he could lay hands on; and, when +the stock ran out, he would go and look in at all the shop windows +within reach, and try to piece out the stories from the bits +exposed in open pages and the woodcuts. + +He had a nurse of very remarkable character - evidently a paragon - +who deeply influenced him and did much to form his young mind - +Alison Cunningham, who, in his juvenile lingo, became "Cumy," and +who not only was never forgotten, but to the end was treated as his +"second mother." In his dedication of his CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES +to her, he says: + + +"My second mother, my first wife, +The angel of my infant life." + + +Her copy of KIDNAPPED was inscribed to her by the hand of +Stevenson, thus: + + +"TO CUMY, FROM HER BOY, THE AUTHOR. +"SKERRYVORE, 18TH JULY 1888." + + +Skerryvore was the name of Stevenson's Bournemouth home, so named +after one of the Stevenson lighthouses. His first volume, AN +INLAND VOYAGE has this pretty dedication, inscribed in a neat, +small hand: + + +"MY DEAR CUMY, - If you had not taken so much trouble with me all +the years of my childhood, this little book would never have been +written. Many a long night you sat up with me when I was ill. I +wish I could hope, by way of return, to amuse a single evening for +you with my little book. But whatever you think of it, I know you +will think kindly of +THE AUTHOR." + + +"Cumy" was perhaps the most influential teacher Stevenson had. +What she and his mother taught took effect and abode with him, +which was hardly the case with any other of his teachers. + + +"In contrast to Goethe," says Mr Baildon, "Stevenson was but little +affected by his relations to women, and, when this point is fully +gone into, it will probably be found that his mother and nurse in +childhood, and his wife and step-daughter in later life, are about +the only women who seriously influenced either his character or his +art." (p. 32). + + +When Mr Kelman is celebrating Stevenson for the consistency and +continuity of his undogmatic religion, he is almost throughout +celebrating "Cumy" and her influence, though unconsciously. Here, +again, we have an apt and yet more striking illustration, after +that of the good Lord Shaftesbury and many others, of the deep and +lasting effect a good and earnest woman, of whom the world may +never hear, may have had upon a youngster of whom all the world +shall hear. When Mr Kelman says that "the religious element in +Stevenson was not a thing of late growth, but an integral part and +vital interest of his life," he but points us back to the earlier +religious influences to which he had been effectually subject. +"His faith was not for himself alone, and the phases of +Christianity which it has asserted are peculiarly suited to the +spiritual needs of many in the present time." + +We should not lay so much weight as Mr Kelman does on the mere +number of times "the Divine name" is found in Stevenson's writings, +but there is something in such confessions as the following to his +father, when he was, amid hardship and illness, in Paris in 1878: + + +"Still I believe in myself and my fellow-men and the God who made +us all.... I am lonely and sick and out of heart. Well, I still +hope; I still believe; I still see the good in the inch, and cling +to it. It is not much, perhaps, but it is always something." + + +Yes, "Cumy" was a very effective teacher, whose influence and +teaching long remained. His other teachers, however famous and +highly gifted, did not attain to such success with him. And +because of this non-success they blamed him, as is usual. He was +fond of playing truant - declared, indeed, that he was about as +methodic a truant as ever could have existed. He much loved to go +on long wanderings by himself on the Pentland Hills and read about +the Covenanters, and while yet a youth of sixteen he wrote THE +PENTLAND RISING - a pamphlet in size and a piece of fine work - +which was duly published, is now scarce, and fetches a high price. +He had made himself thoroughly familiar with all the odd old +corners of Edinburgh - John Knox's haunts and so on, all which he +has turned to account in essays, descriptions and in stories - +especially in CATRIONA. When a mere youth at school, as he tells +us himself, he had little or no desire to carry off prizes and do +just as other boys did; he was always wishing to observe, and to +see, and try things for himself - was, in fact, in the eyes of +schoolmasters and tutors something of an IDLER, with splendid gifts +which he would not rightly apply. He was applying them rightly, +though not in their way. It is not only in his APOLOGY FOR IDLERS +that this confession is made, but elsewhere, as in his essay on A +COLLEGE MAGAZINE, where he says, "I was always busy on my own +private end, which was to learn to write. I kept always two books +in my pocket, one to read and one to write in!" + +When he went to College it was still the same - he tells us in the +funniest way how he managed to wheedle a certificate for Greek out +of Professor Blackie, though the Professor owned "his face was not +familiar to him"! He fared very differently when, afterwards his +father, eager that he should follow his profession, got him to +enter the civil engineering class under Professor Fleeming Jenkin. +He still stuck to his old courses - wandering about, and, in +sheltered corners, writing in the open air, and was not present in +class more than a dozen times. When the session was ended he went +up to try for a certificate from Fleeming Jenkin. "No, no, Mr +Stevenson," said the Professor; "I might give it in a doubtful +case, but yours is not doubtful: you have not kept my classes." +And the most characteristic thing - honourable to both men - is to +come; for this was the beginning of a friendship which grew and +strengthened and is finally celebrated in the younger man's sketch +of the elder. He learned from Professor Fleeming Jenkin, perhaps +unconsciously, more of the HUMANIORES, than consciously he did of +engineering. A friend of mine, who knew well both the Stevenson +family and the Balfours, to which R. L. Stevenson's mother +belonged, recalls, as we have seen, his acting in the private +theatricals that were got up by the Professor, and adds, "He was +then a very handsome fellow, and looked splendidly as Sir Charles +Pomander, and essayed, not wholly without success, Sir Peter +Teazle," which one can well believe, no less than that he acted +such parts splendidly as well as looked them. + +LONGMAN'S MAGAZINE, immediately after his death, published the +following poem, which took a very pathetic touch from the +circumstances of its appearance - the more that, while it +imaginatively and finely commemorated these days of truant +wanderings, it showed the ruling passion for home and the old +haunts, strongly and vividly, even not unnigh to death: + + +"The tropics vanish, and meseems that I, +From Halkerside, from topmost Allermuir, +Or steep Caerketton, dreaming gaze again. +Far set in fields and woods, the town I see +Spring gallant from the shallows of her smoke, +Cragg'd, spired, and turreted, her virgin fort +Beflagg'd. About, on seaward drooping hills, +New folds of city glitter. Last, the Forth +Wheels ample waters set with sacred isles, +And populous Fife smokes with a score of towns, +There, on the sunny frontage of a hill, +Hard by the house of kings, repose the dead, +My dead, the ready and the strong of word. +Their works, the salt-encrusted, still survive; +The sea bombards their founded towers; the night +Thrills pierced with their strong lamps. The artificers, +One after one, here in this grated cell, +Where the rain erases and the rust consumes, +Fell upon lasting silence. Continents +And continental oceans intervene; +A sea uncharted, on a lampless isle, +Environs and confines their wandering child +In vain. The voice of generations dead +Summons me, sitting distant, to arise, +My numerous footsteps nimbly to retrace, +And all mutation over, stretch me down +In that denoted city of the dead." + + + +CHAPTER IV - HEREDITY ILLUSTRATED + + + +AT first sight it would seem hard to trace any illustration of the +doctrine of heredity in the case of this master of romance. George +Eliot's dictum that we are, each one of us, but an omnibus carrying +down the traits of our ancestors, does not appear at all to hold +here. This fanciful realist, this naive-wistful humorist, this +dreamy mystical casuist, crossed by the innocent bohemian, this +serious and genial essayist, in whom the deep thought was hidden by +the gracious play of wit and phantasy, came, on the father's side, +of a stock of what the world regarded as a quiet, ingenious, +demure, practical, home-keeping people. In his rich colour, +originality, and graceful air, it is almost as though the bloom of +japonica came on a rich old orchard apple-tree, all out of season +too. Those who go hard on heredity would say, perhaps, that he was +the result of some strange back-stroke. But, on closer +examination, we need not go so far. His grandfather, Robert +Stevenson, the great lighthouse-builder, the man who reared the +iron-bound pillar on the destructive Bell Rock, and set life-saving +lights there, was very intent on his professional work, yet he had +his ideal, and romantic, and adventurous side. In the delightful +sketch which his famous grandson gave of him, does he not tell of +the joy Robert Stevenson had on the annual voyage in the LIGHTHOUSE +YACHT - how it was looked forward to, yearned for, and how, when he +had Walter Scott on board, his fund of story and reminiscence all +through the tour never failed - how Scott drew upon it in THE +PIRATE and the notes to THE PIRATE, and with what pride Robert +Stevenson preserved the lines Scott wrote in the lighthouse album +at the Bell Rock on that occasion: + + +"PHAROS LOQUITUR + +"Far in the bosom of the deep +O'er these wild shelves my watch I keep, +A ruddy gem of changeful light +Bound on the dusky brow of night. +The seaman bids my lustre hail, +And scorns to strike his timorous sail." + + +And how in 1850 the old man, drawing nigh unto death, was with the +utmost difficulty dissuaded from going the voyage once more, and +was found furtively in his room packing his portmanteau in spite of +the protests of all his family, and would have gone but for the +utter weakness of death. + +His father was also a splendid engineer; was full of invention and +devoted to his profession, but he, too, was not without his +romances, and even vagaries. He loved a story, was a fine teller +of stories, used to sit at night and spin the most wondrous yarns, +a man of much reserve, yet also of much power in discourse, with an +aptness and felicity in the use of phrases - so much so, as his son +tells, that on his deathbed, when his power of speech was passing +from him, and he couldn't articulate the right word, he was silent +rather than use the wrong one. I shall never forget how in these +early morning walks at Braemar, finding me sympathetic, he unbent +with the air of a man who had unexpectedly found something he had +sought, and was fairly confidential. + +On the mother's side our author came of ministers. His maternal +grandfather, the Rev. Dr Balfour of Colinton, was a man of handsome +presence, tall, venerable-looking, and not without a mingled +authority and humour of his own - no very great preacher, I have +heard, but would sometimes bring a smile to the faces of his +hearers by very naive and original ways of putting things. R. L. +Stevenson quaintly tells a story of how his grandfather when he had +physic to take, and was indulged in a sweet afterwards, yet would +not allow the child to have a sweet because he had not had the +physic. A veritable Calvinist in daily action - from him, no +doubt, our subject drew much of his interest in certain directions +- John Knox, Scottish history, the '15 and the '45, and no doubt +much that justifies the line "something of shorter-catechist," as +applied by Henley to Stevenson among very contrasted traits indeed. + +But strange truly are the interblendings of race, and the way in +which traits of ancestors reappear, modifying and transforming each +other. The gardener knows what can be done by grafts and buddings; +but more wonderful far than anything there, are the mysterious +blendings and outbursts of what is old and forgotten, along with +what is wholly new and strange, and all going to produce often what +we call sometimes eccentricity, and sometimes originality and +genius. + +Mr J. F. George, in SCOTTISH NOTES AND QUERIES, wrote as follows on +Stevenson's inheritances and indebtedness to certain of his +ancestors: + + +"About 1650, James Balfour, one of the Principal Clerks of the +Court of Session, married Bridget, daughter of Chalmers of +Balbaithan, Keithhall, and that estate was for some time in the +name of Balfour. His son, James Balfour of Balbaithan, Merchant +and Magistrate of Edinburgh, paid poll-tax in 1696, but by 1699 the +land had been sold. This was probably due to the fact that Balfour +was one of the Governors of the Darien Company. His grandson, +James Balfour of Pilrig (1705 - 1795), sometime Professor of Moral +Philosophy in Edinburgh University, whose portrait is sketched in +CATRIONA, also made a Garioch [Aberdeenshire district] marriage, +his wife being Cecilia, fifth daughter of Sir John Elphinstone, +second baronet of Logie (Elphinstone) and Sheriff of Aberdeen, by +Mary, daughter of Sir Gilbert Elliot, first baronet of Minto. + +"Referring to the Minto descent, Stevenson claims to have 'shaken a +spear in the Debatable Land and shouted the slogan of the Elliots.' +He evidently knew little or nothing of his relations on the +Elphinstone side. The Logie Elphinstones were a cadet branch of +Glack, an estate acquired by Nicholas Elphinstone in 1499. William +Elphinstone, a younger son of James of Glack, and Elizabeth Wood of +Bonnyton, married Margaret Forbes, and was father of Sir James +Elphinstone, Bart., of Logie, so created in 1701. . . . + +"Stevenson would have been delighted to acknowledge his +relationship, remote though it was, to 'the Wolf of Badenoch,' who +burned Elgin Cathedral without the Earl of Kildare's excuse that he +thought the Bishop was in it; and to the Wolf's son, the Victor of +Harlaw [and] to his nephew 'John O'Coull,' Constable of France. . . +. Also among Tusitala's kin may be noted, in addition to the later +Gordons of Gight, the Tiger Earl of Crawford, familiarly known as +'Earl Beardie,' the 'Wicked Master' of the same line, who was +fatally stabbed by a Dundee cobbler 'for taking a stoup of drink +from him'; Lady Jean Lindsay, who ran away with 'a common jockey +with the horn,' and latterly became a beggar; David Lindsay, the +last Laird of Edzell [a lichtsome Lindsay fallen on evil days], who +ended his days as hostler at a Kirkwall inn, and 'Mussel Mou'ed +Charlie,' the Jacobite ballad-singer. + +"Stevenson always believed that he had a strong spiritual affinity +to Robert Fergusson. It is more than probable that there was a +distant maternal affinity as well. Margaret Forbes, the mother of +Sir James Elphinstone, the purchaser of Logie, has not been +identified, but it is probable she was of the branch of the +Tolquhon Forbeses who previously owned Logie. Fergusson's mother, +Elizabeth Forbes, was the daughter of a Kildrummy tacksman, who by +constant tradition is stated to have been of the house of Tolquhon. +It would certainly be interesting if this suggested connection +could be proved." (5) + + +"From his Highland ancestors," says the QUARTERLY REVIEW, "Louis +drew the strain of Celtic melancholy with all its perils and +possibilities, and its kinship, to the mood of day-dreaming, which +has flung over so many of his pages now the vivid light wherein +figures imagined grew as real as flesh and blood, and yet, again, +the ghostly, strange, lonesome, and stinging mist under whose spell +we see the world bewitched, and every object quickens with a throb +of infectious terror." + +Here, as in many other cases, we see how the traits of ancestry +reappear and transform other strains, strangely the more remote +often being the strongest and most persistent and wonderful. + +"It is through his father, strange as it may seem," says Mr +Baildon, "that Stevenson gets the Celtic elements so marked in his +person, character, and genius; for his father's pedigree runs back +to the Highland clan Macgregor, the kin of Rob Roy. Stevenson thus +drew in Celtic strains from both sides - from the Balfours and the +Stevensons alike - and in his strange, dreamy, beautiful, and often +far-removed fancies we have the finest and most effective witness +of it." + +Mr William Archer, in his own characteristic way, has brought the +inheritances from the two sides of the house into more direct +contact and contrast in an article he wrote in THE DAILY CHRONICLE +on the appearance of the LETTERS TO FAMILY AND FRIENDS. + + +"These letters show," he says, "that Stevenson's was not one of +those sunflower temperaments which turn by instinct, not effort, +towards the light, and are, as Mr Francis Thompson puts it, +'heartless and happy, lackeying their god.' The strains of his +heredity were very curiously, but very clearly, mingled. It may +surprise some readers to find him speaking of 'the family evil, +despondency,' but he spoke with knowledge. He inherited from his +father not only a stern Scottish intentness on the moral aspect of +life ('I would rise from the dead to preach'), but a marked +disposition to melancholy and hypochondria. From his mother, on +the other hand, he derived, along with his physical frailty, a +resolute and cheery stoicism. These two elements in his nature +fought many a hard fight, and the besieging forces from without - +ill-health, poverty, and at one time family dissensions - were by +no means without allies in the inner citadel of his soul. His +spirit was courageous in the truest sense of the word: by effort +and conviction, not by temperamental insensibility to fear. It is +clear that there was a period in his life (and that before the +worst of his bodily ills came upon him) when he was often within +measurable distance of Carlylean gloom. He was twenty-four when he +wrote thus, from Swanston, to Mrs Sitwell: + +"'It is warmer a bit; but my body is most decrepit, and I can just +manage to be cheery and tread down hypochondria under foot by work. +I lead such a funny life, utterly without interest or pleasure +outside of my work: nothing, indeed, but work all day long, except +a short walk alone on the cold hills, and meals, and a couple of +pipes with my father in the evening. It is surprising how it suits +me, and how happy I keep.' + + +"This is the serenity which arises, not from the absence of +fuliginous elements in the character, but from a potent smoke- +consuming faculty, and an inflexible will to use it. Nine years +later he thus admonishes his backsliding parent: + + +"'MY DEAR MOTHER, - I give my father up. I give him a parable: +that the Waverley novels are better reading for every day than the +tragic LIFE. And he takes it back-side foremost, and shakes his +head, and is gloomier than ever. Tell him that I give him up. I +don't want no such a parent. This is not the man for my money. I +do not call that by the name of religion which fills a man with +bile. I write him a whole letter, bidding him beware of extremes, +and telling him that his gloom is gallows-worthy; and I get back an +answer -. Perish the thought of it. + +"'Here am I on the threshold of another year, when, according to +all human foresight, I should long ago have been resolved into my +elements: here am I, who you were persuaded was born to disgrace +you - and, I will do you the justice to add, on no such +insufficient grounds - no very burning discredit when all is done; +here am I married, and the marriage recognised to be a blessing of +the first order. A1 at Lloyd's. There is he, at his not first +youth, able to take more exercise than I at thirty-three, and +gaining a stone's weight, a thing of which I am incapable. There +are you; has the man no gratitude? . . . + +"'Even the Shorter Catechism, not the merriest epitome of religion, +and a work exactly as pious although not quite so true as the +multiplication table - even that dry-as-dust epitome begins with a +heroic note. What is man's chief end? Let him study that; and ask +himself if to refuse to enjoy God's kindest gifts is in the spirit +indicated.' + + +"As may be judged from this half-playful, half-serious +remonstrance, Stevenson's relation to his parents was eminently +human and beautiful. The family dissensions above alluded to +belonged only to a short but painful period, when the father could +not reconcile himself to the discovery that the son had ceased to +accept the formulas of Scottish Calvinism. In the eyes of the +older man such heterodoxy was for the moment indistinguishable from +atheism; but he soon arrived at a better understanding of his son's +position. Nothing appears more unmistakably in these letters than +the ingrained theism of Stevenson's way of thought. The poet, the +romancer within him, revolted from the conception of formless +force. A personal deity was a necessary character in the drama, as +he conceived it. And his morality, though (or inasmuch as) it +dwelt more on positive kindness than on negative lawlessness, was, +as he often insisted, very much akin to the morality of the New +Testament." + + +Anyway it is clear that much in the interminglings of blood we CAN +trace, may go to account for not a little in Stevenson. His +peculiar interest in the enormities of old-time feuds, the +excesses, the jealousies, the queer psychological puzzles, the +desire to work on the outlying and morbid, and even the unallowed +and unhallowed, for purposes of romance - the delight in dealing +with revelations of primitive feeling and the out-bursts of the +mere natural man always strangely checked and diverted by the +uprise of other tendencies to the dreamy, impalpable, vague, weird +and horrible. There was the undoubted Celtic element in him +underlying what seemed foreign to it, the disregard of +conventionality in one phase, and the falling under it in another - +the reaction and the retreat from what had attracted and interested +him, and then the return upon it, as with added zest because of the +retreat. The confessed Hedonist, enjoying life and boasting of it +just a little, and yet the Puritan in him, as it were, all the time +eyeing himself as from some loophole of retreat, and then +commenting on his own behaviour as a Hedonist and Bohemian. This +clearly was not what most struck Beerbohm Tree, during the time he +was in close contact with Stevenson, while arranging the production +of BEAU AUSTIN at the Haymarket Theatre, for he sees, or confesses +to seeing, only one side, and that the most assertive, and in a +sense, unreal one: + + +"Stevenson," says Mr Tree, "always seemed to me an epicure in life. +He was always intent on extracting the last drop of honey from +every flower that came in his way. He was absorbed in the business +of the moment, however trivial. As a companion, he was +delightfully witty; as a personality, as much a creature of romance +as his own creations." + + +This is simple, and it looks sincere; but it does not touch 'tother +side, or hint at, not to say, solve the problem of Stevenson's +personality. Had he been the mere Hedonist he could never have +done the work he did. Mr Beerbohm Tree certainly did not there see +far or all round. + +Miss Simpson says: + + +"Mr Henley recalls him to Edinburgh folk as he was and as the true +Stevenson would have wished to be known - a queer, inexplicable +creature, his Celtic blood showing like a vein of unknown metal in +the stolid, steady rock of his sure-founded Stevensonian pedigree. +His cousin and model, 'Bob' Stevenson, the art critic, showed that +this foreign element came from the men who lit our guiding lights +for seamen, not from the gentle-blooded Balfours. + +"Mr Henley is right in saying that the gifted boy had not much +humour. When the joke was against himself he was very thin-skinned +and had a want of balance. This made him feel his honest father's +sensible remarks like the sting of a whip." + + +Miss Simpson then proceeds to say: + + +"The R. L. Stevenson of old Edinburgh days was a conceited, +egotistical youth, but a true and honest one: a youth full of fire +and sentiment, protesting he was misunderstood, though he was not. +Posing as 'Velvet Coat' among the slums, he did no good to himself. +He had not the Dickens aptitude for depicting the ways of life of +his adopted friends. When with refined judgment he wanted a figure +for a novel, he went back to the Bar he scorned in his callow days +and then drew in WEIR OF HERMISTON." + + + +CHAPTER V - TRAVELS + + + +HIS interest in engineering soon went - his mind full of stories +and fancies and human nature. As he had told his mother: he did +not care about finding what was "the strain on a bridge," he wanted +to know something of human beings. + +No doubt, much to the disappointment and grief of his father, who +wished him as an only son to carry on the traditions of the family, +though he had written two engineering essays of utmost promise, the +engineering was given up, and he consented to study law. He had +already contributed to College Magazines, and had had even a short +spell of editing one; of one of these he has given a racy account. +Very soon after his call to the Bar articles and essays from his +pen began to appear in MACMILLAN'S, and later, more regularly in +the CORNHILL. Careful readers soon began to note here the presence +of a new force. He had gone on the INLAND VOYAGE and an account of +it was in hand; and had done that tour in the Cevennes which he has +described under the title TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY IN THE CEVENNES, +with Modestine, sometimes doubting which was the donkey, but on +that tour a chill caught either developed a germ of lung disease +already present, or produced it; and the results unfortunately +remained. + +He never practised at the Bar, though he tells facetiously of his +one brief. He had chosen his own vocation, which was literature, +and the years which followed were, despite the delicacy which +showed itself, very busy years. He produced volume on volume. He +had written many stories which had never seen the light, but, as he +says, passed through the ordeal of the fire by more or less +circuitous ways. + +By this time some trouble and cause for anxiety had arisen about +the lungs, and trials of various places had been made. ORDERED +SOUTH suggests the Mediterranean, sunny Italy, the Riviera. Then a +sea-trip to America was recommended and undertaken. Unfortunately, +he got worse there, his original cause of trouble was complicated +with others, and the medical treatment given was stupid, and +exaggerated some of the symptoms instead of removing them, All +along - up, at all events, to the time of his settlement in Samoa - +Stevenson was more or less of an invalid. + +Indeed, were I ever to write an essay on the art of wisely "laying- +to," as the sailors say, I would point it by a reference to R. L. +Stevenson. For there is a wise way of "laying-to" that does not +imply inaction, but discreet, well-directed effort, against +contrary winds and rough seas, that is, amid obstacles and +drawbacks, and even ill-health, where passive and active may +balance and give effect to each other. Stevenson was by native +instinct and temperament a rover - a lover of adventure, of strange +by-ways, errant tracts (as seen in his INLAND VOYAGE and TRAVELS +WITH A DONKEY THROUGH THE CEVENNES - seen yet more, perhaps, in a +certain account of a voyage to America as a steerage passenger), +lofty mountain-tops, with stronger air, and strange and novel +surroundings. He would fain, like Ulysses, be at home in foreign +lands, making acquaintance with outlying races, with + + +"Cities of men, +And manners, climates, councils, governments: +Myself not least, but honoured of them all, +Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy." + + +If he could not move about as he would, he would invent, make fancy +serve him instead of experience. We thus owe something to the +staying and restraining forces in him, and a wise "laying-to" - for +his works, which are, in large part, finely-healthy, objective, and +in almost everything unlike the work of an invalid, yet, in some +degree, were but the devices to beguile the burdens of an invalid's +days. Instead of remaining in our climate, it might be, to lie +listless and helpless half the day, with no companion but his own +thoughts and fancies (not always so pleasant either, if, like +Frankenstein's monster, or, better still like the imp in the bottle +in the ARABIAN NIGHTS, you cannot, once for all liberate them, and +set them adrift on their own charges to visit other people), he +made a home in the sweeter air and more steady climate of the South +Pacific, where, under the Southern Cross, he could safely and +beneficially be as active as he would be involuntarily idle at +home, or work only under pressure of hampering conditions. That +was surely an illustration of the true "laying-to" with an +unaffectedly brave, bright resolution in it. + + + +CHAPTER VI - SOME EARLIER LETTERS + + + +CARLYLE was wont to say that, next to a faithful portrait, familiar +letters were the best medium to reveal a man. The letters must +have been written with no idea of being used for this end, however +- free, artless, the unstudied self-revealings of mind and heart. +Now, these letters of R. L. Stevenson, written to his friends in +England, have a vast value in this way - they reveal the man - +reveal him in his strength and his weakness - his ready gift in +pleasing and adapting himself to those with whom he corresponded, +and his great power at once of adapting himself to his +circumstances and of humorously rising superior to them. When he +was ill and almost penniless in San Francisco, he could give Mr +Colvin this account of his daily routine: + + +"Any time between eight and half-past nine in the morning a slender +gentleman in an ulster, with a volume buttoned into the breast of +it, maybe observed leaving No. 608 Bush and descending Powell with +an active step. The gentleman is R. L. Stevenson; the volume +relates to Benjamin Franklin, on whom he meditates one of his +charming essays. He descends Powell, crosses Market, and descends +in Sixth on a branch of the original Pine Street Coffee-House, no +less. . . . He seats himself at a table covered with waxcloth, and +a pampered menial of High-Dutch extraction, and, indeed, as yet +only partially extracted, lays before him a cup of coffee, a roll, +and a pat of butter, all, to quote the deity, very good. A while +ago, and R. L. Stevenson used to find the supply of butter +insufficient; but he has now learned the art to exactitude, and +butter and roll expire at the same moment. For this rejection he +pays ten cents, or fivepence sterling. + +"Half an hour later, the inhabitants of Bush Street observed the +same slender gentleman armed, like George Washington, with his +little hatchet, splitting kindling, and breaking coal for his fire. +He does this quasi-publicly upon the window-sill; but this is not +to be attributed to any love of notoriety, though he is indeed vain +of his prowess with the hatchet (which he persists in calling an +axe), and daily surprised at the perpetuation of his fingers. The +reason is this: That the sill is a strong supporting beam, and +that blows of the same emphasis in other parts of his room might +knock the entire shanty into hell. Thenceforth, for from three +hours, he is engaged darkly with an ink-bottle. Yet he is not +blacking his boots, for the only pair that he possesses are +innocent of lustre, and wear the natural hue of the material turned +up with caked and venerable slush. The youngest child of his +landlady remarks several times a day, as this strange occupant +enters or quits the house, 'Dere's de author.' Can it be that this +bright-haired innocent has found the true clue to the mystery? The +being in question is, at least, poor enough to belong to that +honourable craft." + + +Here are a few letters belonging to the winter of 1887-88, nearly +all written from Saranac Lake, in the Adirondacks, celebrated by +Emerson, and now a most popular holiday resort in the United +States, and were originally published in SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE. . . +"It should be said that, after his long spell of weakness at +Bournemouth, Stevenson had gone West in search of health among the +bleak hill summits - 'on the Canadian border of New York State, +very unsettled and primitive and cold.' He had made the voyage in +an ocean tramp, the LUDGATE HILL, the sort of craft which any +person not a born child of the sea would shun in horror. +Stevenson, however, had 'the finest time conceivable on board the +"strange floating menagerie."'" Thus he describes it in a letter +to Mr Henry James: + + +"Stallions and monkeys and matches made our cargo; and the vast +continent of these incongruities rolled the while like a haystack; +and the stallions stood hypnotised by the motion, looking through +the port at our dinner-table, and winked when the crockery was +broken; and the little monkeys stared at each other in their cages, +and were thrown overboard like little bluish babies; and the big +monkey, Jacko, scoured about the ship and rested willingly in my +arms, to the ruin of my clothing; and the man of the stallions made +a bower of the black tarpaulin, and sat therein at the feet of a +raddled divinity, like a picture on a box of chocolates; and the +other passengers, when they were not sick, looked on and laughed. +Take all this picture, and make it roll till the bell shall sound +unexpected notes and the fittings shall break loose in our +stateroom, and you have the voyage of the LUDGATE HILL. She +arrived in the port of New York without beer, porter, soda-water, +curacoa, fresh meat, or fresh water; and yet we lived, and we +regret her." + + +He discovered this that there is no joy in the Universe comparable +to life on a villainous ocean tramp, rolling through a horrible sea +in company with a cargo of cattle. + + +"I have got one good thing of my sea voyage; it is proved the sea +agrees heartily with me, and my mother likes it; so if I get any +better, or no worse, my mother will likely hire a yacht for a month +or so in the summer. Good Lord! what fun! Wealth is only useful +for two things: a yacht and a string quartette. For these two I +will sell my soul. Except for these I hold that 700 pounds a year +is as much as anybody can possibly want; and I have had more, so I +know, for the extra coins were of no use, excepting for illness, +which damns everything. I was so happy on board that ship, I could +not have believed it possible; we had the beastliest weather, and +many discomforts; but the mere fact of its being a tramp ship gave +us many comforts. We could cut about with the men and officers, +stay in the wheel-house, discuss all manner of things, and really +be a little at sea. And truly there is nothing else. I had +literally forgotten what happiness was, and the full mind - full of +external and physical things, not full of cares and labours, and +rot about a fellow's behaviour. My heart literally sang; I truly +care for nothing so much as for that. + +"To go ashore for your letters and hang about the pier among the +holiday yachtsmen - that's fame, that's glory - and nobody can take +it away." + + +At Saranac Lake the Stevensons lived in a "wind-beleaguered hill- +top hat-box of a house," which suited the invalid, but, on the +other hand, invalided his wife. Soon after getting there he +plunged into THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE. + + +"No thought have I now apart from it, and I have got along up to +page ninety-two of the draught with great interest. It is to me a +most seizing tale: there are some fantastic elements, the most is +a dead genuine human problem - human tragedy, I should say rather. +It will be about as long, I imagine, as KIDNAPPED. . . . I have +done most of the big work, the quarrel, duel between the brothers, +and the announcement of the death to Clementina and my Lord - +Clementina, Henry, and Mackellar (nicknamed Squaretoes) are really +very fine fellows; the Master is all I know of the devil; I have +known hints of him, in the world, but always cowards: he is as +bold as a lion, but with the same deadly, causeless duplicity I +have watched with so much surprise in my two cowards. 'Tis true, I +saw a hint of the same nature in another man who was not a coward; +but he had other things to attend to; the Master has nothing else +but his devilry." + + +His wife grows seriously ill, and Stevenson has to turn to +household work. + + +"Lloyd and I get breakfast; I have now, 10.15, just got the dishes +washed and the kitchen all clean, and sit down to give you as much +news as I have spirit for, after such an engagement. Glass is a +thing that really breaks my spirit; and I do not like to fail, and +with glass I cannot reach the work of my high calling - the +artist's." + + +In the midst of such domestic tasks and entanglements he writes THE +MASTER, and very characteristically gets dissatisfied with the last +parts, "which shame, perhaps degrade, the beginning." + +Of Mr Kipling this is his judgment - in the year 1890: + + +"Kipling is by far the most promising young man who has appeared +since - ahem - I appeared. He amazes me by his precocity and +various endowments. But he alarms me by his copiousness and haste. +He should shield his fire with both hands, 'and draw up all his +strength and sweetness in one ball.' ('Draw all his strength and +all his sweetness up into one ball'? I cannot remember Marvell's +words.) So the critics have been saying to me; but I was never +capable of - and surely never guilty of - such a debauch of +production. At this rate his works will soon fill the habitable +globe, and surely he was armed for better conflicts than these +succinct sketches and flying leaves of verse? I look on, I admire, +I rejoice for myself; but in a kind of ambition we all have for our +tongue and literature I am wounded. If I had this man's fertility +and courage, it seems to me I could heave a pyramid. + +"Well, we begin to be the old fogies now, and it was high time +SOMETHING rose to take our places. Certainly Kipling has the +gifts; the fairy godmothers were all tipsy at his christening. +What will he do with them?" + + +Of the rest of Stevenson's career we cannot speak at length, nor is +it needful. How in steady succession came his triumphs: came, +too, his trials from ill-health - how he spent winters at Davos +Platz, Bournemouth, and tried other places in America; and how, at +last, good fortune led him to the South Pacific. After many +voyagings and wanderings among the islands, he settled near Apia, +in Samoa, early in 1890, cleared some four hundred acres, and built +a house; where, while he wrote what delighted the English-speaking +race, he took on himself the defence of the natives against foreign +interlopers, writing under the title A FOOTNOTE TO HISTORY, the +most powerful EXPOSE of the mischief they had done and were doing +there. He was the beloved of the natives, as he made himself the +friend of all with whom he came in contact. There, as at home, he +worked - worked with the same determination and in the enjoyment of +better health. The obtaining idea with him, up to the end, as it +had been from early life, was a brave, resolute, cheerful endeavour +to make the best of it. + +"I chose Samoa instead of Honolulu," he told Mr W. H. Trigg, who +reports the talk in CASSELLS' MAGAZINE, "for the simple and +eminently satisfactory reason that it is less civilised. Can you +not conceive that it is awful fun?" His house was called +"Vailima," which means Five Waters in the Samoan, and indicates the +number of streams that flow by the spot. + + + +CHAPTER VII - THE VAILIMA LETTERS + + + +THE Vailima Letters, written to Mr Sidney Colvin and other friends, +are in their way delightful if not inimitable: and this, in spite +of the idea having occurred to him, that some use might hereafter +be made of these letters for publication purposes. There is, +indeed, as little trace of any change in the style through this as +well could be - the utterly familiar, easy, almost child-like flow +remains, unmarred by self-consciousness or tendency "to put it on." + +In June, 1892, Stevenson says: + + +"It came over me the other day suddenly that this diary of mine to +you would make good pickings after I am dead, and a man could make +some kind of a book out of it, without much trouble. So for God's +sake don't lose them, and they will prove a piece of provision for +'my floor old family,' as Simele calls it." + + +But their great charm remains: they are as free and gracious and +serious and playful and informal as before. Stevenson's traits of +character are all here: his largeness of heart, his delicacy, his +sympathy, his fun, his pathos, his boylike frolicsomeness, his fine +courage, his love of the sea (for he was by nature a sailor), his +passion for action and adventure despite his ill-health, his great +patience with others and fine adaptability to their temper (he says +that he never gets out of temper with those he has to do with), his +unbounded, big-hearted hopefulness, and fine perseverance in face +of difficulties. What could be better than the way in which he +tells that in January, 1892, when he had a bout of influenza and +was dictating ST IVES to his stepdaughter, Mrs Strong, he was +"reduced to dictating to her in the deaf-and-dumb alphabet"? - and +goes on: + + +"The amanuensis has her head quite turned, and believes herself to +be the author of this novel [AND IS TO SOME EXTENT. - A.M.] and as +the creature (!) has not been wholly useless in the matter [I TOLD +YOU SO! - A.M.] I propose to foster her vanity by a little +commemoration gift! . . . I shall tell you on some other occasion, +and when the A.M. is out of hearing, how VERY much I propose to +invest in this testimonial; but I may as well inform you at once +that I intend it to be cheap, sir - damned cheap! My idea of +running amanuenses is by praise, not pudding, flattery, and not +coins." + + +Truly, a rare and rich nature which could thus draw sunshine out of +its trials! - which, by aid of the true philosopher's stone of +cheerfulness and courage, could transmute the heavy dust and clay +to gold. + +His interests are so wide that he is sometimes pulled in different +and conflicting directions, as in the contest between his desire to +aid Mataafa and the other chiefs, and his literary work - between +letters to the TIMES about Samoan politics, and, say, DAVID +BALFOUR. Here is a characteristic bit in that strain: + + +"I have a good dose of the devil in my pipestem atomy; I have had +my little holiday outing in my kick at THE YOUNG CHEVALIER, and I +guess I can settle to DAVID BALFOUR, to-morrow or Friday like a +little man. I wonder if any one had ever more energy upon so +little strength? I know there is a frost; . . . but I mean to +break that frost inside two years, and pull off a big success, and +Vanity whispers in my ear that I have the strength. If I haven't, +whistle owre the lave o't! I can do without glory, and perhaps the +time is not far off when I can do without corn. It is a time +coming soon enough, anyway; and I have endured some two and forty +years without public shame, and had a good time as I did it. If +only I could secure a violent death, what a fine success! I wish +to die in my boots; no more Land of Counterpane for me. To be +drowned, to be shot, to be thrown from a horse - ay, to be hanged, +rather than pass again through that slow dissolution." + + +He would not consent to act the invalid unless the spring ran down +altogether; was keen for exercise and for mixing among men - his +native servants if no others were near by. Here is a bit of +confession and casuistry quite A LA Stevenson: + + +"To come down covered with mud and drenched with sweat and rain +after some hours in the bush, change, rub down, and take a chair in +the verandah, is to taste a quiet conscience. And the strange +thing that I mark is this: If I go out and make sixpence, bossing +my labourers and plying the cutlass or the spade, idiot conscience +applauds me; if I sit in the house and make twenty pounds, idiot +conscience wails over my neglect and the day wasted." + + +His relish for companionship is indeed strong. At one place he +says: + + +"God knows I don't care who I chum with perhaps I like sailors +best, but to go round and sue and sneak to keep a crowd together - +never!" + + +If Stevenson's natural bent was to be an explorer, a mountain- +climber, or a sailor - to sail wide seas, or to range on mountain- +tops to gain free and extensive views - yet he inclines well to +farmer work, and indeed, has to confess it has a rare attraction +for him. + + +"I went crazy over outdoor work," he says at one place, "and had at +last to confine myself to the house, or literature must have gone +by the board. NOTHING is so interesting as weeding, clearing, and +path-making: the oversight of labourers becomes a disease. It is +quite an effort not to drop into the farmer; and it does make you +feel so well." + + +The odd ways of these Samoans, their pride of position, their +vices, their virtues, their vanities, their small thefts, their +tricks, their delightful INSOUCIANCE sometimes, all amused him. He +found in them a fine field of study and observation - a source of +fun and fund of humanity - as this bit about the theft of some +piglings will sufficiently prove: + + +"Last night three piglings were stolen from one of our pig-pens. +The great Lafaele appeared to my wife uneasy, so she engaged him in +conversation on the subject, and played upon him the following +engaging trick: You advance your two forefingers towards the +sitter's eyes; he closes them, whereupon you substitute (on his +eyelids) the fore and middle fingers of the left hand, and with +your right (which he supposes engaged) you tap him on the head and +back. When you let him open his eyes, he sees you withdrawing the +two forefingers. 'What that?' asked Lafaele. 'My devil,' says +Fanny. 'I wake um, my devil. All right now. He go catch the man +that catch my pig.' About an hour afterwards Lafaele came for +further particulars. 'Oh, all right,' my wife says. 'By-and-by +that man be sleep, devil go sleep same place. By-and-by that man +plenty sick. I no care. What for he take my pig?' Lafaele cares +plenty; I don't think he is the man, though he may be; but he knows +him, and most likely will eat some of that pig to-night. He will +not eat with relish.'" + + +Yet in spite of this R. L. Stevenson declares that: + + +"They are a perfectly honest people: nothing of value has ever +been taken from our house, where doors and windows are always wide +open; and upon one occasion when white ants attacked the silver +chest, the whole of my family treasure lay spread upon the floor of +the hall for two days unguarded." + + +Here is a bit on a work of peace, a reflection on a day's weeding +at Vailima - in its way almost as touching as any: + + +"I wonder if any one had ever the same attitude to Nature as I +hold, and have held for so long? This business fascinates me like +a tune or a passion; yet all the while I thrill with a strong +distaste. The horror of the thing, objective and subjective, is +always present to my mind; the horror of creeping things, a +superstitious horror of the void and the powers about me, the +horror of my own devastation and continual murders. The life of +the plants comes through my finger-tips, their struggles go to my +heart like supplications. I feel myself blood-boltered; then I +look back on my cleared grass, and count myself an ally in a fair +quarrel, and make stout my heart." + + +Here, again, is the way in which he celebrates an act of friendly +kindness on the part of Mr Gosse: + + +"MY DEAR GOSSE, - Your letter was to me such a bright spot that I +answer it right away to the prejudice of other correspondents or - +dants (don't know how to spell it) who have prior claims. . . . It +is the history of our kindnesses that alone makes this world +tolerable. If it were not for that, for the effect of kind words, +kind looks, kind letters, multiplying, spreading, making one happy +through another and bringing forth benefits, some thirty, some +fifty, some a thousandfold, I should be tempted to think our life a +practical jest in the worst possible spirit. So your four pages +have confirmed my philosophy as well as consoled my heart in these +ill hours." + + + +CHAPTER VIII - WORK OF LATER YEARS + + + +MR HAMMERTON, in his STEVENSONIANA (pp. 323-4), has given the +humorous inscriptions on the volumes of his works which Stevenson +presented to Dr Trudeau, who attended him when he was in Saranac in +1887-88 - very characteristic in every way, and showing fully +Stevenson's fine appreciation of any attention or service. On the +DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE volume he wrote: + + +"Trudeau was all the winter at my side: +I never saw the nose of Mr Hyde." + + +And on KIDNAPPED is this: + + +"Here is the one sound page of all my writing, +The one I'm proud of and that I delight in." + + +Stevenson was exquisite in this class of efforts, and were they all +collected they would form indeed, a fine supplement and +illustration of the leading lesson of his essays - the true art of +pleasing others, and of truly pleasing one's self at the same time. +To my thinking the finest of all in this line is the legal (?) deed +by which he conveyed his birthday to little Miss Annie Ide, the +daughter of Mr H. C. Ide, a well-known American, who was for +several years a resident of Upolo, in Samoa, first as Land +Commissioner, and later as Chief Justice under the joint +appointment of England, Germany, and the United States. While +living at Apia, Mr Ide and his family were very intimate with the +family of R. L. Stevenson. Little Annie was a special pet and +protege of Stevenson and his wife. After the return of the Ides to +their American home, Stevenson "deeded" to Annie his birthday in +the following unique document: + + +I, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, advocate of the Scots Bar, author of THE +MASTER OF BALLANTRAE and MORAL EMBLEMS, civil engineer, sole owner +and patentee of the palace and plantation known as Vailima, in the +island of Upolo, Samoa, a British subject, being in sound mind, and +pretty well, I thank you, in mind and body; + +In consideration that Miss Annie H. Ide, daughter of H. C. Ide, in +the town of Saint Johnsbury, in the County of Caledonia, in the +State of Vermont, United States of America, was born, out of all +reason, upon Christmas Day, and is, therefore, out of all justice, +denied the consolation and profit of a proper birthday; + +And considering that I, the said Robert Louis Stevenson, have +attained the age when we never mention it, and that I have now no +further use for a birthday of any description; + +And in consideration that I have met H. C. Ide, the father of the +said Annie H. Ide, and found him as white a land commissioner as I +require, I have transferred, and do hereby transfer, to the said +Annie H. Ide, all and whole of my rights and privileges in the 13th +day of November, formerly my birthday, now, hereby and henceforth, +the birthday of the said Annie H. Ide, to have, hold, exercise, and +enjoy the same in the customary manner, by the sporting of fine +raiment, eating of rich meats, and receipt of gifts, compliments, +and copies of verse, according to the manner of our ancestors; + +And I direct the said Annie H. Ide to add to the said name of Annie +H. Ide the name of Louisa - at least in private - and I charge her +to use my said birthday with moderation and humanity, ET TAMQUAM +BONA FILIA FAMILIAS, the said birthday not being so young as it +once was and having carried me in a very satisfactory manner since +I can remember; + +And in case the said Annie H. Ide shall neglect or contravene +either of the above conditions, I hereby revoke the donation and +transfer my rights in the said birthday to the President of the +United States of America for the time being. + +In witness whereof I have hereto set my hand and seal this 19th day +of June, in the year of grace eighteen hundred and ninety-one. + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. [Seal.] +WITNESS, LLOYD OSBOURNE. +WITNESS, HAROLD WATTS. + + +He died in Samoa in December 1894 - not from phthisis or anything +directly connected with it, but from the bursting of a blood-vessel +and suffusion of blood on the brain. He had up to the moment +almost of his sudden and unexpected death been busy on WEIR OF +HERMISTON and ST IVES, which he left unfinished - the latter having +been brought to a conclusion by Mr Quiller-Couch. + + + +CHAPTER IX - SOME CHARACTERISTICS + + + +IN Stevenson we lost one of the most powerful writers of our day, +as well as the most varied in theme and style. When I use the word +"powerful," I do not mean merely the producing of the most striking +or sensational results, nor the facility of weaving a fascinating +or blood-curdling plot; I mean the writer who seemed always to have +most in reserve - a secret fund of power and fascination which +always pointed beyond the printed page, and set before the +attentive and careful reader a strange but fascinating PERSONALITY. +Other authors have done that in measure. There was Hawthorne, +behind whose writings there is always the wistful, cold, far- +withdrawn spectator of human nature - eerie, inquisitive, and, I +had almost said, inquisitorial - a little bloodless, eerie, weird, +and cobwebby. There was Dr Wendell Holmes, with his problems of +heredity, of race-mixture and weird inoculation, as in ELSIE VENNER +and THE GUARDIAN ANGEL, and there were Poe and Charles Whitehead. +Stevenson, in a few of his writings - in one of the MERRY MEN +chapters and in DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE, and, to some extent, in THE +MASTER OF BALLANTRAE - showed that he could enter on the obscure +and, in a sense, weird and metaphysical elements in human life; +though always there was, too, a touch at least of gloomy +suggestion, from which, as it seemed, he could not there wholly +escape. But always, too, there was a touch that suggests the +universal. + +Even in the stories that would be classed as those of incident and +adventure merely, TREASURE ISLAND, KIDNAPPED, and the rest, there +is a sense as of some unaffected but fine symbolism that somehow +touches something of possibility in yourself as you read. The +simplest narrative from his hand proclaimed itself a deep study in +human nature - its motives tendencies, and possibilities. In these +stories there is promise at once of the most realistic imagination, +the most fantastic romance, keen insights into some sides of human +nature, and weird fancies, as well as the most delicate and dainty +pictures of character. And this is precisely what we have - always +with a vein of the finest autobiography - a kind of select and +indirect self-revelation - often with a touch of quaintness, a +subdued humour, and sweet-blooded vagary, if we may be allowed the +word, which make you feel towards the writer as towards a friend. +He was too much an artist to overdo this, and his strength lies +there, that generally he suggests and turns away at the right +point, with a smile, as you ask for MORE. Look how he sets, half +slyly, these words into the mouth of David Balfour on his first +meeting with Catriona in one of the steep wynds or closes off the +High Street of Edinburgh: + + +"There is no greater wonder than the way the face of a young woman +fits in a man's mind, and stays there, and he never could tell you +why: it just seems it was the thing he wanted." + + +Take this alongside of his remark made to his mother while still a +youth - "that he did not care to understand the strain on a bridge" +(when he tried to study engineering); what he wanted was something +with human nature in it. His style, in his essays, etc., where he +writes in his own person, is most polished, full of phrases finely +drawn; when he speaks through others, as in KIDNAPPED and DAVID +BALFOUR, it is still fine and effective, and generally it is fairly +true to the character, with cunning glimpses, nevertheless, of his +own temper and feeling too. He makes us feel his confidants and +friends, as has been said. One could almost construct a biography +from his essays and his novels - the one would give us the facts of +his life suffused with fancy and ideal colour, humour and fine +observation not wanting; the other would give us the history of his +mental and moral being and development, and of the traits and +determinations which he drew from along a lengthened line of +progenitors. How characteristic it is of him - a man who for so +many years suffered as an invalid - that he should lay it down that +the two great virtues, including all others, were cheerfulness and +delight in labour. + +One writer has very well said on this feature in Stevenson: + + +"Other authors have struggled bravely against physical weakness, +but their work has not usually been of a creative order, dependent +for its success on high animal spirits. They have written +histories, essays, contemplative or didactic poems, works which may +more or less be regarded as 'dull narcotics numbing pain.' But +who, in so fragile a frame as Robert Louis Stevenson's, has +retained such indomitable elasticity, such fertility of invention, +such unflagging energy, not merely to collect and arrange, but to +project and body forth? Has any true 'maker' been such an +incessant sufferer? From his childhood, as he himself said apropos +of the CHILD'S GARDEN, he could 'speak with less authority of +gardens than of that other "land of counterpane."' There were, +indeed, a few years of adolescence during which his health was +tolerable, but they were years of apprenticeship to life and art +('pioching,' as he called it), not of serious production. Though +he was a precocious child, his genius ripened slowly, and it was +just reaching maturity when the 'wolverine,' as he called his +disease, fixed its fangs in his flesh. From that time forward not +only did he live with death at his elbow in an almost literal sense +(he used to carry his left arm in a sling lest a too sudden +movement should bring on a haemorrhage), but he had ever-recurring +intervals of weeks and months during which he was totally unfit for +work; while even at the best of times he had to husband his +strength most jealously. Add to all this that he was a slow and +laborious writer, who would take more pains with a phrase than +Scott with a chapter - then look at the stately shelf of his works, +brimful of impulse, initiative, and the joy of life, and say +whether it be an exaggeration to call his tenacity and fortitude +unique!" + + +Samoa, with its fine climate, prolonged his life - we had fain +hoped that in that air he found so favourable he might have lived +for many years, to add to the precious stock of innocent delight he +has given to the world - to do yet more and greater. It was not to +be. They buried him, with full native honours as to a chief, on +the top of Vaea mountain, 1300 feet high - a road for the coffin to +pass being cut through the woods on the slopes of the hill. There +he has a resting-place not all unfit - for he sought the pure and +clearer air on the heights from whence there are widest prospects; +yet not in the spot he would have chosen - for his heart was at +home, and not very long before his death he sang, surely with +pathetic reference now: + + +"Spring shall come, come again, calling up the moorfowl, +Spring shall bring the sun and rain, bring the bees and flowers, +Red shall the heather bloom over hill and valley, +Soft flow the stream thro' the even-flowing hours; +Fair the day shine, as it shone upon my childhood - +Fair shine the day on the house with open door; +Birds come and cry there, and twitter in the chimney - +But I go for ever and come again no more." + + + +CHAPTER X - A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON + + + +A FEW weeks after his death, the mail from Samoa, brought to +Stevenson's friends, myself among the number, a precious, if +pathetic, memorial of the master. It is in the form of "A Letter +to Mr Stevenson's Friends," by his stepson, Mr Lloyd Osbourne, and +bears the motto from Walt Whitman, "I have been waiting for you +these many years. Give me your hand and welcome." Mr Osbourne +gives a full account of the last hours. + + +"He wrote hard all that morning of the last day; his half-finished +book, HERMISTON, he judged the best he had ever written, and the +sense of successful effort made him buoyant and happy as nothing +else could. In the afternoon the mail fell to be answered - not +business correspondence, for this was left till later - but replies +to the long, kindly letters of distant friends received but two +days since, and still bright in memory. At sunset he came +downstairs; rallied his wife about the forebodings she could not +shake off; talked of a lecturing tour to America that he was eager +to make, 'as he was now so well'; and played a game of cards with +her to drive away her melancholy. He said he was hungry; begged +her assistance to help him make a salad for the evening meal; and, +to enhance the little feast he brought up a bottle of old Burgundy +from the cellar. He was helping his wife on the verandah, and +gaily talking, when suddenly he put both hands to his head and +cried out, 'What's that?' Then he asked quickly, 'Do I look +strange?' Even as he did so he fell on his knees beside her. He +was helped into the great hall, between his wife and his body- +servant, Sosimo, losing consciousness instantly as he lay back in +the armchair that had once been his grandfather's. Little time was +lost in bringing the doctors - Anderson of the man-of-war, and his +friend, Dr Funk. They looked at him and shook their heads; they +laboured strenuously, and left nothing undone. But he had passed +the bounds of human skill. He had grown so well and strong, that +his wasted lungs were unable to bear the stress of returning +health." + + +Then 'tis told how the Rev. Mr Clarke came and prayed by him; and +how, soon after, the chiefs were summoned, and came, bringing their +fine mats, which, laid on the body, almost hid the Union jack in +which it had been wrapped. One of the old Mataafa chiefs, who had +been in prison, and who had been one of those who worked on the +making of the "Road of the Loving Heart" (the road of gratitude +which the chiefs had made up to Mr Stevenson's house as a mark of +their appreciation of his efforts on their behalf), came and +crouched beside the body and said: + + +"I am only a poor Samoan, and ignorant. Others are rich, and can +give Tusitala (6) the parting presents of rich, fine mats; I am +poor, and can give nothing this last day he receives his friends. +Yet I am not afraid to come and look the last time in my friend's +face, never to see him more till we meet with God. Behold! +Tusitala is dead; Mataafa is also dead. These two great friends +have been taken by God. When Mataafa was taken, who was our +support but Tusitala? We were in prison, and he cared for us. We +were sick, and he made us well. We were hungry, and he fed us. +The day was no longer than his kindness. You are great people, and +full of love. Yet who among you is so great as Tusitala? What is +your love to his love? Our clan was Mataafa's clan, for whom I +speak this day; therein was Tusitala also. We mourn them both." + +A select company of Samoans would not be deterred, and watched by +the body all night, chanting songs, with bits of Catholic prayers; +and in the morning the work began of clearing a path through the +wood on the hill to the spot on the crown where Mr Stevenson had +expressed a wish to be buried. The following prayer, which Mr +Stevenson had written and read aloud to his family only the night +before, was read by Mr Clarke in the service: + + +"We beseech thee, Lord, to behold us with favour, folk of many +families and nations, gathered together in the peace of this roof; +weak men and women, subsisting under the covert of Thy patience. +Be patient still; suffer us yet a while longer - with our broken +purposes of good, with our idle endeavours against evil - suffer us +a while longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better. +Bless to us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these +must be taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our +friends; be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest: if any +awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when the day +returns to us, our Sun and Comforter, call us up with morning faces +and with morning hearts - eager to labour - eager to be happy, if +happiness shall be our portion; and if the day be marked for +sorrow, strong to endure it. + +"We thank Thee and praise Thee, and in the words of Him to whom +this day is sacred, close our oblations." + + +Mr Bazzet M. Haggard, H.B.M., Land-Commissioner, tells, by way of +reminiscence, the story of "The Road of Good Heart," how it came to +be built, and of the great feast Mr Stevenson gave at the close of +the work, at which, in the course of his speech, he said: + + +"You are all aware in some degree of what has happened. You know +those chiefs to have been prisoners; you perhaps know that during +the term of their confinement I had it in my power to do them +certain favours. One thing some of you cannot know, that they were +immediately repaid by answering attentions. They were liberated by +the new Administration. . . . As soon as they were free men - +owing no man anything - instead of going home to their own places +and families, they came to me. They offered to do this work (to +make this road) for me as a free gift, without hire, without +supplies, and I was tempted at first to refuse their offer. I knew +the country to be poor; I knew famine threatening; I knew their +families long disorganised for want of supervision. Yet I +accepted, because I thought the lesson of that road might be more +useful to Samoa than a thousand bread-fruit trees, and because to +myself it was an exquisite pleasure to receive that which was so +handsomely offered. It is now done; you have trod it to-day in +coming hither. It has been made for me by chiefs; some of them +old, some sick, all newly delivered from a harassing confinement, +and in spite of weather unusually hot and insalubrious. I have +seen these chiefs labour valiantly with their own hands upon the +work, and I have set up over it, now that it is finished the name +of 'The Road of Gratitude' (the road of loving hearts), and the +names of those that built it. 'In perpetuam memoriam,' we say, and +speak idly. At least, as long as my own life shall be spared it +shall be here perpetuated; partly for my pleasure and in my +gratitude; partly for others continually to publish the lesson of +this road." + + +And turning to the chiefs, Mr Stevenson said: + + +"I will tell you, chiefs, that when I saw you working on that road, +my heart grew warm; not with gratitude only, but with hope. It +seemed to me that I read the promise of something good for Samoa; +it seemed to me as I looked at you that you were a company of +warriors in a battle, fighting for the defence of our common +country against all aggression. For there is a time to fight and a +time to dig. You Samoans may fight, you may conquer twenty times, +and thirty times, and all will be in vain. There is but one way to +defend Samoa. Hear it, before it is too late. It is to make roads +and gardens, and care for your trees, and sell their produce +wisely; and, in one word, to occupy and use your country. If you +do not, others will. . . . + +"I love Samoa and her people. I love the land. I have chosen it +to be my home while I live, and my grave after I am dead, and I +love the people, and have chosen them to be my people, to live and +die with. And I see that the day is come now of the great battle; +of the great and the last opportunity by which it shall be decided +whether you are to pass away like those other races of which I have +been speaking, or to stand fast and have your children living on +and honouring your memory in the land you received of your +fathers." + + +Mr James H. Mulligan, U.S. Consul, told of the feast of +Thanksgiving Day on the 29th November prior to Mr Stevenson's +death, and how at great pains he had procured for it the necessary +turkey, and how Mrs Stevenson had found a fair substitute for the +pudding. In the course of his speech in reply to an unexpected +proposal of "The Host," Mr Stevenson said: + + +"There on my right sits she who has but lately from our own loved +native land come back to me - she to whom, with no lessening of +affection to those others to whom I cling, I love better than all +the world besides - my mother. From the opposite end of the table, +my wife, who has been all in all to me, when the days were very +dark, looks to-night into my eyes - while we have both grown a bit +older - with undiminished and undiminishing affection. + +"Childless, yet on either side of me sits that good woman, my +daughter, and the stalwart man, my son, and both have been and are +more than son and daughter to me, and have brought into my life +mirth and beauty. Nor is this all. There sits the bright boy dear +to my heart, full of the flow and the spirits of boyhood, so that I +can even know that for a time at least we have still the voice of a +child in the house." + + +Mr A. W. Mackay gives an account of the funeral and a description +of the burial-place, ending: + + +"Tofa Tusitala! Sleep peacefully! on thy mountain-top, alone in +Nature's sanctity, where the wooddove's note, the moaning of the +waves as they break unceasingly on the distant reef, and the +sighing of the winds in the distant tavai trees chant their +requiem." + + +The Rev. Mr Clarke tells of the constant and active interest Mr +Stevenson took in the missionaries and their work, often aiding +them by his advice and fine insight into the character of the +natives; and a translation follows of a dirge by one of the chiefs, +so fine that we must give it: + + +I. + +"Listen, O this world, as I tell of the disaster +That befell in the late afternoon; +That broke like a wave of the sea +Suddenly and swiftly, blinding our eyes. +Alas for Loia who speaks tears in his voice! + +REFRAIN - Groan and weep, O my heart, in its sorrow. +Alas for Tusitala, who rests in the forest! +Aimlessly we wait, and sorrowing. Will he again return? +Lament, O Vailima, waiting and ever waiting! +Let us search and inquire of the captain of ships, +'Be not angry, but has not Tusitala come?' + +II. + +"Teuila, sorrowing one, come thou hither! +Prepare me a letter, and I will carry it. +Let her Majesty Victoria be told +That Tusitala, the loving one, has been taken hence. + +REFRAIN - Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + +III. + +"Alas! my heart weeps with anxious grief +As I think of the days before us: +Of the white men gathering for the Christmas assembly! +Alas for Aolele! left in her loneliness, +And the men of Vailima, who weep together +Their leader - their leader being taken. + +REFRAIN - Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + +IV. + +"Alas! O my heart! it weeps unceasingly +When I think of his illness +Coming upon him with fatal swiftness. +Would that it waited a glance or a word from him, +Or some token, some token from us of our love. + +REFRAIN - Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc. + +V. + +"Grieve, O my heart! I cannot bear to look on +All the chiefs who are there now assembling: +Alas, Tusitala! Thou art not here! +I look hither and thither in vain for thee. + +REFRAIN - Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc." + + +And the little booklet closes with Mr Stevenson's own lines: + + +"REQUIEM. + +Under the wide and starry sky, +Dig the grave and let me lie; +Glad did I live and gladly die, +And I laid me down with a will. +This be the verse you grave for me: +'Here he lies where he longed to be; +Home is the sailor, home from sea; +And the hunter home from the hill.'" + + +Every touch tells here was a man, with heart and head, with soul +and mind intent on the loftiest things; simple, great, + + +"Like one of the simple great ones gone +For ever and ever by. + +His character towered after all far above his books; great and +beautiful though they were. Ready for friendship; from all +meanness free. So, too, the Samoans felt. This, surely, was what +Goethe meant when he wrote: + + +"The clear head and stout heart, +However far they roam, +Yet in every truth have part, +Are everywhere at home." + + +His manliness, his width of sympathy, his practicality, his range +of interests were in nothing more seen than in his contributions to +the history of Samoa, as specially exhibited in A FOOTNOTE TO +HISTORY and his letters to the TIMES. He was, on this side, in no +sense a dreamer, but a man of acute observation and quick eye for +passing events and the characters that were in them with sympathy +equal to his discernments. His portraits of certain Germans and +others in these writings, and his power of tracing effects to +remote and underlying causes, show sufficiently what he might have +done in the field of history, had not higher voices called him. +His adaptation to the life in Samoa, and his assumption of the +semi-patriarchal character in his own sphere there, were only +tokens of the presence of the same traits as have just been dwelt +on. + + + +CHAPTER XI - MISS STUBBS' RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE + + + +MRS STRONG, in her chapter of TABLE TALK IN MEMORIES OF VAILIMA, +tells a story of the natives' love for Stevenson. "The other day +the cook was away," she writes, "and Louis, who was busy writing, +took his meals in his room. Knowing there was no one to cook his +lunch, he told Sosimo to bring him some bread and cheese. To his +surprise he was served with an excellent meal - an omelette, a good +salad, and perfect coffee. 'Who cooked this?' asked Louis in +Samoan. 'I did,' said Sosimo. 'Well,' said Louis, 'great is your +wisdom.' Sosimo bowed and corrected him - 'Great is my love!'" + +Miss Stubbs, in her STEVENSON'S SHRINE; THE RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE, +illustrates the same devotion. On the top of Mount Vaea, she +writes, is the massive sarcophagus, "not an ideal structure by any +means, not even beautiful, and yet in its massive ruggedness it +somehow suited the man and the place." + +"The wind sighed softly in the branches of the 'Tavau' trees, from +out the green recesses of the 'Toi' came the plaintive coo of the +wood-pigeon. In and out of the branches of the magnificent 'Fau' +tree, which overhangs the grave, a king-fisher, sea-blue, +iridescent, flitted to and fro, whilst a scarlet hibiscus, in full +flower, showed up royally against the gray lichened cement. All +around was light and life and colour, and I said to myself, 'He is +made one with nature'; he is now, body and soul and spirit, +commingled with the loveliness around. He who longed in life to +scale the height, he who attained his wish only in death, has +become in himself a parable of fulfilment. No need now for that +heart-sick cry:- + + +"'Sing me a song of a lad that is gone, +Say, could that lad be I?' + + +No need now for the despairing finality of: + + +"'I have trod the upward and the downward slope, +I have endured and done in the days of yore, +I have longed for all, and bid farewell to hope, +And I have lived, and loved, and closed the door.' + + +"Death has set his seal of peace on the unequal conflict of mind +and matter; the All-Mother has gathered him to herself. + +"In years to come, when his grave is perchance forgotten, a rugged +ruin, home of the lizard and the bat, Tusitala - the story-teller - +'the man with a heart of gold' (as I so often heard him designated +in the Islands), will live, when it may be his tales have ceased to +interest, in the tender remembrance of those whose lives he +beautified, and whose hearts he warmed into gratitude." + +The chiefs have prohibited the use of firearms or other weapons on +Mount Vaea, "in order that the birds may live there undisturbed and +unafraid, and build their nests in the trees around Tusitala's +grave." + +Miss Stubbs has many records of the impression produced on those he +came in contact with in Samoa - white men and women as well as +natives. She met a certain Austrian Count, who adored Stevenson's +memory. Over his camp bed was a framed photograph of R. L. +Stevenson. + + +"So," he said, "I keep him there, for he was my saviour, and I wish +'good-night' and 'good-morning,' every day, both to himself and to +his old home." The Count then told us that when he was stopping at +Vailima he used to have his bath daily on the verandah below his +room. One lovely morning he got up very early, got into the bath, +and splashed and sang, feeling very well and very happy, and at +last beginning to sing very loudly, he forgot Mr Stevenson +altogether. All at once there was Stevenson himself, his hair all +ruffled up, his eyes full of anger. "Man," he said, "you and your +infernal row have cost me more than two hundred pounds in ideas," +and with that he was gone, but he did not address the Count again +the whole of that day. Next morning he had forgotten the Count's +offence and was just as friendly as ever, but - the noise was never +repeated! + + +Another of the Count's stories greatly amused the visitors: + + +"An English lord came all the way to Samoa in his yacht to see Mr +Stevenson, and found him in his cool Kimino sitting with the +ladies, and drinking tea on his verandah; the whole party had their +feet bare. The English lord thought that he must have called at +the wrong time, and offered to go away, but Mr Stevenson called out +to him, and brought him back, and made him stay to dinner. They +all went away to dress, and the guest was left sitting alone in the +verandah. Soon they came back, Mr Osbourne and Mr Stevenson +wearing the form of dress most usual in that hot climate a white +mess jacket, and white trousers, but their feet were still bare. +The guest put up his eyeglass and stared for a bit, then he looked +down upon his own beautifully shod feet, and sighed. They all +talked and laughed until the ladies came in, the ladies in silk +dresses, befrilled with lace, but still with bare feet, and the +guest took a covert look through his eyeglass and gasped, but when +he noticed that there were gold bangles on Mrs Strong's ankles and +rings upon her toes, he could bear no more and dropped his eyeglass +on the ground of the verandah breaking it all to bits." + + +Miss Stubbs met on the other side of the island a photographer who +told her this: + + +"I had but recently come to Samoa," he said, "and was standing one +day in my shop when Mr Stevenson came in and spoke. 'Man,' he +said, 'I tak ye to be a Scotsman like mysel'.' + +"I would I could have claimed a kinship," deplored the +photographer, "but, alas! I am English to the backbone, with never +a drop of Scotch blood in my veins, and I told him this, regretting +the absence of the blood tie." + +"'I could have sworn your back was the back of a Scotsman,' was his +comment, 'but,' and he held out his hand, 'you look sick, and there +is a fellowship in sickness not to be denied.' I said I was not +strong, and had come to the Island on account of my health. 'Well, +then,' replied Mr Stevenson, 'it shall be my business to help you +to get well; come to Vailima whenever you like, and if I am out, +ask for refreshment, and wait until I come in, you will always find +a welcome there.'" + +At this point my informant turned away, and there was a break in +his voice as he exclaimed, "Ah, the years go on, and I don't miss +him less, but more; next to my mother he was the best friend I ever +had: a man with a heart of gold; his house was a second home to +me." + + +Stevenson's experience shows how easy it is with a certain type of +man, to restore the old feudal conditions of service and +relationship. Stevenson did this in essentials in Samoa. He tells +us how he managed to get good service out of the Samoans (who are +accredited with great unwillingness to work); and this he DID by +firm, but generous, kindly, almost brotherly treatment, reviving, +as it were, a kind of clan life - giving a livery of certain +colours - symbol of all this. A little fellow of eight, he tells, +had been taken into the household, made a pet of by Mrs Strong, his +stepdaughter, and had had a dress given to him, like that of the +men; and, when one day he had strolled down by himself as far as +the hotel, and the master of it, seeing him, called out in Samoan, +"Hi, youngster, who are you?" The eight-year-old replied, "Why, +don't you see for yourself? I am one of the Vailima men!" + +The story of the ROAD OF THE LOVING HEART was but another fine +attestation of it. + + + +CHAPTER XII - HIS GENIUS AND METHODS + + + +TO have created a school of idolaters, who will out and out swear +by everything, and as though by necessity, at the same time, a +school of studious detractors, who will suspiciously question +everything, or throw out suggestions of disparagement, is at all +events, a proof of greatness, the countersign of undoubted genius, +and an assurance of lasting fame. R. L. Stevenson has certainly +secured this. Time will tell what of virtue there is with either +party. For me, who knew Stevenson, and loved him, as finding in +the sweet-tempered, brave, and in some things, most generous man, +what gave at once tone and elevation to the artist, I would fain +indicate here my impressions of him and his genius - impressions +that remain almost wholly uninfluenced by the vast mass of matter +about him that the press now turns out. Books, not to speak of +articles, pour forth about him - about his style, his art, his +humour and his characters - aye, and even about his religion. + +Miss Simpson follows Mr Bellyse Baildon with the EDINBURGH DAYS, +Miss Moyes Black comes on with her picture in the FAMOUS SCOTS, and +Professor Raleigh succeeds her; Mr Graham Balfour follows with his +LIFE; Mr Kelman's volume about his Religion comes next, and that is +reinforced by more familiar letters and TABLE TALK, by Lloyd +Osbourne and Mrs Strong, his step-children; Mr J. Hammerton then +comes on handily with STEVENSONIANA - fruit lovingly gathered from +many and far fields, and garnered with not a little tact and taste, +and catholicity; Miss Laura Stubbs then presents us with her +touching STEVENSON'S SHRINE: THE RECORD OF A PILGRIMAGE; and Mr +Sidney Colvin is now busily at work on his LIFE OF STEVENSON, which +must do not a little to enlighten and to settle many questions. + +Curiosity and interest grow as time passes; and the places +connected with Stevenson, hitherto obscure many of them, are now +touched with light if not with romance, and are known, by name at +all events, to every reader of books. Yes; every place he lived +in, or touched at, is worthy of full description if only on account +of its associations with him. If there is not a land of Stevenson, +as there is a land of Scott, or of Burns, it is due to the fact +that he was far-travelled, and in his works painted many scenes: +but there are at home - Edinburgh, and Halkerside and Allermuir, +Caerketton, Swanston, and Colinton, and Maw Moss and Rullion Green +and Tummel, "the WALE of Scotland," as he named it to me, and the +Castletown of Braemar - Braemar in his view coming a good second to +Tummel, for starting-points to any curious worshipper who would go +the round in Scotland and miss nothing. Mr Geddie's work on THE +HOME COUNTRY OF STEVENSON may be found very helpful here. + +1. It is impossible to separate Stevenson from his work, because of +the imperious personal element in it; and so I shall not now strive +to gain the appearance of cleverness by affecting any distinction +here. The first thing I would say is, that he was when I knew him +- what pretty much to the end he remained - a youth. His outlook +on life was boyishly genial and free, despite all his sufferings +from ill-health - it was the pride of action, the joy of endurance, +the revelry of high spirits, and the sense of victory that most +fascinated him; and his theory of life was to take pleasure and +give pleasure, without calculation or stint - a kind of boyish +grace and bounty never to be overcome or disturbed by outer +accident or change. If he was sometimes haunted with the thought +of changes through changed conditions or circumstances, as my very +old friend, Mr Charles Lowe, has told even of the College days that +he was always supposing things to undergo some sea-change into +something else, if not "into something rich and strange," this was +but to add to his sense of enjoyment, and the power of conferring +delight, and the luxuries of variety, as boys do when they let +fancy loose. And this always had, with him, an individual +reference or return. He was thus constantly, and latterly, half- +consciously, trying to interpret himself somehow through all the +things which engaged him, and which he so transmogrified - things +that especially attracted him and took his fancy. Thus, if it must +be confessed, that even in his highest moments, there lingers a +touch - if no more than a touch - of self-consciousness which will +not allow him to forget manner in matter, it is also true that he +is cunningly conveying traits in himself; and the sense of this is +often at the root of his sweet, gentle, naive humour. There is, +therefore, some truth in the criticisms which assert that even +"long John Silver," that fine pirate, with his one leg, was, after +all, a shadow of Stevenson himself - the genial buccaneer who did +his tremendous murdering with a smile on his face was but Stevenson +thrown into new circumstances, or, as one has said, Stevenson-cum- +Henley, so thrown as was also Archer in WEIR OF HERMISTON, and more +than this, that his most successful women-folk - like Miss Grant +and Catriona - are studies of himself, and that in all his heroes, +and even heroines, was an unmistakable touch of R. L. Stevenson. +Even Mr Baildon rather maladroitly admits that in Miss Grant, the +Lord Advocate's daughter, THERE IS A GOOD DEAL OF THE AUTHOR +HIMSELF DISGUISED IN PETTICOATS. I have thought of Stevenson in +many suits, beside that which included the velvet jacket, but - +petticoats! + +Youth is autocratic, and can show a grand indifferency: it goes +for what it likes, and ignores all else - it fondly magnifies its +favourites, and, after all, to a great extent, it is but analysing, +dealing with and presenting itself to us, if we only watch well. +This is the secret of all prevailing romance: it is the secret of +all stories of adventure and chivalry of the simpler and more +primitive order; and in one aspect it is true that R. L. Stevenson +loved and clung to the primitive and elemental, if it may not be +said, as one distinguished writer has said, that he even loved +savagery in itself. But hardly could it be seriously held, as Mr +I. Zangwill held: + + +"That women did not cut any figure in his books springs from this +same interest in the elemental. Women are not born, but made. +They are a social product of infinite complexity and delicacy. For +a like reason Stevenson was no interpreter of the modern.... A +child to the end, always playing at 'make-believe,' dying young, as +those whom the gods love, and, as he would have died had he +achieved his centenary, he was the natural exponent in literature +of the child." + + +But there were subtly qualifying elements beyond what Mr Zangwill +here recognises and reinforces. That is just about as correct and +true as this other deliverance: + + +"His Scotch romances have been as over-praised by the zealous +Scotsmen who cry 'genius' at the sight of a kilt, and who lose +their heads at a waft from the heather, as his other books have +been under-praised. The best of all, THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, +ends in a bog; and where the author aspires to exceptional subtlety +of character-drawing he befogs us or himself altogether. We are so +long weighing the brothers Ballantrae in the balance, watching it +incline now this way, now that, scrupulously removing a particle of +our sympathy from the one brother to the other, to restore it again +in the next chapter, that we end with a conception of them as +confusing as Mr Gilbert's conception of Hamlet, who was idiotically +sane with lucid intervals of lunacy." + + +If Stevenson was, as Mr Zangwill holds, "the child to the end," and +the child only, then if we may not say what Carlyle said of De +Quincey: "ECCOVI, that child has been in hell," we may say, +"ECCOVI, that child has been in unchildlike haunts, and can't +forget the memory of them." In a sense every romancer is a child - +such was Ludwig Tieck, such was Scott, such was James Hogg, the +Ettrick Shepherd. But each is something more - he has been touched +with the wand of a fairy, and knows, at least, some of Elfin Land +as well as of childhood's home. + +The sense of Stevenson's youthfulness seems to have struck every +one who had intimacy with him. Mr Baildon writes (p. 21 of his +book): + + +"I would now give much to possess but one of Stevenson's gifts - +namely, that extraordinary vividness of recollection by which he +could so astonishingly recall, not only the doings, but the very +thoughts and emotions of his youth. For, often as we must have +communed together, with all the shameless candour of boys, hardly +any remark has stuck to me except the opinion already alluded to, +which struck me - his elder by some fifteen months - as very +amusing, that at sixteen 'we should be men.' HE OF ALL MORTALS, +WHO WAS, IN A SENSE, ALWAYS STILL A BOY!" + + +Mr Gosse tells us: + + +"He had retained a great deal of the temperament of a child, and it +was his philosophy to encourage it. In his dreary passages of bed, +when his illness was more than commonly heavy on him, he used to +contrive little amusements for himself. He played on the flute, or +he modelled little groups and figures in clay." + + +2. One of the qualifying elements unnoted by Mr Zangwill is simply +this, that R. L. Stevenson never lost the strange tint imparted to +his youth by the religious influences to which he was subject, and +which left their impress and colour on him and all that he did. +Henley, in his striking sonnet, hit it when he wrote: + + +"A deal of Ariel, just a streak of Puck, +Much Antony, of Hamlet most of all, +AND SOMETHING OF THE SHORTER CATECHIST." + + +SOMETHING! he was a great deal of Shorter Catechist! Scotch +Calvinism, its metaphysic, and all the strange whims, perversities, +and questionings of "Fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute," +which it inevitably awakens, was much with him - the sense of +reprobation and the gloom born of it, as well as the abounding joy +in the sense of the elect - the Covenanters and their wild +resolutions, the moss-troopers and their dare-devilries - Pentland +Risings and fights of Rullion Green; he not only never forgot them, +but they mixed themselves as in his very breath of life, and made +him a great questioner. How would I have borne myself in this or +in that? Supposing I had been there, how would it have been - the +same, or different from what it was with those that were there? +His work is throughout at bottom a series of problems that almost +all trace to this root, directly or indirectly. "There, but for +the grace of God, goes John Bradford," said the famous Puritan on +seeing a felon led to execution; so with Stevenson. Hence his +fondness for tramps, for scamps (he even bestowed special attention +and pains on Villon, the poet-scamp); he was rather impatient with +poor Thoreau, because he was a purist solitary, and had too little +of vice, and, as Stevenson held, narrow in sympathy, and too self- +satisfied, and bent only on self-improvement. He held a brief for +the honest villain, and leaned to him brotherly. Even the +anecdotes he most prizes have a fine look this way - a hunger for +completion in achievement, even in the violation of fine humane +feeling or morality, and all the time a sense of submission to +God's will. "Doctor," said the dying gravedigger in OLD MORTALITY, +"I hae laid three hunner an' fower score in that kirkyaird, an' had +it been His wull," indicating Heaven, "I wad hae likeit weel to hae +made oot the fower hunner." That took Stevenson. Listen to what +Mr Edmond Gosse tells of his talk, when he found him in a private +hotel in Finsbury Circus, London, ready to be put on board a +steamer for America, on 21st August, 1887: + + +"It was church time, and there was some talk of my witnessing his +will, which I could not do because there could be found no other +reputable witness, the whole crew of the hotel being at church. +'This,' he said, 'is the way in which our valuable city hotels - +packed no doubt with gems and jewellery - are deserted on a Sunday +morning. Some bold piratical fellow, defying the spirit of +Sabbatarianism, might make a handsome revenue by sacking the +derelict hotels between the hours of ten and twelve. One hotel a +week would enable such a man to retire in course of a year. A mask +might perhaps be worn for the mere fancy of the thing, and to +terrify kitchen-maids, but no real disguise would be needful.'" + + +I would rather agree with Mr Chesterton than with Mr Zangwill here: + + +"Stevenson's enormous capacity for joy flowed directly out of his +profoundly religious temperament. He conceived himself as an +unimportant guest at one eternal and uproarious banquet, and +instead of grumbling at the soup, he accepted it with careless +gratitude. . . . His gaiety was neither the gaiety of the pagan, +nor the gaiety of the BON VIVANT. It was the greater gaiety of the +mystic. He could enjoy trifles because there was to him no such +thing as a trifle. He was a child who respected his dolls because +they were the images of the image of God, portraits at only two +removes." + + +Here, then, we have the child crossed by the dreamer and the +mystic, bred of Calvinism and speculation on human fate and chance, +and on the mystery of temperament and inheritance, and all that +flows from these - reprobation, with its dire shadows, assured +Election with its joys, etc., etc. + +3. If such a combination is in favour of the story-teller up to a +certain point, it is not favourable to the highest flights, and it +is alien to dramatic presentation pure and simple. This implies +detachment from moods and characters, high as well as low, that +complete justice in presentation may be done to all alike, and the +one balance that obtains in life grasped and repeated with +emphasis. But towards his leading characters Stevenson is +unconsciously biassed, because they are more or less shadowy +projections of himself, or images through which he would reveal one +or other side or aspect of his own personality. Attwater is a +confessed failure, because it, more than any other, testifies this: +he is but a mouth-piece for one side or tendency in Stevenson. If +the same thing is not more decisively felt in some other cases, it +is because Stevenson there showed the better art o' hidin', and not +because he was any more truly detached or dramatic. "Of Hamlet +most of all," wrote Henley in his sonnet. The Hamlet in Stevenson +- the self-questioning, egotistic, moralising Hamlet - was, and to +the end remained, a something alien to bold, dramatic, creative +freedom. He is great as an artist, as a man bent on giving to all +that he did the best and most distinguished form possible, but not +great as a free creator of dramatic power. "Mother," he said as a +mere child, "I've drawed a man. Now, will I draw his soul?" He +was to the end all too fond to essay a picture of the soul, +separate and peculiar. All the Jekyll and Hyde and even Ballantrae +conceptions came out of that - and what is more, he always mixed +his own soul with the other soul, and could not help doing so. + +4. When; therefore, I find Mr Pinero, in lecturing at Edinburgh, +deciding in favour of Stevenson as possessed of rare dramatic +power, and wondering why he did not more effectively employ it, I +can't agree with him; and this because of the presence of a certain +atmosphere in the novels, alien to free play of the individualities +presented. Like Hawthorne's, like the works of our great +symbolists, they are restricted by a sense of some obtaining +conception, some weird metaphysical WEIRD or preconception. This +is the ground "Ian MacLaren" has for saying that "his kinship is +not with Boccaccio and Rabelais, but with Dante and Spenser" - the +ground for many remarks by critics to the effect that they still +crave from him "less symbol and more individuality" - the ground +for the Rev. W. J. Dawson's remark that "he has a powerful and +persistent sense of the spiritual forces which move behind the +painted shows of life; that he writes not only as a realist but as +a prophet, his meanest stage being set with eternity as a +background." + +Such expressions are fullest justification for what we have here +said: it adds, and can only add, to our admiration of Stevenson, +as a thinker, seer, or mystic, but the asserting sense of such +power can only end in lessening the height to which he could attain +as a dramatic artist; and there is much indeed against Mr Pinero's +own view that, in the dramas, he finds that "fine speeches" are +ruinous to them as acting plays. In the strict sense overfine +speeches are yet almost everywhere. David Balfour could never have +writ some speeches attributed to him - they are just R. L. +Stevenson with a very superficial difference that, when once +detected, renders them curious and quaint and interesting, but not +dramatic. + + + +CHAPTER XIII - PREACHER AND MYSTIC FABULIST + + + +IN reality, Stevenson is always directly or indirectly preaching a +sermon - enforcing a moral - as though he could not help it. "He +would rise from the dead to preach a sermon." He wrote some first- +rate fables, and might indeed have figured to effect as a moralist- +fabulist, as truly he was from beginning to end. There was a bit +of Bunyan in him as well as of Aesop and Rousseau and Thoreau - the +mixture that found coherency in his most peculiarly patient and +forbearing temper is what gives at once the quaintness, the +freedom, and yet the odd didactic something that is never wanting. +I remember a fable about the Devil that might well be brought in to +illustrate this here - careful readers who neglect nothing that +Stevenson wrote will remember it also and perhaps bear me out here. + +But for the sake of the young folks who may yet have some leeway to +make up, I shall indulge myself a little by quoting it: and, since +I am on that tack, follow it by another which presents Stevenson in +his favourite guise of quizzing his own characters, if not for his +own advantage certainly for ours, if we would in the least +understand the fine moralist-casuistical qualities of his mind and +fancy: + + +THE DEVIL AND THE INNKEEPER + +Once upon a time the devil stayed at an inn, where no one knew him, +for they were people whose education had been neglected. He was +bent on mischief, and for a time kept everybody by the ears. But +at last the innkeeper set a watch upon the devil and took him in +the act. + +The innkeeper got a rope's end. + +"Now I am going to thrash you," said the inn-keeper. + +"You have no right to be angry with me," said the devil. "I am +only the devil, and it is my nature to do wrong." + +"Is that so?" asked the innkeeper. + +"Fact, I assure you," said the devil. + +"You really cannot help doing ill?" asked the innkeeper. + +"Not in the smallest," said the devil, "it would be useless cruelty +to thrash a thing like me." + +"It would indeed," said the innkeeper. + +And he made a noose and hanged the devil. + +"There!" said the innkeeper. + + +The deeper Stevenson goes, the more happily is he inspired. We +could scarcely cite anything more Stevensonian, alike in its humour +and its philosophy, than the dialogue between Captain Smollett and +Long John Silver, entitled THE PERSONS OF THE TALE. After chapter +xxxii. of TREASURE ISLAND, these two puppets "strolled out to have +a pipe before business should begin again, and met in an open space +not far from the story." After a few preliminaries: + + +"You're a damned rogue, my man," said the Captain. + +"Come, come, Cap'n, be just," returned the other. "There's no call +to be angry with me in earnest. I'm on'y a character in a sea +story. I don't really exist." + +"Well, I don't really exist either," says the Captain, "which seems +to meet that." + +"I wouldn't set no limits to what a virtuous character might +consider argument," responded Silver. "But I'm the villain of the +tale, I am; and speaking as one seafaring man to another, what I +want to know is, what's the odds?" + +"Were you never taught your catechism?" said the Captain. "Don't +you know there's such a thing as an Author?" + +"Such a thing as a Author?" returned John, derisively. "And who +better'n me? And the p'int is, if the Author made you, he made +Long John, and he made Hands, and Pew, and George Merry - not that +George is up to much, for he's little more'n a name; and he made +Flint, what there is of him; and he made this here mutiny, you keep +such a work about; and he had Tom Redruth shot; and - well, if +that's a Author, give me Pew!" + +"Don't you believe in a future state?" said Smollett. "Do you +think there's nothing but the present sorty-paper?" + +" I don't rightly know for that," said Silver, "and I don't see +what it's got to do with it, anyway. What I know is this: if +there is sich a thing as a Author, I'm his favourite chara'ter. He +does me fathoms better'n he does you - fathoms, he does. And he +likes doing me. He keeps me on deck mostly all the time, crutch +and all; and he leaves you measling in the hold, where nobody can't +see you, nor wants to, and you may lay to that! If there is a +Author, by thunder, but he's on my side, and you may lay to it!" + +"I see he's giving you a long rope," said the Captain. . . . + + +Stevenson's stories - one and all - are too closely the +illustrations by characters of which his essays furnish the texts. +You shall not read the one wholly apart from the other without +losing something - without losing much of the quaint, often +childish, and always insinuating personality of the writer. It is +this if fully perceived which would justify one writer, Mr +Zangwill, if I don't forget, in saying, as he did say, that +Stevenson would hold his place by his essays and not by his novels. +Hence there is a unity in all, but a unity found in a root which is +ultimately inimical to what is strictly free dramatic creation - +creation, broad, natural and unmoral in the highest sense just as +nature is, as it is to us, for example, when we speak of +Shakespeare, or even Scott, or of Cervantes or Fielding. If Mr +Henley in his irruptive if not spiteful PALL MALL MAGAZINE article +had made this clear from the high critical ground, then some of his +derogatory remarks would not have been quite so personal and +offensive as they are. + +Stevenson's bohemianism was always restrained and coloured by this. +He is a casuistic moralist, if not a Shorter Catechist, as Mr +Henley put it in his clever sonnet. He is constantly asking +himself about moral laws and how they work themselves out in +character, especially as these suggest and involve the casuistries +of human nature. He is often a little like Nathaniel Hawthorne, +but he hardly follows them far enough and rests on his own +preconceptions and predilections, only he does not, like him, get +into or remain long in the cobwebby corners - his love of the open +air and exercise derived from generations of active lighthouse +engineers, out at all times on sea or land, or from Scottish +ministers who were fond of composing their sermons and reflecting +on the backwardness of human nature as they walked in their gardens +or along the hillsides even among mists and storms, did something +to save him here, reinforcing natural cheerfulness and the warm +desire to give pleasure. His excessive elaboration of style, which +grew upon him more and more, giving throughout often a sense of +extreme artificiality and of the self-consciousness usually bred of +it, is but another incidental proof of this. And let no reader +think that I wish here to decry R. L. Stevenson. I only desire +faithfully to try to understand him, and to indicate the class or +group to which his genius and temperament really belong. He is +from first to last the idealistic dreamy or mystical romancer, and +not the true idealist or dealer direct with life or character for +its own sake. The very beauty and sweetness of his spirit in one +way militated against his dramatic success - he really did not +believe in villains, and always made them better than they should +have been, and that, too, on the very side where wickedness - their +natural wickedness - is most available - on the stage. The dreamer +of dreams and the Shorter Catechist, strangely united together, +were here directly at odds with the creative power, and crossed and +misdirected it, and the casuist came in and manoeuvred the +limelight - all too like the old devil of the mediaeval drama, who +was made only to be laughed at and taken lightly, a buffoon and a +laughing-stock indeed. And while he could unveil villainy, as is +the case pre-eminently in Huish in the EBB-TIDE, he shrank from +inflicting the punishments for which untutored human nature looks, +and thus he lost one great aid to crude dramatic effect. As to his +poems, they are intimately personal in his happiest moments: he +deals with separate moods and sentiments, and scarcely ever touches +those of a type alien to his own. The defect of his child poems is +distinctly that he is everywhere strictly recalling and reproducing +his own quaint and wholly exceptional childhood; and children, +ordinary, normal, healthy children, will not take to these poems +(though grown-ups largely do so), as they would to, say, the +LILLIPUT LEVEE of my old friend, W. B. Rands. Rands showed a great +deal of true dramatic play there within his own very narrow limits, +as, at all events, adults must conceive them. + +Even in his greatest works, in THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE and WEIR OF +HERMISTON, the special power in Stevenson really lies in subduing +his characters at the most critical point for action, to make them +prove or sustain his thesis; and in this way the rare effect that +he might have secured DRAMATICALLY is largely lost and make-believe +substituted, as in the Treasure Search in the end of THE MASTER OF +BALLANTRAE. The powerful dramatic effect he might have had in his +DENOUEMENT is thus completely sacrificed. The essence of the drama +for the stage is that the work is for this and this alone - +dialogue and everything being only worked rightly when it bears on, +aids, and finally secures this in happy completeness. + +In a word, you always, in view of true dramatic effect, see +Stevenson himself too clearly behind his characters. The "fine +speeches" Mr Pinero referred to trace to the intrusion behind the +glass of a part-quicksilvered portion, which cunningly shows, when +the glass is moved about, Stevenson himself behind the character, +as we have said already. For long he shied dealing with women, as +though by a true instinct. Unfortunately for him his image was as +clear behind CATRIONA, with the discerning, as anywhere else; and +this, alas! too far undid her as an independent, individual +character, though traits like those in her author were attractive. +The constant effort to relieve the sense of this affords him the +most admirable openings for the display of his exquisite style, of +which he seldom or never fails to make the very most in this +regard; but the necessity laid upon him to aim at securing a sense +of relief by this is precisely the same as led him to write the +overfine speeches in the plays, as Mr Pinero found and pointed out +at Edinburgh: both defeat the true end, but in the written book +mere art of style and a naivete and a certain sweetness of temper +conceal the lack of nature and creative spontaneity; while on the +stage the descriptions, saving reflections and fine asides, are +ruthlessly cut away under sheer stage necessities, or, if left, but +hinder the action; and art of this kind does not there suffice to +conceal the lack of nature. + +More clearly to bring out my meaning here and draw aid from +comparative illustration, let me take my old friend of many years, +Charles Gibbon. Gibbon was poor, very poor, in intellectual +subtlety compared with Stevenson; he had none of his sweet, quaint, +original fancy; he was no casuist; he was utterly void of power in +the subdued humorous twinkle or genial by-play in which Stevenson +excelled. But he has more of dramatic power, pure and simple, than +Stevenson had - his novels - the best of them - would far more +easily yield themselves to the ordinary purposes of the ordinary +playwright. Along with conscientiousness, perception, penetration, +with the dramatist must go a certain indescribable common-sense +commonplaceness - if I may name it so - protection against vagary +and that over-refined egotism and self-confession which is inimical +to the drama and in which the Stevensonian type all too largely +abounds for successful dramatic production. Mr Henley perhaps put +it too strongly when he said that what was supremely of interest to +R. L. Stevenson was Stevenson himself; but he indicates the +tendency, and that tendency is inimical to strong, broad, effective +and varied dramatic presentation. Water cannot rise above its own +level; nor can minds of this type go freely out of themselves in a +grandly healthy, unconscious, and unaffected way, and this is the +secret of the dramatic spirit, if it be not, as Shelley said, the +secret of morals, which Stevenson, when he passed away, was but on +the way to attain. As we shall see, he had risen so far above it, +subdued it, triumphed over it, that we really cannot guess what he +might have attained had but more years been given him. For the +last attainment of the loftiest and truest genius is precisely this +- to gain such insight of the real that all else becomes +subsidiary. True simplicity and the abiding relief and enduring +power of true art with all classes lies here and not elsewhere. +Cleverness, refinement, fancy, and invention, even sublety of +intellect, are practically nowhere in this sphere without this. + + + +CHAPTER XIV - STEVENSON AS DRAMATIST + + + +IN opposition to Mr Pinero, therefore, I assert that Stevenson's +defect in spontaneous dramatic presentation is seen clearly in his +novels as well as in his plays proper. + +In writing to my good friend, Mr Thomas M'Kie, Advocate, Edinburgh, +telling him of my work on R. L. Stevenson and the results, I thus +gathered up in little the broad reflections on this point, and I +may perhaps be excused quoting the following passages, as they +reinforce by a new reference or illustration or two what has just +been said: + + +"Considering his great keenness and force on some sides, I find R. +L. Stevenson markedly deficient in grip on other sides - common +sides, after all, of human nature. This was so far largely due to +a dreamy, mystical, so far perverted and, so to say, often even +inverted casuistical, fatalistic morality, which would not allow +him scope in what Carlyle would have called a healthy hatred of +fools and scoundrels; with both of which classes - vagabonds in +strictness - he had rather too much of a sneaking sympathy. Mr +Pinero was wrong - totally and incomprehensibly wrong - when he +told the good folks of Edinburgh at the Philosophical Institution, +and afterwards at the London Birkbeck Institution, that it was lack +of concentration and care that made R. L. Stevenson a failure as a +dramatist. No: it was here and not elsewhere that the failure +lay. R. L. Stevenson was himself an unconscious paradox - and +sometimes he realised it - his great weakness from this point of +view being that he wished to show strong and original by making the +villain the hero of the piece as well. Now, THAT, if it may, by +clever manipulation and dexterity, be made to do in a novel, most +certainly it will not do on the stage - more especially if it is +done consciously and, as it were, of MALICE PREPENSE; because, for +one thing, there is in the theatre a very varied yet united +audience which has to give a simultaneous and immediate verdict - +an audience not inclined to some kinds of overwrought subtleties +and casuistries, however clever the technique. If THE MASTER OF +BALLANTRAE (which has some highly dramatic scenes and situations, +if it is not in itself substantially a drama) were to be put on the +stage, the playwright, if wisely determined for success, would +really have - not in details, but in essential conception - to kick +R. L. Stevenson in his most personal aim out of it, and take and +present a more definite moral view of the two villain-heroes +(brothers, too); improve and elevate the one a bit if he lowered +the other, and not wobble in sympathy and try to make the audience +wobble in sympathy also, as R. L. Stevenson certainly does. As for +BEAU AUSTIN, it most emphatically, in view of this, should be re- +writ - re-writ especially towards the ending - and the scandalous +Beau tarred and feathered, metaphorically speaking, instead of +walking off at the end in a sneaking, mincing sort of way, with no +more than a little momentary twinge of discomfort at the wreck and +ruin he has wrought, for having acted as a selfish, snivelling +poltroon and coward, though in fine clothes and with fine ways and +fine manners, which only, from our point of view, make matters +worse. It is, with variations I admit, much the same all through: +R. L. Stevenson felt it and confessed it about the EBB-TIDE, and +Huish, the cockney hero and villain; but the sense of healthy +disgust, even at the vile Huish, is not emphasised in the book as +it would have demanded to be for the stage - the audience would not +have stood it, and the more mixed and varied, the less would it +have stood it - not at all; and his relief of style and fine or +finished speeches would not THERE in the least have told. This is +demanded of the drama - that at once it satisfies a certain crude +something subsisting under all outward glosses and veneers that +might be in some a lively sense of right and wrong - the uprisal of +a conscience, in fact, or in others a vague instinct of proper +reward or punishment, which will even cover and sanction certain +kinds of revenge or retaliation. The one feeling will emerge most +among the cultured, and the other among the ruder and more +ignorant; but both meet immediately on beholding action and the +limits of action on the demand for some clear leading to what may +be called Providential equity - each man undoubtedly rewarded or +punished, roughly, according to his deserts, if not outwardly then +certainly in the inner torments that so often lead to confessions. +There it is - a radical fact of human nature - as radical as any +reading of trait or determination of character presented - seen in +the Greek drama as well as in Shakespeare and the great Elizabethan +dramatists, and in the drama-transpontine and others of to-day. R. +L. Stevenson was all too casuistical (though not in the exclusively +bad sense) for this; and so he was not dramatic, though WEIR OF +HERMISTON promised something like an advance to it, and ST IVES +did, in my idea, yet more." + + +The one essential of a DRAMATIC piece is that, by the interaction +of character and incident (one or other may be preponderating, +according to the type and intention of the writer) all naturally +leads up to a crisis in which the moral motives, appealed to or +awakened by the presentation of the play, are justified. Where +this is wanting the true leading and the definite justification are +wanting. Goethe failed in this in his FAUST, resourceful and far- +seeing though he was - he failed because a certain sympathy is +awakened for Mephistopheles in being, so to say, chivied out of his +bargain, when he had complied with the terms of the contract by +Faust; and Gounod in his opera does exactly for "immediate dramatic +effect," what we hold it would be necessary to do for R. L. +Stevenson. Goethe, with his casuistries which led him to allegory +and all manner of overdone symbolisms and perversions in the Second +Part, is set aside and a true crisis and close is found by Gounod +through simply sending Marguerite above and Faust below, as, +indeed, Faust had agreed by solemn compact with Mephistopheles that +it should be. And to come to another illustration from our own +times, Mr Bernard Shaw's very clever and all too ingenious and +over-subtle MAN AND SUPERMAN would, in my idea, and for much the +same reason, be an utterly ineffective and weak piece on the stage, +however carefully handled and however clever the setting - the +reason lying in the egotistic upsetting of the "personal equation" +and the theory of life that lies behind all - tinting it with +strange and even OUTRE colours. Much the same has to be said of +most of what are problem-plays - several of Ibsen's among the rest. + +Those who remember the Fairy opera of HANSEL AND GRETEL on the +stage in London, will not have forgotten in the witching memory of +all the charms of scenery and setting, how the scene where the +witch of the wood, who was planning out the baking of the little +hero and heroine in her oven, having "fatted" them up well, to make +sweet her eating of them, was by the coolness and cleverness of the +heroine locked in her own oven and baked there, literally brought +down the house. She received exactly what she had planned to give +those children, whom their own cruel parents had unwittingly, by +losing the children in the wood, put into her hands. Quaint, +naive, half-grotesque it was in conception, yet the truth of all +drama was there actively exhibited, and all casuistic pleading of +excuses of some sort, even of justification for the witch (that it +was her nature; heredity in her aworking, etc., etc.) would have +not only been out of place, but hotly resented by that audience. +Now, Stevenson, if he could have made up his mind to have the witch +locked in her own oven, would most assuredly have tried some device +to get her out by some fairy witch-device or magic slide at the far +end of it, and have proceeded to paint for us the changed character +that she was after she had been so outwitted by a child, and her +witchdom proved after all of little effect. He would have put +probably some of the most effective moralities into her mouth if +indeed he would not after all have made the witch a triumph on his +early principle of bad-heartedness being strength. If this is the +sort of falsification which the play demands, and is of all tastes +the most ungrateful, then, it is clear, that for full effect of the +drama it is essential to it; but what is primary in it is the +direct answering to certain immediate and instinctive demands in +common human nature, the doing of which is far more effective than +no end of deep philosophy to show how much better human nature +would be if it were not just quite thus constituted. +"Concentration," says Mr Pinero, "is first, second, and last in +it," and he goes on thus, as reported in the SCOTSMAN, to show +Stevenson's defect and mistake and, as is not, of course, +unnatural, to magnify the greatness and grandeur of the style of +work in which he has himself been so successful. + + +"If Stevenson had ever mastered that art - and I do not question +that if he had properly conceived it he had it in him to master it +- he might have found the stage a gold mine, but he would have +found, too, that it is a gold mine which cannot be worked in a +smiling, sportive, half-contemptuous spirit, but only in the sweat +of the brain, and with every mental nerve and sinew strained to its +uttermost. He would have known that no ingots are to be got out of +this mine, save after sleepless nights, days of gloom and +discouragement, and other days, again, of feverish toil, the result +of which proves in the end to be misapplied and has to be thrown to +the winds. . . . When you take up a play-book (if ever you do take +one up) it strikes you as being a very trifling thing - a mere +insubstantial pamphlet beside the imposing bulk of the latest six- +shilling novel. Little do you guess that every page of the play +has cost more care, severer mental tension, if not more actual +manual labour, than any chapter of a novel, though it be fifty +pages long. It is the height of the author's art, according to the +old maxim, that the ordinary spectator should never be clearly +conscious of the skill and travail that have gone to the making of +the finished product. But the artist who would achieve a like feat +must realise its difficulties, or what are his chances of success?" + + +But what I should, in little, be inclined to say, in answer to the +"concentration" idea is that, unless you have first some firm hold +on the broad bed-rock facts of human nature specially appealed to +or called forth by the drama, you may concentrate as much as you +please, but you will not write a successful acting drama, not to +speak of a great one. Mr Pinero's magnifications of the immense +effort demanded from him must in the end come to mean that he +himself does not instinctively and with natural ease and +spontaneity secure this, but secures it only after great conscious +effort; and hence, perhaps, it is that he as well as so many other +modern playwrights fall so far behind alike in the amount turned +out, and also in its quality as compared with the products of many +playwrights in the past. + +The problem drama, in every phase and turn of it, endeavours to +dispense with these fundamental demands implied in the common and +instinctive sense or consciousness of the mass of men and women, +and to substitute for that interest something which will +artificially supersede it, or, at any rate, take its place. The +interest is transferred from the crises necessarily worked up to in +the one case, with all of situation and dialogue directed to it, +and without which it would not be strictly explicable, to something +abnormal, odd, artificial or inverted, or exceptional in the +characters themselves. Having thus, instead of natural process and +sequence, if we may put it so, the problem dramatist has a double +task - he must gain what unity he can, and reach such crises as he +may by artificial aids and inventions which the more he uses the +more makes natural simplicity unattainable; and next he must reduce +and hide as far as he can the abnormality he has, after all, in the +long run, created and presented. He cannot maintain it to the +full, else his work would become a mere medical or psychological +treatise under the poorest of disguises; and the very necessity for +the action and reaction of characters upon each other is a further +element against him. In a word no one character can stand alone, +and cannot escape influencing others, and also the action. Thus it +is that he cannot isolate as a doctor does his patient for +scientific examination. The healthy and normal must come in to +modify on all sides what is presented of unhealthy and abnormal, +and by its very presence expose the other, while at the same time +it, by its very presence, ministers improvement, exactly as the +sunlight disperses mist and all unhealthy vapours, germs, and +microbes. + +The problem dramatist, in place of broad effect and truth to +nature, must find it in stress of invention and resource of that +kind. Thus care and concentration must be all in all with him - he +must never let himself go, or get so interested and taken with his +characters that THEY, in a sense, control or direct him. He is all +too conscious a "maker" and must pay for his originality by what in +the end is really painful and overweighted work. This, I take it, +is the reason why so many of the modern dramatists find their work +so hard, and are, comparatively, so slow in the production of it, +while they would fain, by many devices, secure the general +impression or appeal made to all classes alike by the natural or +what we may call spontaneous drama, they are yet, by the necessity +of subject matter and methods of dealing with it, limited to the +real interest of a special class - to whom is finally given up what +was meant for mankind - and the troublesome and trying task laid on +them, to try as best they may to reconcile two really conflicting +tendencies which cannot even by art be reconciled but really point +different ways and tend to different ends. As the impressionist +and the pre-Raphaelite, in the sister-art of painting cannot be +combined and reconciled in one painter - so it is here; by +conception and methods they go different ways, and if they SEEK the +same end, it is by opposing processes - the original conception +alike of nature and of art dictating the process. + +As for Stevenson, it was no lack of care or concentration in +anything that he touched; these two were never lacking, but because +his subtlety, mystical bias and dreaminess, and theorising on human +nature made this to him impossible. He might have concentrated as +much as he pleased, concentrated as much as even Mr Pinero desires, +but he would not have made a successful drama, because he was +Robert Louis Stevenson, and not Mr Pinero, and too long, as he +himself confessed, had a tendency to think bad-heartedness was +strength; while the only true and enduring joy attainable in this +world - whether by deduction from life itself, or from IMPRESSIONS +of art or of the drama, is simply the steady, unassailable, and +triumphant consciousness that it is not so, but the reverse, that +goodness and self-sacrifice and self-surrender are the only +strength in the universe. Just as Byron had it with patriotism:- + + +"Freedom's battle once begun, +Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son, +Tho' baffled oft is ever won." + + +To go consciously either in fiction or in the drama for bad- +heartedness as strength, is to court failure - the broad, healthy, +human heart, thank Heaven, is so made as to resent the doctrine; +and if a fiction or a play based on this idea for the moment +succeeds, it can only be because of strength in other elements, or +because of partial blindness and partially paralysed moral sense in +the case of those who accept it and joy in it. If Mr Pinero +directly disputes this, then he and I have no common standing- +ground, and I need not follow the matter any further. Of course, +the dramatist may, under mistaken sympathy and in the midst of +complex and bewildering concatenations, give wrong readings to his +audience, but he must not be always doing even that, or doing it on +principle or system, else his work, however careful and +concentrated, will before long share the fate of the Stevenson- +Henley dramas confessedly wrought when the authors all too +definitely held bad-heartedness was strength. + + + +CHAPTER XV - THEORY OF GOOD AND EVIL + + + +WE have not hitherto concerned ourselves, in any express sense, +with the ethical elements involved in the tendency now dwelt on, +though they are, of necessity, of a very vital character. We have +shown only as yet the effect of this mood of mind on dramatic +intention and effort. The position is simply that there is, +broadly speaking, the endeavour to eliminate an element which is +essential to successful dramatic presentation. That element is the +eternal distinction, speaking broadly, between good and evil - +between right and wrong - between the secret consciousness of +having done right, and the consciousness of mere strength and force +in certain other ways. + +Nothing else will make up for vagueness and cloudiness here - no +technical skill, no apt dialogue nor concentration, any more than +"fine speeches," as Mr Pinero calls them. Now the dramatic demand +and the ethical demand here meet and take each other's hands, and +will not be separated. This is why Mr Stevenson and Mr Henley - +young men of great talent, failed - utterly failed - they thought +they could make a hero out of a shady and dare-devil yet really +cowardly villain generally - and failed. + +The spirit of this is of the clever youth type - all too ready to +forego the moral for the sake of the fun any day of the week, and +the unthinking selfishness and self-enjoyment of youth - whose +tender mercies are often cruel, are transcendent in it. As +Stevenson himself said, they were young men then and fancied bad- +heartedness was strength. Perhaps it was a sense of this that made +R. L. Stevenson speak as he did of the EBB-TIDE with Huish the +cockney in it, after he was powerless to recall it; which made him +say, as we have seen, that the closing chapters of THE MASTER OF +BALLANTRAE "SHAME, AND PERHAPS DEGRADE, THE BEGINNING." He himself +came to see then the great error; but, alas! it was too late to +remedy it - he could but go forward to essay new tales, not +backward to put right errors in what was done. + +Did Mr William Archer have anything of this in his mind and the +far-reaching effects on this side, when he wrote the following: + + +"Let me add that the omission with which, in 1885, I mildly +reproached him - the omission to tell what he knew to be an +essential part of the truth about life - was abundantly made good +in his later writings. It is true that even in his final +philosophy he still seems to me to underrate, or rather to shirk, +the significance of that most compendious parable which he thus +relates in a letter to Mr Henry James:- 'Do you know the story of +the man who found a button in his hash, and called the waiter? +"What do you call that?" says he. "Well," said the waiter, "what +d'you expect? Expect to find a gold watch and chain?" Heavenly +apologue, is it not?' Heavenly, by all means; but I think +Stevenson relished the humour of it so much that he 'smiling passed +the moral by.' In his enjoyment of the waiter's effrontery, he +forgot to sympathise with the man (even though it was himself) who +had broken his teeth upon the harmful, unnecessary button. He +forgot that all the apologetics in the world are based upon just +this audacious paralogism." + + +Many writers have done the same - and not a few critics have hinted +at this: I do not think any writer has got at the radical truth of +it more directly, decisively, and clearly than "J. F. M.," in a +monthly magazine, about the time of Stevenson's death; and the +whole is so good and clear that I must quote it - the writer was +not thinking of the drama specially; only of prose fiction, and +this but makes the passage the more effective and apt to my point. + + +"In the outburst of regret which followed the death of Robert Louis +Stevenson, one leading journal dwelt on his too early removal in +middle life 'with only half his message delivered.' Such a phrase +may have been used in the mere cant of modern journalism. Still it +set one questioning what was Stevenson's message, or at least that +part of it which we had time given us to hear. + +"Wonderful as was the popularity of the dead author, we are +inclined to doubt whether the right appreciation of him was half as +wide. To a certain section of the public he seemed a successful +writer of boys' books, which yet held captive older people. Now, +undoubtedly there was an element (not the highest) in his work +which fascinated boys. It gratified their yearning for adventure. +To too large a number of his readers, we suspect, this remains +Stevenson's chief charm; though even of those there were many able +to recognise and be thankful for the literary power and grace which +could serve up their sanguinary diet so daintily. + +"Most of Stevenson's titles, too, like TREASURE ISLAND, KIDNAPPED, +and THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, tended to foster delusion in this +direction. The books were largely bought for gifts by maiden +aunts, and bestowed as school prizes, when it might not have been +so had their titles given more indication of their real scope and +tendency. + +"All this, it seems to us, has somewhat obscured Stevenson's true +power, which is surely that of an arch-delineator of 'human nature' +and of the devious ways of men. As we read him we feel that we +have our finger on the pulse of the cruel politics of the world. +He has the Shakespearean gift which makes us recognise that his +pirates and his statesmen, with their violence and their murders +and their perversions of justice, are swayed by the same interests +and are pulling the same strings and playing on the same passions +which are at work in quieter methods around ourselves. The vast +crimes and the reckless bloodshed are nothing more nor less than +stage effects used to accentuate for the common eye what the seer +can detect without them. + +"And reading him from this standpoint, Stevenson's 'message' (so +far as it was delivered) appears to be that of utter gloom - the +creed that good is always overcome by evil. We do not mean in the +sense that good always suffers through evil and is frequently +crucified by evil. That is only the sowing of the martyr's blood, +which is, we know, the seed of the Church. We should not have +marvelled in the least that a genius like Stevenson should rebel +against mere external 'happy endings,' which, being in flat +contradiction to the ordinary ways of Providence, are little short +of thoughtless blasphemy against Providence. But the terrible +thing about the Stevenson philosophy of life is that it seems to +make evil overcome good in the sense of absorbing it, or perverting +it, or at best lowering it. When good and evil come in conflict in +one person, Dr Jekyll vanishes into Mr Hyde. The awful Master of +Ballantrae drags down his brother, though he seems to fight for his +soul at every step. The sequel to KIDNAPPED shows David Balfour +ready at last to be hail-fellow-well-met with the supple +Prestongrange and the other intriguers, even though they had +forcibly made him a partner to their shedding of innocent blood. + +"Is it possible that this was what Stevenson's experience of real +life had brought him? Fortunate himself in so many respects, he +was yet one of those who turn aside from the smooth and sunny paths +of life, to enter into brotherly sympathy and fellowship with the +disinherited. Is this, then, what he found on those darker levels? +Did he discover that triumphant hypocrisy treads down souls as well +as lives? + +"We cannot doubt that it often does so; and it is well that we +should see this sometimes, to make us strong to contend with evil +before it works out this, its worst mischief, and to rouse us from +the easy optimist laziness which sits idle while others are being +wronged, and bids them believe 'that all will come right in the +end,' when it is our direct duty to do our utmost to make it 'come +right' to-day. + +"But to show us nothing but the gloomy side, nothing but the +weakness of good, nothing but the strength of evil, does not +inspire us to contend for the right, does not inform us of the +powers and weapons with which we might so contend. To gaze at +unqualified and inevitable moral defeat will but leave us to the +still worse laziness of pessimism, uttering its discouraging and +blasphemous cry, 'It does not matter; nothing will ever come +right!' + +"Shakespeare has shown us - and never so nobly as in his last great +creation of THE TEMPEST - that a man has one stronghold which none +but himself can deliver over to the enemy - that citadel of his own +conduct and character, from which he can smile supreme upon the +foe, who may have conquered all down the line, but must finally +make pause there. + +"We must remember that THE TEMPEST was Shakespeare's last work. +The genuine consciousness of the possible triumph of the moral +nature against every assault is probably reserved for the later +years of life, when, somewhat withdrawn from the passions of its +struggle, we become those lookers-on who see most of the game. +Strange fate is it that so much of our genius vanishes into the +great silence before those later years are reached!" + + +Stevenson was too late in awakening fully to the tragic error to +which short-sighted youth is apt to wander that "bad-heartedness is +strength." And so, from this point of view, to our sorrow, he too +much verified Goethe's saw that "simplicity (not artifice) and +repose are the acme of art, and therefore no youth can be a +master." In fact, he might very well from another side, have taken +one of Goethe's fine sayings as a motto for himself: + + +"Greatest saints were ever most kindly-hearted to sinners; +Here I'm a saint with the best; sinners I never could hate." (7) + + +Stevenson's own verdict on DEACON BRODIE given to a NEW YORK HERALD +reporter on the author's arrival in New York in September 1887, on +the LUDGATE HILL, is thus very near the precise truth: "The piece +has been all overhauled, and though I have no idea whether it will +please an audience, I don't think either Mr Henley or I are ashamed +of it. BUT WE WERE BOTH YOUNG MEN WHEN WE DID THAT, AND I THINK WE +HAD AN IDEA THAT BAD-HEARTEDNESS WAS STRENGTH." + +If Mr Henley in any way confirmed R. L. Stevenson in this +perversion, as I much fear he did, no true admirer of Stevenson has +much to thank him for, whatever claims he may have fancied he had +to Stevenson's eternal gratitude. He did Stevenson about the very +worst turn he could have done, and aided and abetted in robbing us +and the world of yet greater works than we have had from his hands. +He was but condemning himself when he wrote some of the detractory +things he did in the PALL MALL MAGAZINE about the EDINBURGH +EDITION, etc. Men are mirrors in which they see each other: +Henley, after all, painted himself much more effectively in that +now notorious PALL MALL MAGAZINE article than he did R. L. +Stevenson. Such is the penalty men too often pay for wreaking +paltry revenges - writing under morbid memories and narrow and +petty grievances - they not only fail in truth and impartiality, +but inscribe a kind of grotesque parody of themselves in their +effort to make their subject ridiculous, as he did, for example, +about the name Lewis=Louis, and various other things. + +R. L. Stevenson's fate was to be a casuistic and mystic moralist at +bottom, and could not help it; while, owing to some kink or twist, +due, perhaps, mainly to his earlier sufferings, and the teachings +he then received, he could not help giving it always a turn to what +he himself called "tail-foremost" or inverted morality; and it was +not till near the close that he fully awakened to the fact that +here he was false to the truest canons at once of morality and life +and art, and that if he pursued this course his doom was, and would +be, to make his endings "disgrace, or perhaps, degrade his +beginnings," and that no true and effective dramatic unity and +effect and climax was to be gained. Pity that he did so much on +this perverted view of life and world and art: and well it is that +he came to perceive it, even though almost too late:- certainly too +late for that full presentment of that awful yet gladdening +presence of a God's power and equity in this seeming tangled web of +a world, the idea which inspired Robert Browning as well as +Wordsworth, when he wrote, and gathered it up into a few lines in +PIPPA PASSES: + + +"The year's at the spring, +And day's at the morn; +Morning's at seven; +The hillsides dew-pearled; + +The lark's on the wing; +The snail's on the thorn: +God's in His heaven, +All's right with the world. + +. . . . . . . . . . . . + +"All service ranks the same with God, +If now, as formerly he trod +Paradise, His presence fills +Our earth, each only as God wills +Can work - God's puppets best and worst, +Are we; there is no last or first." + + +It shows what he might have accomplished, had longer life been but +allowed him. + + + +CHAPTER XVI - STEVENSON'S GLOOM + + + +THE problem of Stevenson's gloom cannot be solved by any +commonplace cut-and-dried process. It will remain a problem only +unless (1) his original dreamy tendency crossed, if not warped, by +the fatalistic Calvinism which was drummed into him by father, +mother, and nurse in his tender years, is taken fully into account; +then (2) the peculiar action on such a nature of the unsatisfying +and, on the whole, distracting effect of the bohemian and hail- +fellow-well-met sort of ideal to which he yielded, and which has to +be charged with much; and (3) the conflict in him of a keenly +social animus with a very strong egotistical effusiveness, fed by +fancy, and nourished by the enforced solitariness inevitable in the +case of one who, from early years up, suffered from painful, and +even crushing, disease. + +His text and his sermon - which may be shortly summed in the +following sentence - be kind, for in kindness to others lies the +only true pleasure to be gained in life; be cheerful, even to the +point of egotistic self-satisfaction, for through cheerfulness only +is the flow of this incessant kindliness of thought and service +possible. He was not in harmony with the actual effect of much of +his creative work, though he illustrated this in his life, as few +men have done. He regarded it as the highest duty of life to give +pleasure to others; his art in his own idea thus became in an +unostentatious way consecrated, and while he would not have claimed +to be a seer, any more than he would have claimed to be a saint, as +he would have held in contempt a mere sybarite, most certainly a +vein of unblamable hedonism pervaded his whole philosophy of life. +Suffering constantly, he still was always kindly. He encouraged, +as Mr Gosse has said, this philosophy by every resource open to +him. In practical life, all who knew him declared that he was +brightness, naive fancy, and sunshine personified, and yet he could +not help always, somehow, infusing into his fiction a pronounced, +and sometimes almost fatal, element of gloom. Even in his own case +they were not pleasure-giving and failed thus in essence. Some +wise critic has said that no man can ever write well creatively of +that in which in his early youth he had no knowledge. Always +behind Stevenson's latest exercises lies the shadow of this as an +unshifting background, which by art may be relieved, but never +refined away wholly. He cannot escape from it if he would. Here, +too, as George MacDonald has neatly and nicely said: We are the +victims of our own past, and often a hand is put forth upon us from +behind and draws us into life backward. Here was Stevenson, with +his half-hedonistic theories of life, the duty of giving pleasure, +of making eyes brighter, and casting sunshine around one wherever +one went, yet the creator of gloom for us, when all the world was +before him where to choose. This fateful shadow pursued him to the +end, often giving us, as it were, the very justificative ground for +his own father's despondency and gloom, which the son rather too +decisively reproved, while he might have sympathised with it in a +stranger, and in that most characteristic letter to his mother, +which we have quoted, said that it made his father often seem, to +him, to be ungrateful - "HAS THE MAN NO GRATITUDE?" Two selves +thus persistently and constantly struggled in Stevenson. He was +from this point of view, indeed, his own Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, the +buoyant, self-enjoying, because pleasure-conferring, man, and at +the same time the helpless yet fascinating "dark interpreter" of +the gloomy and gloom-inspiring side of life, viewed from the point +of view of dominating character and inherited influence. When he +reached out his hand with desire of pleasure-conferring, lo and +behold, as he wrote, a hand from his forefathers was stretched out, +and he was pulled backward; so that, as he has confessed, his +endings were apt to shame, perhaps to degrade, the beginnings. +Here is something pointing to the hidden and secret springs that +feed the deeper will and bend it to their service. Individuality +itself is but a mirror, which by its inequalities transforms things +to odd shapes. Hawthorne confessed to something of this sort. He, +like Stevenson, suffered much in youth, if not from disease then +through accident, which kept him long from youthful company. At a +time when he should have been running free with other boys, he had +to be lonely, reading what books he could lay his hands on, mostly +mournful and puritanic, by the borders of lone Sebago Lake. He +that hath once in youth been touched by this Marah-rod of +bitterness will not easily escape from it, when he essays in later +years to paint life and the world as he sees them; nay, the hand, +when he deems himself freest, will be laid upon him from behind, if +not to pull him, as MacDonald has said, into life backward, then to +make him a mournful witness of having once been touched by the +Marah-rod, whose bitterness again declares itself and wells out its +bitterness when set even in the rising and the stirring of the +waters. + +Such is our view of the "gloom" of Stevenson - a gloom which well +might have justified something of his father's despondency. He +struggles in vain to escape from it - it narrows, it fatefully +hampers and limits the free field of his art, lays upon it a +strange atmosphere, fascinating, but not favourable to true +dramatic breadth and force, and spontaneous natural simplicity, +invariably lending a certain touch of weakness, inconsistency, and +inconclusiveness to his endings; so that he himself could too often +speak of them afterwards as apt to "shame, perhaps to degrade, the +beginnings." This is what true dramatic art should never do. In +the ending all that may raise legitimate question in the process - +all that is confusing, perplexing in the separate parts - is met, +solved, reconciled, at least in a way satisfactory to the general, +or ordinary mind; and thus such unity is by it so gained and +sealed, that in no case can the true artist, whatever faults may +lie in portions of the process-work, say of his endings that "they +shame, perhaps degrade, the beginning." Wherever this is the case +there will be "gloom," and there will also be a sad, tormenting +sense of something wanting. "The evening brings a 'hame';" so +should it be here - should it especially be in a dramatic work. If +not, "We start; for soul is wanting there;" or, if not soul, then +the last halo of the soul's serene triumph. From this side, too, +there is another cause for the undramatic character, in the +stricter sense of Stevenson's work generally: it is, after all, +distressful, unsatisfying, egotistic, for fancy is led at the beck +of some pre-established disharmony which throws back an abiding and +irremovable gloom on all that went before; and the free spontaneous +grace of natural creation which ensures natural simplicity is, as +said already, not quite attained. + +It was well pointed out in HAMMERTON, by an unanonymous author +there quoted (pp. 22, 23), that while in the story, Hyde, the worse +one, wins, in Stevenson himself - in his real life - Jekyll won, +and not Mr Hyde. This writer, too, might have added that the +Master of Ballantrae also wins as well as Beau Austin and Deacon +Brodie. R. L. Stevenson's dramatic art and a good deal of his +fiction, then, was untrue to his life, and on one side was a lie - +it was not in consonance with his own practice or his belief as +expressed in life. + +In some other matters the test laid down here is not difficult of +application. Stevenson, at the time he wrote THE FOREIGNER AT +HOME, had seen a good deal; he had been abroad; he had already had +experiences; he had had differences with his father about Calvinism +and some other things; and yet just see how he applies the standard +of his earlier knowledge and observation to England - and by doing +so, cannot help exaggerating the outstanding differences, always +with an almost provincial accent of unwavering conviction due to +his early associations and knowledge. He cannot help paying an +excessive tribute to the Calvinism he had formally rejected, in so +far as, according to him, it goes to form character - even national +character, at all events, in its production of types; and he never +in any really effective way glances at what Mr Matthew Arnold +called "Scottish manners, Scottish drink" as elements in any way +radically qualifying. It is not, of course, that I, as a Scotsman, +well acquainted with rural life in some parts of England, as with +rural life in many parts of Scotland in my youth, do not heartily +agree with him - the point is that, when he comes to this sort of +comparison and contrast, he writes exactly as his father would or +might have done, with a full consciousness, after all, of the +tribute he was paying to the practical outcome on character of the +Calvinism in which he so thoroughly believed. It is, in its way, a +very peculiar thing - and had I space, and did I believe it would +prove interesting to readers in general, I might write an essay on +it, with instances - in which case the Address to the Scottish +Clergy would come in for more notice, citation and application than +it has yet received. But meanwhile just take this little snippet - +very characteristic and very suggestive in its own way - and tell +me whether it does not justify and bear out fully what I have now +said as illustrating a certain side and a strange uncertain +limitation in Stevenson: + + +"But it is not alone in scenery and architecture that we count +England foreign. The constitution of society, the very pillars of +the empire, surprise and even pain us. The dull neglected peasant, +sunk in matter, insolent, gross and servile, makes a startling +contrast to our own long-legged, long-headed, thoughtful, Bible- +loving ploughman. A week or two in such a place as Suffolk leaves +the Scotsman gasping. It seems impossible that within the +boundaries of his own island a class should have been thus +forgotten. Even the educated and intelligent who hold our own +opinions and speak in our own words, yet seem to hold them with a +difference or from another reason, and to speak on all things with +less interest and conviction. The first shock of English society +is like a cold plunge." (8) + + +As there was a great deal of the "John Bull element" (9) in the +little dreamer De Quincey, so there was a great deal, after all, of +the rather conceited Calvinistic Scot in R. L. Stevenson, and it is +to be traced as clearly in certain of his fictions as anywhere, +though he himself would not perhaps have seen it and acknowledged +it, as I am here forced now to see it, and to acknowledge it for +him. + + + +CHAPTER XVII - PROOFS OF GROWTH + + + +Once again I quote Goethe: + +"Natural simplicity and repose are the acme of art, and hence it +follows no youth can be a master." It has to be confessed that +seldom, if ever, does Stevenson naturally and by sheer enthusiasm +for subject and characters attain this natural simplicity, if he +often attained the counterfeit presentment - artistic and graceful +euphony, and new, subtle, and often unexpected concatenations of +phrase. Style is much; but it is not everything. We often love +Scott the more that he shows loosenesses and lapses here, for, in +spite of them, he gains natural simplicity, while not seldom +Stevenson, with all his art and fine sense of verbal music, rather +misses it. THE SEDULOUS APE sometimes disenchants as well as +charms; for occasionally a word, a touch, a turn, sends us off too +directly in search of the model; and this operates against the +interest as introducing a new and alien series of associations, +where, for full effect, it should not be so. And this distraction +will be the more insistent, the more knowledge the reader has and +the more he remembers; and since Stevenson's first appeal, both by +his spirit and his methods, is to the cultured and well read, +rather than to the great mass, his "sedulous apehood" only the more +directly wars against him as regards deep, continuous, and lasting +impression; where he should be most simple, natural and +spontaneous; he also is most artificial and involved. If the +story-writer is not so much in earnest, not so possessed by his +matter that this is allowed to him, how is it to be hoped that we +shall be possessed in the reading of it? More than once in +CATRIONA we must own we had this experience, directly warring +against full possession by the story, and certain passages about +Simon Lovat were especially marked by this; if even the first +introduction to Catriona herself was not so. As for Miss Barbara +Grant, of whom so much has been made by many admirers, she is +decidedly clever, indeed too clever by half, and yet her doom is to +be a mere DEUS EX MACHINA, and never do more than just pay a little +tribute to Stevenson's own power of PERSIFLAGE, or, if you like, to +pay a penalty, poor lass, for the too perfect doing of hat, and +really, really, I could not help saying this much, though, I do +believe that she deserved just a wee bit better fate than that. + +But we have proofs of great growth, and nowhere are they greater +than at the very close. Stevenson died young: in some phases he +was but a youth to the last. To a true critic then, the problem +is, having already attained so much - a grand style, grasp of a +limited group of characters, with fancy, sincerity, and +imagination, - what would Stevenson have attained in another ten +years had such been but allotted him? It has over and over again +been said that, for long he SHIED presenting women altogether. +This is not quite true: THRAWN JANET was an earlier effort; and if +there the problem is persistent, the woman is real. Here also he +was on the right road - the advance road. The sex-question was +coming forward as inevitably a part of life, and could not be left +out in any broad and true picture. This element was effectively +revived in WEIR OF HERMISTON, and "Weir" has been well said to be +sadder, if it does not go deeper than DENIS DUVAL or EDWIN DROOD. +We know what Dickens and Thackeray could do there; we can but guess +now what Stevenson would have done. "Weir" is but a fragment; but, +to a wisely critical and unprejudiced mind, it suffices to show not +only what the complete work would have been, but what would have +inevitably followed it. It shows the turning-point, and the way +that was to be followed at the cross-roads - the way into a bigger, +realer, grander world, where realism, freed from the dream, and +fancy, and prejudice of youth, would glory in achieving the more +enduring romance of manhood, maturity and humanity. + +Yes; there was growth - undoubted growth. The questioning and +severely moral element mainly due to the Shorter Catechism - the +tendency to casuistry, and to problems, and wistful introspection - +which had so coloured Stevenson's art up to the date of THE MASTER +OF BALLANTRAE, and made him a great essayist, was passing in the +satisfaction of assured insight into life itself. The art would +gradually have been transformed also. The problem, pure and +simple, would have been subdued in face of the great facts of life; +if not lost, swallowed up in the grandeur, pathos, and awe of the +tragedy clearly realised and presented. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII - EARLIER DETERMINATIONS AND RESULTS + + + +STEVENSON'S earlier determination was so distinctly to the +symbolic, the parabolic, allegoric, dreamy and mystical - to +treatment of the world as an array of weird or half-fanciful +existences, witnessing only to certain dim spiritual facts or +abstract moralities, occasionally inverted moralities - "tail +foremost moralities" as later he himself named them - that a strong +Celtic strain in him had been detected and dwelt on by acute +critics long before any attention had been given to his genealogy +on both sides of the house. The strong Celtic strain is now amply +attested by many researches. Such phantasies as THE HOUSE OF ELD, +THE TOUCHSTONE, THE POOR THING, and THE SONG OF THE MORROW, +published along with some fables at the end of an edition of DR +JEKYLL AND MR HYDE, by Longman's, I think, in 1896, tell to the +initiated as forcibly as anything could tell of the presence of +this element, as though moonshine, disguising and transfiguring, +was laid over all real things and the secret of the world and life +was in its glamour: the shimmering and soft shading rendering all +outlines indeterminate, though a great idea is felt to be present +in the mind of the author, for which he works. The man who would +say there is no feeling for symbol - no phantasy or Celtic glamour +in these weird, puzzling, and yet on all sides suggestive tales +would thereby be declared inept, inefficient - blind to certain +qualities that lie near to grandeur in fanciful literature, or the +literature of phantasy, more properly. + +This power in weird and playful phantasy is accompanied with the +gift of impersonating or embodying mere abstract qualities or +tendencies in characters. The little early sketch written in June +1875, titled GOOD CONTENT, well illustrates this: + + +"Pleasure goes by piping: Hope unfurls his purple flag; and meek +Content follows them on a snow-white ass. Here, the broad sunlight +falls on open ways and goodly countries; here, stage by stage, +pleasant old towns and hamlets border the road, now with high sign- +poles, now with high minster spires; the lanes go burrowing under +blossomed banks, green meadows, and deep woods encompass them +about; from wood to wood flock the glad birds; the vane turns in +the variable wind; and as I journey with Hope and Pleasure, and +quite a company of jolly personifications, who but the lady I love +is by my side, and walks with her slim hand upon my arm? + +"Suddenly, at a corner, something beckons; a phantom finger-post, a +will o' the wisp, a foolish challenge writ in big letters on a +brand. And twisting his red moustaches, braggadocio Virtue takes +the perilous way where dim rain falls ever, and sad winds sigh. +And after him, on his white ass, follows simpering Content. + +"Ever since I walk behind these two in the rain. Virtue is all a- +cold; limp are his curling feather and fierce moustache. Sore +besmirched, on his jackass, follows Content." + + +The record, entitled SUNDAY THOUGHTS, which is dated some five days +earlier is naive and most characteristic, touched with the +phantastic moralities and suggestions already indicated in every +sentence; and rises to the fine climax in this respect at the +close. + + +"A plague o' these Sundays! How the church bells ring up the +sleeping past! I cannot go in to sermon: memories ache too hard; +and so I hide out under the blue heavens, beside the small kirk +whelmed in leaves. Tittering country girls see me as I go past +from where they sit in the pews, and through the open door comes +the loud psalm and the fervent solitary voice of the preacher. To +and fro I wander among the graves, and now look over one side of +the platform and see the sunlit meadow where the grown lambs go +bleating and the ewes lie in the shadow under their heaped fleeces; +and now over the other, where the rhododendrons flower fair among +the chestnut boles, and far overhead the chestnut lifts its thick +leaves and spiry blossom into the dark-blue air. Oh, the height +and depth and thickness of the chestnut foliage! Oh, to have wings +like a dove, and dwell in the tree's green heart! + +. . . . . . . . + +"A plague o' these Sundays! How the Church bells ring up the +sleeping past! Here has a maddening memory broken into my brain. +To the door, to the door, with the naked lunatic thought! Once it +is forth we may talk of what we dare not entertain; once the +intriguing thought has been put to the door I can watch it out of +the loophole where, with its fellows, it raves and threatens in +dumb show. Years ago when that thought was young, it was dearer to +me than all others, and I would speak with it always when I had an +hour alone. These rags that so dismally trick forth its madness +were once the splendid livery my favour wrought for it on my bed at +night. Can you see the device on the badge? I dare not read it +there myself, yet have a guess - 'BAD WARE NICHT' - is not that the +humour of it? + +. . . . . . . . . + +"A plague o' these Sundays! How the Church bells ring up the +sleeping past! If I were a dove and dwelt in the monstrous +chestnuts, where the bees murmur all day about the flowers; if I +were a sheep and lay on the field there under my comely fleece; if +I were one of the quiet dead in the kirkyard - some homespun farmer +dead for a long age, some dull hind who followed the plough and +handled the sickle for threescore years and ten in the distant +past; if I were anything but what I am out here, under the sultry +noon, between the deep chestnuts, among the graves, where the +fervent voice of the preacher comes to me, thin and solitary, +through the open windows; IF I WERE WHAT I WAS YESTERDAY, AND WHAT, +BEFORE GOD, I SHALL BE AGAIN TO-MORROW, HOW SHOULD I OUTFACE THESE +BRAZEN MEMORIES, HOW LIVE DOWN THIS UNCLEAN RESURRECTION OF DEAD +HOPES!" + + +Close associated with this always is the moralising faculty, which +is assertive. Take here the cunning sentences on SELFISHNESS AND +EGOTISM, very Hawthornian yet quite original: + + +"An unconscious, easy, selfish person shocks less, and is more +easily loved, than one who is laboriously and egotistically +unselfish. There is at least no fuss about the first; but the +other parades his sacrifices, and so sells his favours too dear. +Selfishness is calm, a force of nature; you might say the trees +were selfish. But egotism is a piece of vanity; it must always +take you into its confidence; it is uneasy, troublesome, seeking; +it can do good, but not handsomely; it is uglier, because less +dignified, than selfishness itself." + + +If Mr Henley had but had this clear in his mind he might well have +quoted it in one connection against Stevenson himself in the PALL +MALL MAGAZINE article. He could hardly have quoted anything more +apparently apt to the purpose. + +In the sphere of minor morals there is no more important topic. +Unselfishness is too often only the most exasperating form of +selfishness. Here is another very characteristic bit: + + +"You will always do wrong: you must try to get used to that, my +son. It is a small matter to make a work about, when all the world +is in the same case. I meant when I was a young man to write a +great poem; and now I am cobbling little prose articles and in +excellent good spirits. I thank you. . . . Our business in life is +not to succeed, but to continue to fail, in good spirits." + + +Again: + + +"It is the mark of good action that it appears inevitable in the +retrospect. We should have been cut-throats to do otherwise. And +there's an end. We ought to know distinctly that we are damned for +what we do wrong; but when we have done right, we have only been +gentlemen, after all. There is nothing to make a work about." + + +The moral to THE HOUSE OF ELD is incisive writ out of true +experience - phantasy there becomes solemn, if not, for the nonce, +tragic:- + + +"Old is the tree and the fruit good, +Very old and thick the wood. +Woodman, is your courage stout? +Beware! the root is wrapped about +Your mother's heart, your father's bones; +And, like the mandrake, comes with groans." + + +The phantastic moralist is supreme, jauntily serious, facetiously +earnest, most gravely funny in the whole series of MORAL EMBLEMS. + + +"Reader, your soul upraise to see, +In yon fair cut designed by me, +The pauper by the highwayside +Vainly soliciting from pride. +Mark how the Beau with easy air +Contemns the anxious rustic's prayer +And casting a disdainful eye +Goes gaily gallivanting by. +He from the poor averts his head . . . +He will regret it when he's dead." + + +Now, the man who would trace out step by step and point by point, +clearly and faithfully, the process by which Stevenson worked +himself so far free of this his besetting tendency to moralised +symbolism or allegory into the freer air of life and real +character, would do more to throw light on Stevenson's genius, and +the obstacles he had had to contend with in becoming a novelist +eager to interpret definite times and character, than has yet been +done or even faithfully attempted. This would show at once +Stevenson's wonderful growth and the saving grace and elasticity of +his temperament and genius. Few men who have by force of native +genius gone into allegory or moralised phantasy ever depart out of +that fateful and enchanted region. They are as it were at once +lost and imprisoned in it and kept there as by a spell - the more +they struggle for freedom the more surely is the bewitching charm +laid upon them - they are but like the fly in amber. It was so +with Ludwig Tieck; it was so with Nathaniel Hawthorne; it was so +with our own George MacDonald, whose professedly real pictures of +life are all informed of this phantasy, which spoils them for what +they profess to be, and yet to the discerning cannot disguise what +they really are - the attempts of a mystic poet and phantasy writer +and allegoristic moralist to walk in the ways of Anthony Trollope +or of Mrs Oliphant, and, like a stranger in a new land always +looking back (at least by a side-glance, an averted or half-averted +face which keeps him from seeing steadily and seeing whole the real +world with which now he is fain to deal), to the country from which +he came. + +Stevenson did largely free himself, that is his great achievement - +had he lived, we verily believe, so marked was his progress, he +would have been a great and true realist, a profound interpreter of +human life and its tragic laws and wondrous compensations - he +would have shown how to make the full retreat from fairyland +without penalty of too early an escape from it, as was the case +with Thomas the Rymer of Ercildoune, and with one other told of by +him, and proved that to have been a dreamer need not absolutely +close the door to insight into the real world and to art. This +side of the subject, never even glanced at by Mr Henley or Mr +Zangwill or their CONFRERES, yet demands, and will well reward the +closest and most careful attention and thought that can be given to +it. + +The parabolic element, with the whimsical humour and turn for +paradoxical inversion, comes out fully in such a work as DR JEKYLL +AND MR HYDE. There his humour gives body to his fancy, and reality +to the half-whimsical forms in which he embodies the results of +deep and earnest speculations on human nature and motive. But even +when he is professedly concerned with incident and adventure +merely, he manages to communicate to his pages some touch of +universality, as of unconscious parable or allegory, so that the +reader feels now and then as though some thought, or motive, or +aspiration, or weakness of his own were being there cunningly +unveiled or presented; and not seldom you feel he has also unveiled +and presented some of yours, secret and unacknowledged too. + +Hence the interest which young and old alike have felt in TREASURE +ISLAND, KIDNAPPED, and THE WRECKER - a something which suffices +decisively to mark off these books from the mass with which +superficially they might be classed. + + + +CHAPTER XIX - EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN'S ESTIMATE + + + +It should be clearly remembered that Stevenson died at a little +over forty - the age at which severity and simplicity and breadth +in art but begin to be attained. If Scott had died at the age when +Stevenson was taken from us, the world would have lacked the +WAVERLEY NOVELS; if a like fate had overtaken Dickens, we should +not have had A TALE OF TWO CITIES; and under a similar stroke, +Goldsmith could not have written RETALIATION, or tasted the bitter- +sweet first night of SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER. At the age of forty- +four Mr Thomas Hardy had probably not dreamt of TESS OF THE +D'URBERVILLES. But what a man has already done at forty years is +likely, I am afraid, to be a gauge as well as a promise of what he +will do in the future; and from Stevenson we were entitled to +expect perfect form and continued variety of subject, rather than a +measurable dynamic gain. + +This is the point of view which my friend and correspondent of +years ago, Mr Edmund Clarence Stedman, of New York, set out by +emphasising in his address, as President of the meeting under the +auspices of the Uncut Leaves Society in New York, in the beginning +of 1895, on the death of Stevenson, and to honour the memory of the +great romancer, as reported in the NEW YORK TRIBUNE: + + +"We are brought together by tidings, almost from the Antipodes, of +the death of a beloved writer in his early prime. The work of a +romancer and poet, of a man of insight and feeling, which may be +said to have begun but fifteen years ago, has ended, through +fortune's sternest cynicism, just as it seemed entering upon even +more splendid achievement. A star surely rising, as we thought, +has suddenly gone out. A radiant invention shines no more; the +voice is hushed of a creative mind, expressing its fine imagining +in this, our peerless English tongue. His expression was so +original and fresh from Nature's treasure-house, so prodigal and +various, its too brief flow so consummate through an inborn gift +made perfect by unsparing toil, that mastery of the art by which +Robert Louis Stevenson conveyed those imaginings to us so +picturesque, yet wisely ordered, his own romantic life - and now, +at last, so pathetic a loss which renews + +"'The Virgilian cry, +The sense of tears in mortal things,' + +that this assemblage has gathered at the first summons, in tribute +to a beautiful genius, and to avow that with the putting out of +that bright intelligence the reading world experiences a more than +wonted grief. + +"Judged by the sum of his interrupted work, Stevenson had his +limitations. But the work was adjusted to the scale of a possibly +long career. As it was, the good fairies brought all gifts, save +that of health, to his cradle, and the gift-spoiler wrapped them in +a shroud. Thinking of what his art seemed leading to - for things +that would be the crowning efforts of other men seemed prentice- +work in his case - it was not safe to bound his limitations. And +now it is as if Sir Walter, for example, had died at forty-four, +with the WAVERLEY NOVELS just begun! In originality, in the +conception of action and situation, which, however phantastic, are +seemingly within reason, once we breathe the air of his Fancyland; +in the union of bracing and heroic character and adventure; in all +that belongs to tale-writing pure and simple, his gift was +exhaustless. No other such charmer, in this wise, has appeared in +his generation. We thought the stories, the fairy tales, had all +been told, but 'Once upon a time' meant for him our own time, and +the grave and gay magic of Prince Florizel in dingy London or sunny +France. All this is but one of his provinces, however distinctive. +Besides, how he buttressed his romance with apparent truth! Since +Defoe, none had a better right to say: 'There was one thing I +determined to do when I began this long story, and that was to tell +out everything as it befell.' + +"I remember delighting in two fascinating stories of Paris in the +time of Francois Villon, anonymously reprinted by a New York paper +from a London magazine. They had all the quality, all the +distinction, of which I speak. Shortly afterward I met Mr +Stevenson, then in his twenty-ninth year, at a London club, where +we chanced to be the only loungers in an upper room. To my +surprise he opened a conversation - you know there could be nothing +more unexpected than that in London - and thereby I guessed that he +was as much, if not as far, away from home as I was. He asked many +questions concerning 'the States'; in fact, this was but a few +months before he took his steerage passage for our shores. I was +drawn to the young Scotsman at once. He seemed more like a New- +Englander of Holmes's Brahmin caste, who might have come from +Harvard or Yale. But as he grew animated I thought, as others have +thought, and as one would suspect from his name, that he must have +Scandinavian blood in his veins - that he was of the heroic, +restless, strong and tender Viking strain, and certainly from that +day his works and wanderings have not belied the surmise. He told +me that he was the author of that charming book of gipsying in the +Cevennes which just then had gained for him some attentions from +the literary set. But if I had known that he had written those two +stories of sixteenth-century Paris - as I learned afterwards when +they reappeared in the NEW ARABIAN NIGHTS - I would not have bidden +him good-bye as to an 'unfledged comrade,' but would have wished +indeed to 'grapple him to my soul with hooks of steel.' + +"Another point is made clear as crystal by his life itself. He had +the instinct, and he had the courage, to make it the servant, and +not the master, of the faculty within him. I say he had the +courage, but so potent was his birth-spell that doubtless he could +not otherwise. Nothing commonplace sufficed him. A regulation +stay-at-home life would have been fatal to his art. The ancient +mandate, 'Follow thy Genius,' was well obeyed. Unshackled freedom +of person and habit was a prerequisite; as an imaginary artist he +felt - nature keeps her poets and story-tellers children to the +last - he felt, if he ever reasoned it out, that he must gang his +own gait, whether it seemed promising, or the reverse, to kith, +kin, or alien. So his wanderings were not only in the most natural +but in the wisest consonance with his creative dreams. Wherever he +went, he found something essential for his use, breathed upon it, +and returned it fourfold in beauty and worth. The longing of the +Norseman for the tropic, of the pine for the palm, took him to the +South Seas. There, too, strange secrets were at once revealed to +him, and every island became an 'Isle of Voices.' Yes, an +additional proof of Stevenson's artistic mission lay in his +careless, careful, liberty of life; in that he was an artist no +less than in his work. He trusted to the impulse which possessed +him - that which so many of us have conscientiously disobeyed and +too late have found ourselves in reputable bondage to +circumstances. + +"But those whom you are waiting to hear will speak more fully of +all this - some of them with the interest of their personal +remembrance - with the strength of their affection for the man +beloved by young and old. In the strange and sudden intimacy with +an author's record which death makes sure, we realise how notable +the list of Stevenson's works produced since 1878; more than a +score of books - not fiction alone, but also essays, criticism, +biography, drama, even history, and, as I need not remind you, that +spontaneous poetry which comes only from a true poet. None can +have failed to observe that, having recreated the story of +adventure, he seemed in his later fiction to interfuse a subtler +purpose - the search for character, the analysis of mind and soul. +Just here his summons came. Between the sunrise of one day and the +sunset of the next he exchanged the forest study for the mountain +grave. There, as he had sung his own wish, he lies 'under the wide +and starry sky.' If there was something of his own romance, so +exquisitely capricious, in the life of Robert Louis Stevenson, so, +also, the poetic conditions are satisfied in his death, and in the +choice of his burial-place upon the top of Pala. As for the +splendour of that maturity upon which we counted, now never to be +fulfilled on sea or land, I say - as once before, when the great +New-England romancer passed in the stillness of the night: + + +"'What though his work unfinished lies? Half bent +The rainbow's arch fades out in upper air, +The shining cataract half-way down the height +Breaks into mist; the haunting strain, that fell +On listeners unaware, +Ends incomplete, but through the starry night +The ear still waits for what it did not tell.'" + + +Dr Edward Eggleston finely sounded the personal note, and told of +having met Stevenson at a hotel in New York. Stevenson was ill +when the landlord came to Dr Eggleston and asked him if he should +like to meet him. Continuing, he said: + + +"He was flat on his back when I entered, but I think I never saw +anybody grow well in so short a time. It was a soul rather than a +body that lay there, ablaze with spiritual fire, good will shining +through everywhere. He did not pay me any compliment about my +work, and I didn't pay him any about his. We did not burn any of +the incense before each other which authors so often think it +necessary to do, but we were friends instantly. I am not given to +speedy intimacies, but I could not help my heart going out to him. +It was a wonderfully invested soul, no hedges or fences across his +fields, no concealment. He was a romanticist; I was - well, I +don't know exactly what. But he let me into the springs of his +romanticism then and there. + +"'You go in your boat every day?' he asked. 'You sail? Oh! to +write a novel a man must take his life in his hands. He must not +live in the town.' And so he spoke, in his broad way, of course, +according to the enthusiasm of the moment. + +"I can't sound any note of pathos here to-night. Some lives are so +brave and sweet and joyous and well-rounded, with such a +completeness about them that death does not leave imperfection. He +never had the air of sitting up with his own reputation. He let +his books toss in the waves of criticism and make their ports if +they deserve to. He had no claptrap, no great cause, none of the +disease of pruriency which came into fashion with Flaubert and Guy +de Maupassant. He simply told his story, with no condescension, +taking the readers into his heart and his confidence." + + + +CHAPTER XX - EGOTISTIC ELEMENT AND ITS EFFECTS + + + +FROM these sources now traced out by us - his youthfulness of +spirit, his mystical bias, and tendency to dream - symbolisms +leading to disregard of common feelings - flows too often the +indeterminateness of Stevenson's work, at the very points where for +direct interest there should be decision. In THE MASTER OF +BALLANTRAE this leads him to try to bring the balances even as +regards our interest in the two brothers, in so far justifying from +one point of view what Mr Zangwill said in the quotation we have +given, or, as Sir Leslie Stephen had it in his second series of the +STUDIES OF A BIOGRAPHER: + + +"The younger brother in THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, who is black- +mailed by the utterly reprobate master, ought surely to be +interesting instead of being simply sullen and dogged. In the +later adventures, we are invited to forgive him on the ground that +his brain has been affected: but the impression upon me is that he +is sacrificed throughout to the interests of the story [or more +strictly for the working out of the problem as originally conceived +by the author]. The curious exclusion of women is natural in the +purely boyish stories, since to a boy woman is simply an +incumbrance upon reasonable modes of life. When in CATRIONA +Stevenson introduces a love story, it is still unsatisfactory, +because David Balfour is so much the undeveloped animal that his +passion is clumsy, and his charm for the girl unintelligible. I +cannot feel, to say the truth, that in any of these stories I am +really among living human beings with whom, apart from their +adventures, I can feel any very lively affection or antipathy." + + +In the EBB-TIDE it is, in this respect, yet worse: the three +heroes choke each other off all too literally. + +In his excess of impartiality he tones down the points and lines +that would give the attraction of true individuality to his +characters, and instead, would fain have us contented with his +liberal, and even over-sympathetic views of them and allowances for +them. But instead of thus furthering his object, he sacrifices the +whole - and his story becomes, instead of a broad and faithful +human record, really a curiosity of autobiographic perversion, and +of overweening, if not extravagant egotism of the more refined, but +yet over-obtrusive kind. + +Mr Baildon thus hits the subjective tendency, out of which mainly +this defect - a serious defect in view of interest - arises. + + +"That we can none of us be sure to what crime we might not descend, +if only our temptation were sufficiently acute, lies at the root of +his fondness and toleration for wrong-doers (p. 74). + + +Thus he practically declines to do for us what we are unwilling or +unable to do for ourselves. Interest in two characters in fiction +can never, in this artificial way, and if they are real characters +truly conceived, be made equal, nor can one element of claim be +balanced against another, even at the beck of the greatest artist. +The common sentiment, as we have seen, resents it even as it +resents lack of guidance elsewhere. After all, the novelist is +bound to give guidance: he is an authority in his own world, where +he is an autocrat indeed; and can work out issues as he pleases, +even as the Pope is an authority in the Roman Catholic world: he +abdicates his functions when he declines to lead: we depend on him +from the human point of view to guide us right, according to the +heart, if not according to any conventional notion or opinion. +Stevenson's pause in individual presentation in the desire now to +raise our sympathy for the one, and then for the other in THE +MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, admits us too far into Stevenson's secret or +trick of affected self-withdrawal in order to work his problem and +to signify his theories, to the loss and utter confusion of his +aims from the point of common dramatic and human interest. It is +the same in CATRIONA in much of the treatment of James Mohr or +More; it is still more so in not a little of the treatment of WEIR +OF HERMISTON and his son, though there, happily for him and for us, +there were the direct restrictions of known fact and history, and +clearly an attempt at a truer and broader human conception +unburdened by theory or egotistic conception. + +Everywhere the problem due to the desire to be overjust, so to say, +emerges; and exactly in the measure it does so the source of true +dramatic directness and variety is lost. It is just as though +Shakespeare were to invent a chorus to cry out at intervals about +Iago - "a villain, bad lot, you see, still there's a great deal to +be said for him - victim of inheritance, this, that and the other; +and considering everything how could you really expect anything +else now." Thackeray was often weak from this same tendency - he +meant Becky Sharp to be largely excused by the reader on these +grounds, as he tries to excuse several others of his characters; +but his endeavours in this way to gloss over "wickedness" in a way, +do not succeed - the reader does not carry clear in mind as he goes +along, the suggestions Thackeray has ineffectually set out and the +"healthy hatred of scoundrels" Carlyle talked about has its full +play in spite of Thackeray's suggested excuses and palliations, and +all in his own favour, too, as a story-wright. + +Stevenson's constant habit of putting himself in the place of +another, and asking himself how would I have borne myself here or +there, thus limited his field of dramatic interest, where the +subject should have been made pre-eminently in aid of this effect. +Even in Long John Silver we see it, as in various others of his +characters, though there, owing to the demand for adventure, and +action contributory to it, the defect is not so emphasised. The +sense as of a projection of certain features of the writer into all +and sundry of his important characters, thus imparts, if not an air +of egotism, then most certainly a somewhat constrained, if not +somewhat artificial, autobiographical air - in the very midst of +action, questions of ethical or casuistical character arise, all +contributing to submerging individual character and its dramatic +interests under a wave of but half-disguised autobiography. Let +Stevenson do his very best - let him adopt all the artificial +disguises he may, as writing narrative in the first person, etc., +as in KIDNAPPED and CATRIONA, nevertheless, the attentive reader's +mind is constantly called off to the man who is actually writing +the story. It is as though, after all, all the artistic or +artificial disguises were a mere mask, as more than once Thackeray +represented himself, the mask partially moved aside, just enough to +show a chubby, childish kind of transformed Thackeray face below. +This belongs, after all, to the order of self-revelation though +under many disguises: it is creation only in its manner of work, +not in its essential being - the spirit does not so to us go clean +forth of itself, it stops at home, and, as if from a remote and +shadowy cave or recess, projects its own colour on all on which it +looks. + +This is essentially the character of the MYSTIC; and hence the +justification for this word as applied expressly to Stevenson by Mr +Chesterton and others. + + +"The inner life like rings of light +Goes forth of us, transfiguring all we see." + + +The effect of these early days, with the peculiar tint due to the +questionings raised by religious stress and strain, persists with +Stevenson; he grows, but he never escapes from that peculiar +something which tells of childish influences - of boyish +perversions and troubled self-examinations due to Shorter Catechism +- any one who would view Stevenson without thought of this, would +view him only from the outside - see him merely in dress and outer +oddities. Here I see definite and clear heredity. Much as he +differed from his worthy father in many things, he was like him in +this - the old man like the son, bore on him the marks of early +excesses of wistful self-questionings and painful wrestlings with +religious problems, that perpetuated themselves in a quaint kind of +self-revelation often masked by an assumed self-withdrawal or +indifference which to the keen eye only the more revealed the real +case. Stevenson never, any more than his father, ceased to be +interested in the religious questions for which Scotland has always +had a PENCHANT - and so much is this the case that I could wish +Professor Sidney Colvin would even yet attempt to show the bearing +of certain things in that ADDRESS TO THE SCOTTISH CLERGY written +when Stevenson was yet but a young man, on all that he afterwards +said and did. It starts in the EDINBURGH EDITION without any note, +comment, or explanation whatever, but in that respect the EDINBURGH +EDITION is not quite so complete as it might have been made. In +view of the point now before us, it is far more important than many +of the other trifles there given, and wants explanation and its +relation to much in the novels brought out and illustrated. Were +this adequately done, only new ground would be got for holding that +Stevenson, instead of, as has been said, "seeing only the visible +world," was, in truth, a mystical moralist, once and always, whose +thoughts ran all too easily into parable and fable, and who, +indeed, never escaped wholly from that atmosphere, even when +writing of things and characters that seemed of themselves to be +wholly outside that sphere. This was the tendency, indeed, that +militated against the complete detachment in his case from moral +problems and mystical thought, so as to enable him to paint, as it +were, with a free hand exactly as he saw; and most certainly not +that he saw only the visible world. The mystical element is not +directly favourable to creative art. You see in Tolstoy how it +arrests and perplexes - how it lays a disturbing check on real +presentation - hindering the action, and is not favourable to the +loving and faithful representation, which, as Goethe said, all true +and high art should be. To some extent you see exactly the same +thing in Nathaniel Hawthorne as in Tolstoy. Hawthorne's +preoccupations in this way militated against his character-power; +his healthy characters who would never have been influenced as he +describes by morbid ones yet are not only influenced according to +him, but suffer sadly. Phoebe Pyncheon in THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN +GABLES, gives sunshine to poor Hepzibah Clifford, but is herself +never merry again, though joyousness was her natural element. So, +doubtless, it would have been with Pansie in DOCTOR DOLLIVER, as +indeed it was with Zenobia and with the hero in the MARBLE FAUN. +"We all go wrong," said Hawthorne, "by a too strenuous resolution +to go right." Lady Byron was to him an intolerably irreproachable +person, just as Stevenson felt a little of the same towards +Thoreau; notwithstanding that he was the "sunnily-ascetic," the +asceticism and its corollary, as he puts it: the passion for +individual self-improvement was alien in a way to Stevenson. This +is the position of the casuistic mystic moralist and not of the man +who sees only the visible world. + +Mr Baildon says: + + +"Stevenson has many of the things that are wanting or defective in +Scott. He has his philosophy of life; he is beyond remedy a +moralist, even when his morality is of the kind which he happily +calls 'tail foremost,' or as we may say, inverted morality. +Stevenson is, in fact, much more of a thinker than Scott, and he is +also much more of the conscious artist, questionable advantage as +that sometimes is. He has also a much cleverer, acuter mind than +Scott, also a questionable advantage, as genius has no greater +enemy than cleverness, and there is really no greater descent than +to fall from the style of genius to that of cleverness. But +Stevenson was too critical and alive to misuse his cleverness, and +it is generally employed with great effect as in the diabolical +ingenuities of a John Silver, or a Master of Ballantrae. In one +sense Stevenson does not even belong to the school of Scott, but +rather to that of Poe, Hawthorne, and the Brontes, in that he aims +more at concentration and intensity, than at the easy, quiet +breadth of Scott." + + +If, indeed, it should not here have been added that Stevenson's +theory of life and conduct was not seldom too insistent for free +creativeness, for dramatic freedom, breadth and reality. + +Now here I humbly think Mr Baldion errs about the cleverness when +he criticises Stevenson for the FAUX PAS artistically of resorting +to the piratic filibustering and the treasure-seeking at the close +of THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, he only tells and tells plainly how +cleverness took the place of genius there; as indeed it did in not +a few cases - certainly in some points in the Dutch escapade in +CATRIONA and in not a few in DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE. The fault of +that last story is simply that we seem to hear Stevenson chuckling +to himself, "Ah, now, won't they all say at last how clever I am." +That too mars the MERRY MEN, whoever wrote them or part wrote them, +and PRINCE OTTO would have been irretrievably spoiled by this self- +conscious sense of cleverness had it not been for style and +artifice. In this incessant "see how clever I am," we have another +proof of the abounding youthfulness of R. L. Stevenson. If, as Mr +Baildon says (p. 30), he had true child's horror of being put in +fine clothes in which one must sit still and be good, PRINCE OTTO +remains attractive in spite of some things and because of his fine +clothes. Neither Poe nor Hawthorne could have fallen to the +piracy, and treasure-hunting of THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE. + +"Far behind Scott in the power of instinctive, irreflective, +spontaneous creation of character, Stevenson tells his story with +more art and with a firmer grip on his reader." And that is +exactly what I, wishing to do all I dutifully can for Stevenson, +cannot see. His genius is in nearly all cases pulled up or spoiled +by his all too conscious cleverness, and at last we say, "Oh +Heavens! if he could and would but let himself go or forget himself +what he might achieve." But he doesn't - never does, and therefore +remains but a second-rate creator though more and more the stylist +and the artist. This is more especially the case at the very +points where writers like Scott would have risen and roused all the +readers' interest. When Stevenson reaches such points, he is +always as though saying "See now how cleverly I'll clear that old +and stereotyped style of thing and do something NEW." But there +are things in life and human nature, which though they are old are +yet ever new, and the true greatness of a writer can never come +from evading or looking askance at them or trying to make them out +something else than what they really are. No artistic aim or +ambition can suffice to stand instead of them or to refine them +away. That way lies only cold artifice and frigid lacework, and +sometimes Stevenson did go a little too much on this line. + + + +CHAPTER XXI - UNITY IN STEVENSON'S STORIES + + + +THE unity in Stevenson's stories is generally a unity of subjective +impression and reminiscence due, in the first place, to his quick, +almost abnormal boyish reverence for mere animal courage, audacity, +and doggedness, and, in the second place, to his theory of life, +his philosophy, his moral view. He produces an artificial +atmosphere. Everything then has to be worked up to this - kept +really in accordance with it, and he shows great art in the doing +of this. Hence, though, a quaint sense of sameness, of artificial +atmosphere - at once really a lack of spontaneity and of freedom. +He is freest when he pretends to nothing but adventure - when he +aims professedly at nothing save to let his characters develop +themselves by action. In this respect the most successful of his +stories is yet TREASURE ISLAND, and the least successful perhaps +CATRIONA, when just as the ambitious aim compels him to pause in +incident, the first-person form creates a cold stiffness and +artificiality alien to the full impression he would produce upon +the reader. The two stories he left unfinished promised far +greater things in this respect than he ever accomplished. For it +is an indisputable fact, and indeed very remarkable, that the +ordinary types of men and women have little or no attraction for +Stevenson, nor their commonplace passions either. Yet precisely +what his art wanted was due infusion of this very interest. +Nothing else will supply the place. The ordinary passion of love +to the end he SHIES, and must invent no end of expedients to supply +the want. The devotion of the ordinary type, as Thomas Hardy has +over and over exhibited it, is precisely what Stevenson wants, to +impart to his novels the full sense of reality. The secret of +morals, says Shelley, is a going out of self. Stevenson was only +on the way to secure this grand and all-sufficing motive. His +characters, in a way, are all already like himself, romantic, but +the highest is when the ordinary and commonplace is so apprehended +that it becomes romantic, and may even, through the artist's deeper +perception and unconscious grasp and vision, take the hand of +tragedy, and lose nothing. The very atmosphere Stevenson so loved +to create was in itself alien to this; and, so far as he went, his +most successful revelations were but records of his own +limitations. It is something that he was to the end so much the +youth, with fine impulses, if sometimes with sympathies +misdirected, and that, too, in such a way as to render his work +cold and artificial, else he might have turned out more of the +Swift than of the Sterne or Fielding. Prince Otto and Seraphina +are from this cause mainly complete failures, alike from the point +of view of nature and of art, and the Countess von Rosen is not a +complete failure, and would perhaps have been a bit of a success, +if only she had made Prince Otto come nearer to losing his virtue. +The most perfect in style, perhaps, of all Stevenson's efforts it +is yet most out of nature and truth, - a farce, felt to be +disguised only when read in a certain mood; and this all the more +for its perfections, just as Stevenson would have said it of a +human being too icily perfect whom he had met. + +On this subject, Mr Baildon has some words so decisive, true, and +final, that I cannot refrain from here quoting them: + + +"From sheer incapacity to retain it, Prince Otto loses the regard, +affection, and esteem of his wife. He goes eavesdropping among the +peasantry, and has to sit silent while his wife's honour is +coarsely impugned. After that I hold it is impossible for +Stevenson to rehabilitate his hero, and, with all his brilliant +effects, he fails. . . . I cannot help feeling a regret that such +fine work is thrown away on what I must honestly hold to be an +unworthy subject. The music of the spheres is rather too sublime +an accompaniment for this genteel comedy Princess. A touch of +Offenbach would seem more appropriate. Then even in comedy the +hero must not be the butt." And it must reluctantly be confessed +that in Prince Otto you see in excess that to which there is a +tendency in almost all the rest - it is to make up for lack of hold +on human nature itself, by resources of style and mere external +technical art. + + + +CHAPTER XXII - PERSONAL CHEERFULNESS AND INVENTED GLOOM + + + +NOW, it is in its own way surely a very remarkable thing that +Stevenson, who, like a youth, was all for HEITERKEIT, cheerfulness, +taking and giving of pleasure, for relief, change, variety, new +impressions, new sensations, should, at the time he did, have +conceived and written a story like THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE - all +in a grave, grey, sombre tone, not aiming even generally at what at +least indirectly all art is conceived to aim at - the giving of +pleasure: he himself decisively said that it "lacked all +pleasurableness, and hence was imperfect in essence." A very +strange utterance in face of the oft-repeated doctrine of the +essays that the one aim of art, as of true life, is to communicate +pleasure, to cheer and to elevate and improve, and in face of two +of his doctrines that life itself is a monitor to cheerfulness and +mirth. This is true: and it is only explainable on the ground +that it is youth alone which can exult in its power of accumulating +shadows and dwelling on the dark side - it is youth that revels in +the possible as a set-off to its brightness and irresponsibility: +it is youth that can delight in its own excess of shade, and can +even dispense with sunshine - hugging to its heart the memory of +its own often self-created distresses and conjuring up and, with +self-satisfaction, brooding over the pain and imagined horrors of a +lifetime. Maturity and age kindly bring their own relief - +rendering this kind of ministry to itself no longer desirable, even +were it possible. THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE indeed marks the +crisis. It shows, and effectively shows, the other side of the +adventure passion - the desire of escape from its own sombre +introspections, which yet, in all its "go" and glow and glitter, +tells by its very excess of their tendency to pass into this other +and apparently opposite. But here, too, there is nothing single or +separate. The device of piracy, etc., at close of BALLANTRAE, is +one of the poorest expedients for relief in all fiction. + +Will in WILL O' THE MILL presents another. When at the last moment +he decides that it is not worth while to get married, the author's +then rather incontinent philosophy - which, by-the-bye, he did not +himself act on - spoils his story as it did so much else. Such an +ending to such a romance is worse even than any blundering such as +the commonplace inventor could be guilty of, for he would be in a +low sense natural if he were but commonplace. We need not +therefore be surprised to find Mr Gwynn thus writing: + + +"The love scenes in WEIR OF HERMISTON are almost unsurpassable; but +the central interest of the story lies elsewhere - in the relations +between father and son. Whatever the cause, the fact is clear that +in the last years of his life Stevenson recognised in himself an +ability to treat subjects which he had hitherto avoided, and was +thus no longer under the necessity of detaching fragments from +life. Before this, he had largely confined himself to the +adventures of roving men where women had made no entrance; or, if +he treated of a settled family group, the result was what we see in +THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE." + + +In a word, between this work and WEIR OF HERMISTON we have the +passage from mere youth to manhood, with its wider, calmer views, +and its patience, inclusiveness, and mild, genial acceptance of +types that before did not come, and could not by any effort of will +be brought, within range or made to adhere consistently with what +was already accepted and workable. He was less the egotist now and +more the realist. He was not so prone to the high lights in which +all seems overwrought, exaggerated; concerned really with effects +of a more subdued order, if still the theme was a wee out of +ordinary nature. Enough is left to prove that Stevenson's life- +long devotion to his art anyway was on the point of being rewarded +by such a success as he had always dreamt of: that in the man's +nature there was power to conceive scenes of a tragic beauty and +intensity unsurpassed in our prose literature, and to create +characters not unworthy of his greatest predecessors. The blind +stroke of fate had nothing to say to the lesson of his life, and +though we deplore that he never completed his masterpieces, we may +at least be thankful that time enough was given him to prove to his +fellow-craftsmen, that such labour for the sake of art is not +without art's peculiar reward - the triumph of successful +execution. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII - EDINBURGH REVIEWERS' DICTA INAPPLICABLE TO LATER +WORK + + + +FROM many different points of view discerning critics have +celebrated the autobiographic vein - the self-revealing turn, the +self-portraiture, the quaint, genial, yet really child-like +egotistic and even dreamy element that lies like an amalgam, behind +all Stevenson's work. Some have even said, that because of this, +he will finally live by his essays and not by his stories. That is +extreme, and is not critically based or justified, because, however +true it may be up to a certain point, it is not true of Stevenson's +quite latest fictions where we see a decided breaking through of +the old limits, and an advance upon a new and a fresher and broader +sphere of interest and character altogether. But these ideas set +down truly enough at a certain date, or prior to a certain date, +are wrong and falsely directed in view of Stevenson's latest work +and what it promised. For instance, what a discerning and able +writer in the EDINBURGH REVIEW of July 1895 said truly then was in +great part utterly inapplicable to the whole of the work of the +last years, for in it there was grasp, wide and deep, of new +possibilities - promise of clear insight, discrimination, and +contrast of character, as well as firm hold of new and great human +interest under which the egotistic or autobiographic vein was +submerged or weakened. The EDINBURGH REVIEWER wrote: + + +"There was irresistible fascination in what it would be unfair to +characterise as egotism, for it came natural to him to talk frankly +and easily of himself. . . . He could never have dreamed, like +Pepys, of locking up his confidence in a diary. From first to +last, in inconsecutive essays, in the records of sentimental +touring, in fiction and in verse, he has embodied the outer and the +inner autobiography. He discourses - he prattles - he almost +babbles about himself. He seems to have taken minute and habitual +introspection for the chief study in his analysis of human nature, +as a subject which was immediately in his reach, and would most +surely serve his purpose. We suspect much of the success of his +novels was due to the fact that as he seized for a substructure on +the scenery and situations which had impressed him forcibly, so in +the characters of the most different types, there was always more +or less of self-portraiture. The subtle touch, eminently and +unmistakably realistic, gave life to what might otherwise have +seemed a lay-figure. . . . He hesitated again and again as to his +destination; and under mistakes, advice of friends, doubted his +chances, as a story-writer, even after TREASURE ISLAND had enjoyed +its special success. . . . We venture to think that, with his love +of intellectual self-indulgence, had he found novel-writing really +enjoyable, he would never have doubted at all. But there comes in +the difference between him and Scott, whom he condemns for the +slovenliness of hasty workmanship. Scott, in his best days, sat +down to his desk and let the swift pen take its course in +inspiration that seemed to come without an effort. Even when +racked with pains, and groaning in agony, the intellectual +machinery was still driven at a high pressure by something that +resembled an irrepressible instinct. Stevenson can have had little +or nothing of that inspiriting afflatus. He did his painstaking +work conscientiously, thoughtfully; he erased, he revised, and he +was hard to satisfy. In short, it was his weird - and he could not +resist it - to set style and form before fire and spirit." + + + +CHAPTER XXIV - MR HENLEY'S SPITEFUL PERVERSIONS + + + +MORE unfortunate still, as disturbing and prejudicing a sane and +true and disinterested view of Stevenson's claims, was that article +of his erewhile "friend," Mr W. E. Henley, published on the +appearance of the MEMOIR by Mr Graham Balfour, in the PALL MALL +MAGAZINE. It was well that Mr Henley there acknowledged frankly +that he wrote under a keen sense of "grievance" - a most dangerous +mood for the most soberly critical and self-restrained of men to +write in, and that most certainly Mr W. E. Henley was not - and +that he owned to having lost contact with, and recognition of the +R. L. Stevenson who went to America in 1887, as he says, and never +came back again. To do bare justice to Stevenson it is clear that +knowledge of that later Stevenson was essential - essential whether +it was calculated to deepen sympathy or the reverse. It goes +without saying that the Louis he knew and hobnobbed with, and +nursed near by the Old Bristo Port in Edinburgh could not be the +same exactly as the Louis of Samoa and later years - to suppose so, +or to expect so, would simply be to deny all room for growth and +expansion. It is clear that the W. E. Henley of those days was not +the same as the W. E. Henley who indited that article, and if +growth and further insight are to be allowed to Mr Henley and be +pleaded as his justification CUM spite born of sense of grievance +for such an onslaught, then clearly some allowance in the same +direction must be made for Stevenson. One can hardly think that in +his case old affection and friendship had been so completely +submerged, under feelings of grievance and paltry pique, almost +always bred of grievances dwelt on and nursed, which it is +especially bad for men of genius to acknowledge, and to make a +basis, as it were, for clearer knowledge, insight, and judgment. +In other cases the pleading would simply amount to an immediate and +complete arrest of judgment. Mr Henley throughout writes as though +whilst he had changed, and changed in points most essential, his +erewhile friend remained exactly where he was as to literary +position and product - the Louis who went away in 1887 and never +returned, had, as Mr W. E. Henley, most unfortunately for himself, +would imply, retained the mastery, and the Louis who never came +back had made no progress, had not added an inch, not to say a +cubit, to his statue, while Mr Henley remained IN STATU QUO, and +was so only to be judged. It is an instance of the imperfect +sympathy which Charles Lamb finely celebrated - only here it is +acknowledged, and the "imperfect sympathy" pled as a ground for +claiming the full insight which only sympathy can secure. If Mr +Henley was fair to the Louis he knew and loved, it is clear that he +was and could only be unjust to the Louis who went away in 1887 and +never came back. + + +"At bottom Stevenson was an excellent fellow. But he was of his +essence what the French call PERSONNEL. He was, that is, +incessantly and passionately interested in Stevenson. He could not +be in the same room with a mirror but he must invite its +confidences every time he passed it; to him there was nothing +obvious in time and eternity, and the smallest of his discoveries, +his most trivial apprehensions, were all by way of being +revelations, and as revelations must be thrust upon the world; he +was never so much in earnest, never so well pleased (this were he +happy or wretched), never so irresistible as when he wrote about +himself. WITHAL, IF HE WANTED A THING, HE WENT AFTER IT WITH AN +ENTIRE CONTEMPT OF CONSEQUENCES. FOR THESE, INDEED, THE SHORTER +CATECHISM WAS EVER PREPARED TO ANSWER; SO THAT WHETHER HE DID WELL +OR ILL, HE WAS SAFE TO COME OUT UNABASHED AND CHEERFUL." + + +Notice here, how undiscerning the mentor becomes. The words put in +"italics," unqualified as they are, would fit and admirably cover +the character of the greatest criminal. They would do as they +stand, for Wainwright, for Dr Dodd, for Deeming, for Neil Cream, +for Canham Read, or for Dougal of Moat Farm fame. And then the +touch that, in the Shorter Catechism, Stevenson would have found a +cover or justification for it somehow! This comes of writing under +a keen sense of grievance; and how could this be truly said of one +who was "at bottom an excellent fellow." W. Henley's ethics are +about as clear-obscure as is his reading of character. Listen to +him once again - more directly on the literary point. + + +"To tell the truth, his books are none of mine; I mean that if I +wanted reading, I do not go for it to the EDINBURGH EDITION. I am +not interested in remarks about morals; in and out of letters. I +HAVE LIVED A FULL AND VARIED LIFE, and my opinions are my own. SO, +IF I CRAVE THE ENCHANTMENT OF ROMANCE, I ASK IT OF BIGGER MEN THAN +HE, AND OF BIGGER BOOKS THAN HIS: of ESMOND (say) and GREAT +EXPECTATIONS, of REDGAUNTLET and OLD MORTALITY, OF LA REINE MARGOT +and BRAGELONNE, of DAVID COPPERFIELD and A TALE OF TWO CITIES; +while if good writing and some other things be in my appetite, are +there not always Hazlitt and Lamb - to say nothing of that globe of +miraculous continents; which is known to us as Shakespeare? There +is his style, you will say, and it is a fact that it is rare, and +IN THE LAST times better, because much simpler than in the first. +But, after all, his style is so perfectly achieved that the +achievement gets obvious: and when achievement gets obvious, is it +not by way of becoming uninteresting? And is there not something +to be said for the person who wrote that Stevenson always reminded +him of a young man dressed the best he ever saw for the Burlington +Arcade? (10) Stevenson's work in letters does not now take me +much, and I decline to enter on the question of his immortality; +since that, despite what any can say, will get itself settled soon +or late, for all time. No - when I care to think of Stevenson it +is not of R. L. Stevenson - R. L. Stevenson, the renowned, the +accomplished - executing his difficult solo, but of the Lewis that +I knew and loved, and wrought for, and worked with for so long. +The successful man of letters does not greatly interest me. I read +his careful prayers and pass on, with the certainty that, well as +they read, they were not written for print. I learn of his +nameless prodigalities, and recall some instances of conduct in +another vein. I remember, rather, the unmarried and irresponsible +Lewis; the friend, the comrade, the CHARMEUR. Truly, that last +word, French as it is, is the only one that is worthy of him. I +shall ever remember him as that. The impression of his writings +disappears; the impression of himself and his talk is ever a +possession. . . . Forasmuch as he was primarily a talker, his +printed works, like these of others after his kind, are but a sop +for posterity. A last dying speech and confession (as it were) to +show that not for nothing were they held rare fellows in their +day." + + +Just a month or two before Mr Henley's self-revealing article +appeared in the PALL MALL MAGAZINE, Mr Chesterton, in the DAILY +NEWS, with almost prophetic forecast, had said: + + +"Mr Henley might write an excellent study of Stevenson, but it +would only be of the Henleyish part of Stevenson, and it would show +a distinct divergence from the finished portrait of Stevenson, +which would be given by Professor Colvin." + + +And it were indeed hard to reconcile some things here with what Mr +Henley set down of individual works many times in the SCOTS AND +NATIONAL OBSERVER, and elsewhere, and in literary judgments as in +some other things there should, at least, be general consistency, +else the search for an honest man in the late years would be yet +harder than it was when Diogenes looked out from his tub! + +Mr James Douglas, in the STAR, in his half-playful and suggestive +way, chose to put it as though he regarded the article in the PALL +MALL MAGAZINE as a hoax, perpetrated by some clever, unscrupulous +writer, intent on provoking both Mr Henley and his friends, and +Stevenson's friends and admirers. This called forth a letter from +one signing himself "A Lover of R. L. Stevenson," which is so good +that we must give it here. + + +A LITERARY HOAX. +TO THE EDITOR OF THE STAR. + +SIR - I fear that, despite the charitable scepticism of Mr Douglas, +there is no doubt that Mr Henley is the perpetrator of the +saddening Depreciation of Stevenson which has been published over +his name. + +What openings there are for reprisals let Mr Henley's conscience +tell him; but permit me to remind him of two or three things which +R. L. Stevenson has written concerning W. E. Henley. + +First this scene in the infirmary at Edinburgh: + +"(Leslie) Stephen and I sat on a couple of chairs, and the poor +fellow (Henley) sat up in his bed with his hair and beard all +tangled, and talked as cheerfully as if he had been in a king's +palace, or the great King's palace of the blue air. He has taught +himself two languages since he has been lying there. I SHALL TRY +TO BE OF USE TO HIM." + +Secondly, this passage from Stevenson's dedication of VIRGINIBUS +PUERISQUE to "My dear William Ernest Henley": + +"These papers are like milestones on the wayside of my life; and as +I look back in memory, there is hardly a stage of that distance but +I see you present with advice, reproof, or praise. Meanwhile, many +things have changed, you and I among the rest; but I hope that our +sympathy, founded on the love of our art, and nourished by mutual +assistance, shall survive these little revolutions, undiminished, +and, with God's help, unite us to the end." + +Thirdly, two scraps from letters from Stevenson to Henley, to show +that the latter was not always a depreciator of R. L. Stevenson's +work: + +"1. I'm glad to think I owe you the review that pleased me best of +all the reviews I ever had.... To live reading such reviews and die +eating ortolans - sich is my aspiration. + +"2. Dear lad, - If there was any more praise in what you wrote, I +think - (the editor who had pruned down Mr Henley's review of +Stevenson's PRINCE OTTO) has done us both a service; some of it +stops my throat. . . . Whether (considering our intimate relations) +you would not do better to refrain from reviewing me, I will leave +to yourself." + +And, lastly, this extract from the very last of Stevenson's letters +to Henley, published in the two volumes of LETTERS: + +"It is impossible to let your new volume pass in silence. I have +not received the same thrill of poetry since G. M.'s JOY OF EARTH +volume, and LOVE IN A VALLEY; and I do not know that even that was +so intimate and deep. . . . I thank you for the joy you have given +me, and remain your old friend and present huge admirer, R. L. S." + + +It is difficult to decide on which side in this literary friendship +lies the true modesty and magnanimity? I had rather be the author +of the last message of R. L. Stevenson to W. E. Henley, than of the +last words of W. E. Henley concerning R. L. Stevenson. + + + +CHAPTER XXV - MR CHRISTIE MURRAY'S IMPRESSIONS + + + +MR CHRISTIE MURRAY, writing as "Merlin" in our handbook in the +REFEREE at the time, thus disposed of some of the points just dealt +with by us: + + +"Here is libel on a large scale, and I have purposely refrained +from approaching it until I could show my readers something of the +spirit in which the whole attack is conceived. 'If he wanted a +thing he went after it with an entire contempt for consequences. +For these, indeed, the Shorter Catechist was ever prepared to +answer; so that whether he did well or ill, he was safe to come out +unabashed and cheerful.' Now if Mr Henley does not mean that for +the very express picture of a rascal without a conscience he has +been most strangely infelicitous in his choice of terms, and he is +one of those who make so strong a profession of duty towards mere +vocables that we are obliged to take him AU PIED DE LA LETTRE. A +man who goes after whatever he wants with an entire contempt of +consequences is a scoundrel, and the man who emerges from such an +enterprise unabashed and cheerful, whatever his conduct may have +been, and justifies himself on the principles of the Shorter +Catechism, is a hypocrite to boot. This is not the report we have +of Robert Louis Stevenson from most of those who knew him. It is a +most grave and dreadful accusation, and it is not minimised by Mr +Henley's acknowledgment that Stevenson was a good fellow. We all +know the air of false candour which lends a disputant so much +advantage in debate. In Victor Hugo's tremendous indictment of +Napoleon le Petit we remember the telling allowance for fine +horsemanship. It spreads an air of impartiality over the most +mordant of Hugo's pages. It is meant to do that. An insignificant +praise is meant to show how a whole Niagara of blame is poured on +the victim of invective in all sincerity, and even with a touch of +reluctance. + +"Mr Henley, despite his absurdities of ''Tis' and 'it were,' is a +fairly competent literary craftsman, and he is quite gifted enough +to make a plain man's plain meaning an evident thing if he chose to +do it. But if for the friend for whom 'first and last he did +share' he can only show us the figure of one 'who was at bottom an +excellent fellow,' and who had 'an entire contempt' for the +consequences of his own acts, he presents a picture which can only +purposely be obscured. . . . + +"All I know of Robert Louis Stevenson I have learned from his +books, and from one unexpected impromptu letter which he wrote to +me years ago in friendly recognition of my own work. I add the +testimonies of friends who may have been of less actual service to +him than Mr Henley, but who surely loved him better and more +lastingly. These do not represent him as the victim of an +overweening personal vanity, nor as a person reckless of the +consequences of his own acts, nor as a Pecksniff who consoled +himself for moral failure out of the Shorter Catechism. The books +and the friends amongst them show me an erratic yet lovable +personality, a man of devotion and courage, a loyal, charming, and +rather irresponsible person whose very slight faults were counter- +balanced many times over by very solid virtues.... + +"To put the thing flatly, it is not a heroism to cling to mere +existence. The basest of us can do that. But it is a heroism to +maintain an equable and unbroken cheerfulness in the face of death. +For my own part, I never bowed at the literary shrine Mr Henley and +his friends were at so great pains to rear. I am not disposed to +think more loftily than I ever thought of their idol. But the Man +- the Man was made of enduring valour and childlike charm, and +these will keep him alive when his detractors are dead and buried." + + +As to the Christian name, it is notorious that he was christened +Robert Lewis - the Lewis being after his maternal grandfather - Dr +Lewis Balfour. Some attempt has been made to show that the Louis +was adopted because so many cousins and relatives had also been so +christened; but the most likely explanation I have ever heard was +that his father changed the name to Louis, that there might be no +chance through it of any notion of association with a very +prominent noisy person of the name of Lewis, in Edinburgh, towards +whom Thomas Stevenson felt dislike, if not positive animosity. +Anyhow, it is clear from the entries in the register of pupils at +the Edinburgh Academy, in the two years when Stevenson was there, +that in early youth he was called Robert only; for in the school +list for 1862 the name appears as Robert Stevenson, without the +Lewis, while in the 1883 list it is given as Lewis Robert +Stevenson. Clearly if in earlier years Stevenson was, in his +family and elsewhere, called ROBERT, there could have then arisen +no risk of confusion with any of his relatives who bore the name of +Lewis; and all this goes to support the view which I have given +above. Anyhow he ceased to be called Robert at home, and ceased in +1863 to be Robert on the Edinburgh Academy list, and became Lewis +Robert. Whether my view is right or not, he was thenceforward +called Louis in his family, and the name uniformly spelt Louis. +What blame on Stevenson's part could be attached to this family +determination it is hard to see - people are absolutely free to +spell their names as they please, and the matter would not be worth +a moment's attention, or the waste of one drop of ink, had not Mr +Henley chosen to be very nasty about the name, and in the PALL MALL +MAGAZINE article persisted in printing it Lewis as though that were +worthy of him and of it. That was not quite the unkindest cut of +all, but it was as unkind as it was trumpery. Mr Christie Murray +neatly set off the trumpery spite of this in the following passage: + + +"Stevenson, it appears, according to his friend's judgment, was +'incessantly and passionately interested in Stevenson,' but most of +us are incessantly and passionately interested in ourselves. 'He +could not be in the same room with a mirror but he must invite its +confidences every time he passed it.' I remember that George Sala, +who was certainly under no illusion as to his own personal aspect, +made public confession of an identical foible. Mr Henley may not +have an equal affection for the looking-glass, but he is a very +poor and unimaginative reader who does not see him gloating over +the god-like proportions of the shadow he sends sprawling over his +own page. I make free to say that a more self-conscious person +than Mr Henley does not live. 'The best and most interesting part +of Stevenson's life will never get written - even by me,' says Mr +Henley. + +"There is one curious little mark of animus, or one equally curious +affectation - I do not profess to know which, and it is most +probably a compound of the two - in Mr Henley's guardedly spiteful +essay which asks for notice. The dead novelist signed his second +name on his title-pages and his private correspondence 'Louis.' Mr +Henley spells it 'Lewis.' Is this intended to say that Stevenson +took an ornamenting liberty with his own baptismal appellation? If +so, why not say the thing and have done with it? Or is it one of +Mr Henley's wilful ridiculosities? It seems to stand for some sort +of meaning, and to me, at least, it offers a jarring hint of small +spitefulness which might go for nothing if it were not so well +borne out by the general tone of Mr Henley's article. It is a +small matter enough, God knows, but it is precisely because it is +so very small that it irritates." + + + +CHAPTER XXVI - HERO-VILLAINS + + + +IN truth, it must indeed be here repeated that Stevenson for the +reason he himself gave about DEACON BRODIE utterly fails in that +healthy hatred of "fools and scoundrels" on which Carlyle somewhat +incontinently dilated. Nor does he, as we have seen, draw the line +between hero and villain of the piece, as he ought to have done; +and, even for his own artistic purposes, has it too much all on one +side, to express it simply. Art demands relief from any one phase +of human nature, more especially of that phase, and even from what +is morbid or exceptional. Admitting that such natures, say as +Huish, the cockney, in the EBB-TIDE on the one side, and Prince +Otto on the other are possible, it is yet absolutely demanded that +they should not stand ALONE, but have their due complement and +balance present in the piece also to deter and finally to tell on +them in the action. If "a knave or villain," as George Eliot aptly +said, is but a fool with a circumbendibus, this not only wants to +be shown, but to have that definite human counterpart and +corrective; and this not in any indirect and perfunctory way, but +in a direct and effective sense. It is here that Stevenson fails - +fails absolutely in most of his work, save the very latest - fails, +as has been shown, in THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, as it were almost +of perverse and set purpose, in lack of what one might call ethical +decision which causes him to waver or seem to waver and wobble in +his judgment of his characters or in his sympathy with them or for +them. Thus he fails to give his readers the proper cue which was +his duty both as man and artist to have given. The highest art and +the lowest are indeed here at one in demanding moral poise, if we +may call it so, that however crudely in the low, and however +artistically and refinedly in the high, vice should not only not be +set forth as absolutely triumphing, nor virtue as being absolutely, +outwardly, and inwardly defeated. It is here the same in the +melodrama of the transpontine theatre as in the tragedies of the +Greek dramatists and Shakespeare. "The evening brings a' 'hame'" +and the end ought to show something to satisfy the innate craving +(for it is innate, thank Heaven! and low and high alike in moments +of ELEVATED IMPRESSION, acknowledge it and bow to it) else there +can scarce be true DENOUEMENT and the sense of any moral rectitude +or law remain as felt or acknowledged in human nature or in the +Universe itself. + +Stevenson's toleration and constant sermonising in the essays - his +desire to make us yield allowances all round is so far, it may be, +there in place; but it will not work out in story or play, and +declares the need for correction and limitation the moment that he +essays artistic presentation - from the point of view of art he +lacks at once artistic clearness and decision, and from the point +of view of morality seems utterly loose and confusing. His +artistic quality here rests wholly in his style - mere style, and +he is, alas! a castaway as regards discernment and reading of human +nature in its deepest demands and laws. Herein lies the false +strain that has spoiled much of his earlier work, which renders +really superficial and confusing and undramatic his professedly +dramatic work - which never will and never can commend the hearty +suffrages of a mixed and various theatrical audience in violating +the very first rule of the theatre, and of dramatic creation. + +From another point of view this is my answer to Mr Pinero in regard +to the failure of Stevenson to command theatrical success. He +confuses and so far misdirects the sympathies in issues which +strictly are at once moral and dramatic. + +I am absolutely at one with Mr Baildon, though I reach my results +from somewhat different grounds from what he does, when he says +this about BEAU AUSTIN, and the reason of its failure - complete +failure - on the stage: + + +"I confess I should have liked immensely to have seen [? to see] +this piece on the boards; for only then could one be quite sure +whether it could be made convincing to an audience and carry their +sympathies in the way the author intended. Yet the fact that BEAU +AUSTIN, in spite of being 'put on' by so eminent an actor-manager +as Mr Beerbohm Tree, was no great success on the stage, is a fair +proof that the piece lacked some of the essentials, good or bad, of +dramatic success. Now a drama, like a picture or a musical +composition, must have a certain unity of key and tone. You can, +indeed, mingle comedy with tragedy as an interlude or relief from +the strain and stress of the serious interest of the piece. But +you cannot reverse the process and mingle tragedy with comedy. +Once touch the fine spun-silk of the pretty fire-balloon of comedy +with the tragic dagger, and it falls to earth a shrivelled nothing. +And the reason that no melodrama can be great art is just that it +is a compromise between tragedy and comedy, a mixture of tragedy +with comedy and not comedy with tragedy. So in drama, the middle +course, proverbially the safest, is in reality the most dangerous. +Now I maintain that in BEAU AUSTIN we have an element of tragedy. +The betrayal of a beautiful, pure and noble-minded woman is surely +at once the basest act a man can be capable of, and a more tragic +event than death itself to the woman. Richardson, in CLARISSA +HARLOWE, is well aware of this, and is perfectly right in making +his DENOUEMENT tragic. Stevenson, on the other hand, patches up +the matter into a rather tame comedy. It is even much tamer than +it would have been in the case of Lovelace and Clarissa Harlowe; +for Lovelace is a strong character, a man who could have been put +through some crucial atonement, and come out purged and ennobled. +But Beau Austin we feel is but a frip. He endures a few minutes of +sharp humiliation, it is true, but to the spectator this cannot but +seem a very insufficient expiation, not only of the wrong he had +done one woman, but of the indefinite number of wrongs he had done +others. He is at once the villain and the hero of the piece, and +in the narrow limits of a brief comedy this transformation cannot +be convincingly effected. Wrongly or rightly, a theatrical +audience, like the spectators of a trial, demand a definite verdict +and sentence, and no play can satisfy which does not reasonably +meet this demand. And this arises not from any merely Christian +prudery or Puritanism, for it is as true for Greek tragedy and +other high forms of dramatic art." + + +The transformation of villain into hero, if possible at all, could +only be convincingly effected in a piece of wide scope, where there +was room for working out the effect of some great shock, upheaval +of the nature, change due to deep and unprecedented experiences - +religious conversion, witnessing of sudden death, providential +rescue from great peril of death, or circumstance of that kind; but +to be effective and convincing it needs to be marked and FULLY +JUSTIFIED in some such way; and no cleverness in the writer will +absolve him from deference to this great law in serious work for +presentation on the stage; if mere farces or little comedies may +seem sometimes to contravene it, yet this - even this - is only in +appearance. + +True, it is not the dramatists part OF HIMSELF to condemn, or to +approve, or praise: he has to present, and to present various +characters faithfully in their relation to each other, and their +effect upon each other. But the moral element cannot be expunged +or set lightly aside because it is closely involved in the very +working out and presentation of these relations, and the effect +upon each other. Character is vital. And character, if it tells +in life, in influence and affection, must be made to tell directly +also in the drama. There is no escape from this - none; the +dramatist is lopsided if he tries to ignore it; he is a monster if +he is wholly blind to it - like the poet in IN MEMORIAM, "Without a +conscience or an aim." Mr Henley, in his notorious, all too +confessional, and yet rather affected article on Stevenson in the +PALL MALL MAGAZINE, has a remark which I confess astonished me - a +remark I could never forget as coming from him. He said that he +"had lived a very full and varied life, and had no interest in +remarks about morals." "Remarks about morals" are, nevertheless, +in essence, the pith of all the books to which he referred, as +those to which he turned in preference to the EDINBURGH EDITION of +R. L. Stevenson's works. The moral element is implicit in the +drama, and it is implicit there because it is implicit in life +itself, or so the great common-sense conceives it and demands it. +What we might call the asides proper of the drama, are "remarks +about morals," nothing else - the chorus in the Greek tragedy +gathered up "remarks about morals" as near as might be to the +"remarks about morals" in the streets of that day, only shaped to a +certain artistic consistency. Shakespeare is rich in "remarks +about morals," often coming near, indeed, to personal utterance, +and this not only when Polonius addresses his son before his going +forth on his travels. Mr Henley here only too plainly confessed, +indeed, to lack of that conviction and insight which, had he but +possessed them, might have done a little to relieve BEAU AUSTIN and +the other plays in which he collaborated with R. L. Stevenson, from +their besetting and fatal weakness. The two youths, alas! thought +they could be grandly original by despising, or worse, contemning +"remarks about morals" in the loftier as in the lower sense. To +"live a full and varied life," if the experience derived from it is +to have expression in the drama, is only to have the richer +resource in "remarks about morals." If this is perverted under any +self-conscious notion of doing something spick-and-span new in the +way of character and plot, alien to all the old conceptions, then +we know our writers set themselves boldly at loggerheads with +certain old-fashioned and yet older new-fashioned laws, which +forbid the violation of certain common demands of the ordinary +nature and common-sense; and for the lack of this, as said already, +no cleverness, no resource, no style or graft, will any way make +up. So long as this is tried, with whatever concentration of mind +and purpose, failure is yet inevitable, and the more inevitable the +more concentration and less of humorous by-play, because genius +itself, if it despises the general moral sentiment and instinct for +moral proportion - an ethnic reward and punishment, so to say - is +all astray, working outside the line; and this, if Mr Pinero will +kindly excuse me, is the secret of the failure of these plays, and +not want of concentration, etc., in the sense he meant, or as he +has put it. + +Stevenson rather affected what he called "tail-foremost morality," +a kind of inversion in the field of morals, as De Quincey mixed it +up with tail-foremost humour in MURDER AS A FINE ART, etc., etc., +but for all such perversions as these the stage is a grand test and +corrector, and such perversions, and not "remarks about morals," +are most strictly prohibited there. Perverted subtleties of the +sort Stevenson in earlier times especially much affected are not +only amiss but ruinous on the stage; and what genius itself would +maybe sanction, common-sense must reject and rigidly cut away. +Final success and triumph come largely by THIS kind of condensation +and concentration, and the stern and severe lopping off of the +indulgence of the EGOTISTICAL genius, which is human discipline, +and the best exponent of the doctrine of unity also. This is the +straight and the narrow way along which genius, if it walk but +faithfully, sows as it goes in the dramatic pathway all the flowers +of human passion, hope, love, terror, and triumph. + +I find it advisable, if not needful, here to reinforce my own +impressions, at some points, by another quotation from Mr Baildon, +if he will allow me, in which Stevenson's dependence in certain +respects on the dream-faculty is emphasised, and to it is traced a +certain tendency to a moral callousness or indifference which is +one of the things in which the waking Stevenson transparently +suffered now and then invasions from the dream-Stevenson - the +result, a kind of spot, as we may call it, on the eye of the moral +sense; it is a small spot; but we know how a very small object held +close before the eye will wholly shut out the most lovely natural +prospects, interposing distressful phantasmagoria, due to the +strained and, for the time, morbid condition of the organ itself. +So, it must be confessed, it is to a great extent here. + +But listen to Mr Baildon: + + +"In A CHAPTER ON DREAMS, Stevenson confesses his indebtedness to +this still mysterious agency. From a child he had been a great and +vivid dreamer, his dreams often taking such frightful shape that he +used to awake 'clinging in terror to the bedpost.' Later in life +his dreams continued to be frequent and vivid, but less terrifying +in character and more continuous and systematic. 'The Brownies,' +as he picturesquely names that 'sub-conscious imagination,' as the +scientist would call it, that works with such surprising freedom +and ingenuity in our dreams, became, as it were, COLLABORATEURS in +his work of authorship. He declares that they invented plots and +even elaborated whole novels, and that, not in a single night or +single dream, but continuously, and from one night to another, like +a story in serial parts. Long before this essay was written or +published, I had been struck by this phantasmal dream-like quality +in some of Stevenson's works, which I was puzzled to account for, +until I read this extraordinary explanation, for explanation it +undoubtedly affords. Anything imagined in a dream would have a +tendency, when retold, to retain something of its dream-like +character, and I have on doubt one could trace in many instances +and distinguish the dreaming and the waking Stevenson, though in +others they may be blended beyond recognition. The trouble with +the Brownies or the dream-Stevenson WAS HIS OR THEIR WANT OF MORAL +SENSE, so that they sometimes presented the waking author with +plots which he could not make use of. Of this Stevenson gives an +instance in which a complete story of marked ingenuity is vetoed +through the moral impossibility of its presentment by a writer so +scrupulous (and in some directions he is extremely scrupulous) as +Stevenson was. But Stevenson admits that his most famous story, +THE STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE, was not only suggested +by a dream, but that some of the most important and most criticised +points, such as the matter of the powder, were taken direct from +the dream. It had been extremely instructive and interesting had +he gone more into detail and mentioned some of the other stories +into which the dream-element entered largely and pointed out its +influence, and would have given us a better clue than we have or +now ever can have. + +"Even in THE SUICIDE CLUB and the RAJAH'S DIAMOND, I seem to feel +strongly the presence of the dream-Stevenson. . . . AT CERTAIN +POINTS ONE FEELS CONSCIOUS OF A CERTAIN MORAL CALLOUSNESS, SUCH AS +MARKS THE DREAM STATE, AS IN THE MURDER OF COLONEL GERALDINE'S +BROTHER, THE HORROR OF WHICH NEVER SEEMS TO COME FULLY HOME TO US. +But let no one suppose these stories are lacking in vividness and +in strangely realistic detail; for this is of the very nature of +dreaming at its height. . . . While the DRAMATIS PERSONAE play +their parts with the utmost spirit while the story proceeds, they +do not, as the past creations do, seem to survive this first +contact and live in our minds. This is particularly true of the +women. They are well drawn, and play the assigned parts well +enough, but they do not, as a rule, make a place for themselves +either in our hearts or memories. If there is an exception it is +Elvira, in PROVIDENCE AND THE GUITAR; but we remember her chiefly +by the one picture of her falling asleep, after the misadventures +of the night, at the supper-table, with her head on her husband's +shoulder, and her hand locked in his with instinctive, almost +unconscious tenderness." + + + +CHAPTER XXVII - MR G. MOORE, MR MARRIOTT WATSON AND OTHERS + + + +FROM our point of view it will therefore be seen that we could not +have read Mr George Moore's wonderfully uncritical and misdirected +diatribe against Stevenson in THE DAILY CHRONICLE of 24th April +1897, without amusement, if not without laughter - indeed, we +confess we may here quote Shakespeare's words, we "laughed so +consumedly" that, unless for Mr Moore's high position and his +assured self-confidence, we should not trust ourselves to refer to +it, not to speak of writing about it. It was a review of THE +SECRET ROSE by W. B. Yeats, but it passed after one single touch to +belittling abuse of Stevenson - an abuse that was justified the +more, in Mr Moore's idea, because Stevenson was dead. Had he been +alive he might have had something to say to it, in the way, at +least, of fable and moral. And when towards the close Mr Moore +again quotes from Mr Yeats, it is still "harping on my daughter" to +undo Stevenson, as though a rat was behind the arras, as in HAMLET. +"Stevenson," says he, "is the leader of these countless writers who +perceive nothing but the visible world," and these are antagonistic +to the great literature, of which Mr Yeats's SECRET ROSE is a +survival or a renaissance, a literature whose watchword should be +Mr Yeats's significant phrase, "When one looks into the darkness +there is always something there." No doubt Mr Yeats's product all +along the line ranks with the great literature - unlike Homer, +according to Mr Moore, he never nods, though in the light of great +literature, poor Stevenson is always at his noddings, and more than +that, in the words of Leland's Hans Breitmann, he has "nodings on." +He is poor, naked, miserable - a mere pretender - and has no share +in the makings of great literature. Mr Moore has stripped him to +the skin, and leaves him to the mercy of rain and storm, like Lear, +though Lear had a solid ground to go on in self-aid, which +Stevenson had not; he had daughters, and one of them was Cordelia, +after all. This comes of painting all boldly in black and white: +Mr Yeats is white, R. L. Stevenson is black, and I am sure neither +one nor other, because simply of their self-devotion to their art, +could have subscribed heartily to Mr Moore's black art and white +art theory. Mr Yeats is hardly the truest modern Celtic artist I +take him for, if he can fully subscribe to all this. + +Mr Marriott Watson has a little unadvisedly, in my view, too like +ambition, fallen on 'tother side, and celebrated Stevenson as the +master of the horrifying. (11) He even finds the EBB-TIDE, and +Huish, the cockney, in it richly illustrative and grand. "There +never was a more magnificent cad in literature, and never a more +foul-hearted little ruffian. His picture glitters (!) with life, +and when he curls up on the island beach with the bullet in his +body, amid the flames of the vitriol he had intended for another, +the reader's shudder conveys something also, even (!) of regret." + +And well it may! Individual taste and opinion are but individual +taste and opinion, but the EBB-TIDE and the cockney I should be +inclined to cite as a specimen of Stevenson's all too facile make- +believe, in which there is too definite a machinery set agoing for +horrors for the horrors to be quite genuine. The process is often +too forced with Stevenson, and the incidents too much of the +manufactured order, for the triumph of that simplicity which is of +inspiration and unassailable. Here Stevenson, alas! all too often, +PACE Mr Marriott Watson, treads on the skirts of E. A. Poe, and +that in his least composed and elevated artistic moments. And +though, it is true, that "genius will not follow rules laid down by +desultory critics," yet when it is averred that "this piece of work +fulfils Aristotle's definition of true tragedy, in accomplishing +upon the reader a certain purification of the emotions by means of +terror and pity," expectations will be raised in many of the new +generation, doomed in the cases of the more sensitive and +discerning, at all events, not to be gratified. There is a +distinction, very bold and very essential, between melodrama, +however carefully worked and staged, and that tragedy to which +Aristotle was there referring. Stevenson's "horrifying," to my +mind, too often touches the trying borders of melodrama, and +nowhere more so than in the very forced and unequal EBB-TIDE, +which, with its rather doubtful moral and forced incident when it +is good, seems merely to borrow from what had gone before, if not a +very little even from some of what came after. No service is done +to an author like Stevenson by fatefully praising him for precisely +the wrong thing. + + +"Romance attracted Stevenson, at least during the earlier part of +his life, as a lodestone attracts the magnet. To romance he +brought the highest gifts, and he has left us not only essays of +delicate humour" (should this not be "essays FULL OF" OR +"characterised by"?) "and sensitive imagination, but stories also +which thrill with the realities of life, which are faithful +pictures of the times and tempers he dealt with, and which, I +firmly believe, will live so" (should it not be "as"?) "long as our +noble English language." + + +Mr Marriott Watson sees very clearly in some things; but +occasionally he misses the point. The problem is here raised how +two honest, far-seeing critics could see so very differently on so +simple a subject. + +Mr Baildon says about the EBB-TIDE: + + +"I can compare his next book, the EBB-TIDE (in collaboration with +Osbourne) to little better than a mud-bath, for we find ourselves, +as it were, unrelieved by dredging among the scum and dregs of +humanity, the 'white trash' of the Pacific. Here we have +Stevenson's masterly but utterly revolting incarnation of the +lowest, vilest, vulgarest villainy in the cockney, Huish. +Stevenson's other villains shock us by their cruel and wicked +conduct; but there is a kind of fallen satanic glory about them, +some shining threads of possible virtue. They might have been +good, even great in goodness, but for the malady of not wanting. +But Huish is a creature hatched in slime, his soul has no true +humanity: it is squat and toad-like, and can only spit venom. . . +. He himself felt a sort of revulsive after-sickness for the story, +and calls it in one passage of his VAILIMA LETTERS 'the ever-to-be- +execrated EBB-TIDE' (pp. 178 and 184). . . . He repented of it +like a debauch, and, as with some men after a debauch, felt cleared +and strengthened instead of wrecked. So, after what in one sense +was his lowest plunge, Stevenson rose to the greatest height. That +is the tribute to his virtue and strength indeed, but it does not +change the character of the EBB-TIDE as 'the ever-to-be- +execrated.'" + + +Mr Baildon truly says (p. 49): + + +"The curious point is that Stevenson's own great fault, that +tendency to what has been called the 'Twopence-coloured' style, is +always at its worst in books over which he collaborated." + +"Verax," in one of his "Occasional Papers" in the DAILY NEWS on +"The Average Reader" has this passage: + +"We should not object to a writer who could repeat Barrie in A +WINDOW IN THRUMS, nor to one who would paint a scene as Louis +Stevenson paints Attwater alone on his South Sea island, the +approach of the pirates to the harbour, and their subsequent +reception and fate. All these are surely specimens of brilliant +writing, and they are brilliant because, in the first place, they +give truth. The events described must, in the supposed +circumstances, and with the given characters, have happened in the +way stated. Only in none of the specimens have we a mere +photograph of the outside of what took place. We have great +pictures by genius of the - to the prosaic eye - invisible +realities, as well as of the outward form of the actions. We +behold and are made to feel the solemnity, the wildness, the +pathos, the earnestness, the agony, the pity, the moral squalor, +the grotesque fun, the delicate and minute beauty, the natural +loveliness and loneliness, the quiet desperate bravery, or whatever +else any of these wonderful pictures disclose to our view. Had we +been lookers-on, we, the average readers, could not have seen these +qualities for ourselves. But they are there, and genius enables us +to see them. Genius makes truth shine. + +"Is it not, therefore, probable that the brilliancy which we +average readers do not want, and only laugh at when we get it, is +something altogether different? I think I know what it is. It is +an attempt to describe with words without thoughts, an effort to +make readers see something the writer has never seen himself in his +mind's eye. He has no revelation, no vision, nothing to disclose, +and to produce an impression uses words, words, words, makes daub, +daub, daub, without any definite purpose, and certainly without any +real, or artistic, or definite effect. To describe, one must first +of all see, and if we see anything the description of it will, as +far as it is in us, come as effortless and natural as the leaves on +trees, or as 'the tender greening of April meadows.' I, therefore, +more than suspect that the brilliancy which the average reader +laughs at is not brilliancy. A pot of flaming red paint thrown at +a canvas does not make a picture." + + +Now there is vision for outward picture or separate incident, which +may exist quite apart from what may be called moral, spiritual, or +even loftily imaginative conception, at once commanding unity and +commanding it. There can be no doubt of Stevenson's power in the +former line - the earliest as the latest of his works are witnesses +to it. THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE abounds in picture and incident +and dramatic situations and touches; but it lacks true unity, and +the reason simply is given by Stevenson himself - that the "ending +shames, perhaps degrades, the beginning," as it is in the EBB-TIDE, +with the cockney Huish, "execrable." "We have great pictures by +genius of the - to the prosaic eye - invisible realities, as well +as the outward form of the action." True, but the "invisible +realities" form that from which true unity is derived, else their +partial presence but makes the whole the more incomplete and lop- +sided, if not indeed, top-heavy, from light weight beneath; and it +is in the unity derived from this higher pervading, yet not too +assertive "invisible reality," that Stevenson most often fails, and +is, in his own words, "execrable"; the ending shaming, if not +degrading, the beginning - "and without the true sense of +pleasurableness; and therefore really imperfect IN ESSENCE." Ah, +it is to be feared that Stevenson, viewing it in retrospect, was a +far truer critic of his own work, than many or most of his all too +effusive and admiring critics - from Lord Rosebery to Mr Marriott +Watson. + +Amid the too extreme deliverances of detractors and especially of +erewhile friends, become detractors or panegyrists, who disturb +judgment by overzeal, which is often but half-blindness, it is +pleasant to come on one who bears the balances in his hand, and +will report faithfully as he has seen and felt, neither more nor +less than what he holds is true. Mr Andrew Lang wrote an article +in the MORNING POST of 16th December 1901, under the title +"Literary Quarrels," in which, as I think, he fulfilled his part in +midst of the talk about Mr Henley's regrettable attack on +Stevenson. + + +"Without defending the character of a friend whom even now I almost +daily miss, as that character was displayed in circumstances +unknown to me, I think that I ought to speak of him as I found him. +Perhaps our sympathy was mainly intellectual. Constantly do those +who knew him desire to turn to him, to communicate with him, to +share with him the pleasure of some idea, some little discovery +about men or things in which he would have taken pleasure, +increasing our own by the gaiety of his enjoyment, the brilliance +of his appreciation. We may say, as Scott said at the grave of +John Ballantyne, that he has taken with him half the sunlight out +of our lives. That he was sympathetic and interested in the work +of others (which I understand has been denied) I have reason to +know. His work and mine lay far apart: mine, I think, we never +discussed, I did not expect it to interest him. But in a +fragmentary manuscript of his after his death I found the unlooked +for and touching evidence of his kindness. Again, he once wrote to +me from Samoa about the work of a friend of mine whom he had never +met. His remarks were ideally judicious, a model of serviceable +criticism. I found him chivalrous as an honest boy; brave, with an +indomitable gaiety of courage; on the point of honour, a Sydney or +a Bayard (so he seemed to me); that he was open-handed I have +reason to believe; he took life 'with a frolic welcome.' That he +was self-conscious, and saw himself as it were, from without; that +he was fond of attitude (like his own brave admirals) he himself +knew well, and I doubt not that he would laugh at himself and his +habit of 'playing at' things after the fashion of childhood. +Genius is the survival into maturity of the inspiration of +childhood, and Stevenson is not the only genius who has retained +from childhood something more than its inspiration. Other examples +readily occur to the memory - in one way Byron, in another +Tennyson. None of us is perfect: I do not want to erect an +immaculate clay-cold image of a man, in marble or in sugar-candy. +But I will say that I do not remember ever to have heard Mr +Stevenson utter a word against any mortal, friend or foe. Even in +a case where he had, or believed himself to have, received some +wrong, his comment was merely humorous. Especially when very +young, his dislike of respectability and of the BOURGEOIS (a +literary tradition) led him to show a kind of contempt for virtues +which, though certainly respectable, are no less certainly +virtuous. He was then more or less seduced by the Bohemian legend, +but he was intolerant of the fudge about the rights and privileges +of genius. A man's first business, he thought, was 'keep his end +up' by his work. If, what he reckoned his inspired work would not +serve, then by something else. Of many virtues he was an ensample +and an inspiring force. One foible I admit: the tendency to +inopportune benevolence. Mr Graham Balfour says that if he fell +into ill terms with a man he would try to do him good by stealth. +Though he had seen much of the world and of men, this practice +showed an invincible ignorance of mankind. It is improbable, on +the doctrine of chances, that he was always in the wrong; and it is +probable, as he was human, that he always thought himself in the +right. But as the other party to the misunderstanding, being also +human, would necessarily think himself in the right, such secret +benefits would be, as Sophocles says, 'the gifts of foeman and +unprofitable.' The secret would leak out, the benefits would be +rejected, the misunderstanding would be embittered. This reminds +me of an anecdote which is not given in Mr Graham Balfour's +biography. As a little delicate, lonely boy in Edinburgh, Mr +Stevenson read a book called MINISTERING CHILDREN. I have a faint +recollection of this work concerning a small Lord and Lady +Bountiful. Children, we know, like to 'play at' the events and +characters they have read about, and the boy wanted to play at +being a ministering child. He 'scanned his whole horizon' for +somebody to play with, and thought he had found his playmate. From +the window he observed street boys (in Scots 'keelies') enjoying +themselves. But one child was out of the sports, a little lame +fellow, the son of a baker. Here was a chance! After some +misgivings Louis hardened his heart, put on his cap, walked out - a +refined little figure - approached the object of his sympathy, and +said, 'Will you let me play with you?' 'Go to hell!' said the +democratic offspring of the baker. This lesson against doing good +by stealth to persons of unknown or hostile disposition was, it +seems, thrown away. Such endeavours are apt to be misconstrued." + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII - UNEXPECTED COMBINATIONS + + + +THE complete artist should not be mystical-moralist any more than +the man who "perceives only the visible world" - he should not +engage himself with problems in the direct sense any more than he +should blind himself to their effect upon others, whom he should +study, and under certain conditions represent, though he should not +commit himself to any form of zealot faith, yet should he not be, +as Lord Tennyson puts it in the Palace of Art: + + +"As God holding no form of creed, +But contemplating all," + + +because his power lies in the broadness of his humanity touched to +fine issues whenever there is the seal at once of truth, reality, +and passion, and the tragedy bred of their contact and conflict. + +All these things are to him real and clamant in the measure that +they aid appeal to heart and emotion - in the measure that they +may, in his hands, be made to tell for sympathy and general effect. +He creates an atmosphere in which each and all may be seen the more +effectively, but never seen alone or separate, but only in strict +relation to each other that they may heighten the sense of some +supreme controlling power in the destinies of men, which with the +ancients was figured as Fate, and for which the moderns have hardly +yet found an enduring and exhaustive name. Character revealed in +reference to that, is the ideal and the aim of all high creative +art. Stevenson's narrowness, allied to a quaint and occasionally +just a wee pedantic finickiness, as we may call it - an over- +elaborate, almost tricky play with mere words and phrases, was in +so far alien to the very highest - he was too often like a man +magnetised and moving at the dictates of some outside influence +rather than according to his own freewill and as he would. + +Action in creative literary art is a SINE QUA NON; keeping all the +characters and parts in unison, that a true DENOUEMENT, determined +by their own tendencies and temperaments, may appear; dialogue and +all asides, if we may call them so, being supererogatory and weak +really unless they aid this and are constantly contributory to it. +Egotistical predeterminations, however artfully intruded, are, +alien to the full result, the unity which is finally craved: +Stevenson fails, when he does fail, distinctly from excess of +egotistic regards; he is, as Henley has said, in the French sense, +too PERSONNEL, and cannot escape from it. And though these +personal regards are exceedingly interesting and indeed fascinating +from the point of view of autobiographical study, they are, and +cannot but be, a drawback on fiction or the disinterested +revelation of life and reality. Instead, therefore, of "the +visible world," as the only thing seen, Stevenson's defect is, that +between it and him lies a cloud strictly self-projected, like +breath on a mirror, which dims the lines of reality and confuses +the character marks, in fact melting them into each other; and in +his sympathetic regards, causing them all to become too much alike. +Scott had more of the power of healthy self-withdrawal, creating +more of a free atmosphere, in which his characters could freely +move - though in this, it must be confessed, he failed far more +with women than with men. The very defects poor Carlyle found in +Scott, and for which he dealt so severely with him, as sounding no +depth, are really the basis of his strength, precisely as the +absence of them were the defects of Goethe, who invariably ran his +characters finally into the mere moods of his own mind and the +mould of his errant philosophy, so that they became merely erratic +symbols without hold in the common sympathy. Whether +WALVERWANDSCHAFTEN, WILHELM MEISTER, or FAUST, it is still the same +- the company before all is done are translated into misty shapes +that he actually needs to label for our identification and for his +own. Even Mr G. H. Lewes saw this and could not help declaring his +own lack of interest in the latter parts of Goethe's greatest +efforts. Stevenson, too, tends to run his characters into symbols +- his moralist-fabulist determinations are too much for him - he +would translate them into a kind of chessmen, moved or moving on a +board. The essence of romance strictly is, that as the characters +will not submit themselves to the check of reality, the romancer +may consciously, if it suits him, touch them at any point with the +magic wand of symbol, and if he finds a consistency in mere +fanciful invention it is enough. Tieck's PHANTASUS and George +MacDonald's PHANTASTES are ready instances illustrative of this. +But it is very different with the story of real life, where there +is a definite check in the common-sense and knowledge of the +reader, and where the highest victory always lies in drawing from +the reader the admission - "that is life - life exactly as I have +seen and known it. Though I could never have put it so, still it +only realises my own conception and observation. That is something +lovingly remembered and re-presented, and this master makes me +lovingly remember too, though 'twas his to represent and reproduce +with such vigor, vividness and truth that he carried me with him, +exactly as though I had been looking on real men and women playing +their part or their game in the great world." + +Mr Zangwill, in his own style, wrote: + + +"He seeks to combine the novel of character with the novel of +adventure; to develop character through romantic action, and to +bring out your hero at the end of the episode, not the fixed +character he was at the beginning, as is the way of adventure +books, but a modified creature. . . . It is his essays and his +personality, rather than his novels, that will count with +posterity. On the whole, a great provincial writer. Whether he +has that inherent grip which makes a man's provinciality the very +source of his strength . . . only the centuries can show. + + +The romanticist to the end pursued Stevenson - he could not, wholly +or at once, shake off the bonds in which he had bound himself to +his first love, and it was the romanticist crossed by the casuist, +and the mystic - Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Markheim and Will of the +Mill, insisted on his acknowledging them in his work up to the end. +THE MODIFIED CREATURE at the end of Mr Zangwill was modified too +directly by the egotistic element as well as through the romantic +action, and this point missed the great defect was missed, and Mr +Zangwill spoke only in generals. + +M. Schwob, after having related how unreal a real sheep's heart +looked when introduced on the end of Giovanni's dagger in a French +performance of John Ford's ANNABELLA AND GIOVANNI, and how at the +next performance the audience was duly thrilled when Annabella's +bleeding heart, made of a bit of red flannel, was borne upon the +stage, goes on to say significantly: + + +"Il me semble que les personnages de Stevenson ont justement cette +espece de realisme irreal. La large figure luisante de Long John, +la couleur bleme du crane de Thevenin Pensete s'attachent a la +memoire de nos yeux en vertue de leur irrealite meme. Ce sont des +fantomes de la verite, hallucinants comme de vrais fantomes. Notez +en passant que les traits de John Silver hallucinent Jim Hawkins, +et que Francois Villon est hante par l'aspect de Thevenin Pensete." + + +Perhaps the most notable fact arising here, and one that well +deserves celebration, is this, that Stevenson's development towards +a broader and more natural creation was coincident with a definite +return on the religious views which had so powerfully prevailed +with his father - a circumstance which it is to be feared did not, +any more than some other changes in him, at all commend itself to +Mr Henley, though he had deliberately dubbed him even in the times +of nursing nigh to the Old Bristo Port in Edinburgh - something of +"Shorter Catechist." Anyway Miss Simpson deliberately wrote: + + +"Mr Henley takes exception to Stevenson's later phase in life - +what he calls his 'Shorter Catechism phase.' It should be +remembered that Mr Henley is not a Scotsman, and in some things has +little sympathy with Scotch characteristics. Stevenson, in his +Samoan days, harked back to the teaching of his youth; the tenets +of the Shorter Catechism, which his mother and nurse had dinned +into his head, were not forgotten. Mr Henley knew him best, as +Stevenson says in the preface to VIRGINIBUS PUERISQUE dedicated to +Henley, 'when he lived his life at twenty-five.' In these days he +had [in some degree] forgotten about the Shorter Catechism, but the +'solemn pause' between Saturday and Monday came back in full force +to R. L. Stevenson in Samoa." + + +Now to me that is a most suggestive and significant fact. It will +be the business of future critics to show in how far such falling +back would of necessity modify what Mr Baildon has set down as his +corner-stone of morality, and how far it was bound to modify the +atmosphere - the purely egotistic, hedonistic, and artistic +atmosphere, in which, in his earlier life as a novelist, at all +events, he had been, on the whole, for long whiles content to work. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX - LOVE OF VAGABONDS + + + +WHAT is very remarkable in Stevenson is that a man who was so much +the dreamer of dreams - the mystic moralist, the constant +questioner and speculator on human destiny and human perversity, +and the riddles that arise on the search for the threads of motive +and incentives to human action - moreover, a man, who constantly +suffered from one of the most trying and weakening forms of ill- +health - should have been so full-blooded, as it were, so keen for +contact with all forms of human life and character, what is called +the rougher and coarser being by no means excluded. Not only this: +he was himself a rover - seeking daily adventure and contact with +men and women of alien habit and taste and liking. His patience is +supported by his humour. He was a bit of a vagabond in the good +sense of the word, and always going round in search of "honest +men," like Diogenes, and with no tub to retire into or the desire +for it. He thus on this side touches the Chaucers and their +kindred, as well as the Spensers and Dantes and their often +illusive CONFRERES. His voyage as a steerage passenger across the +Atlantic is only one out of a whole chapter of such episodes, and +is more significant and characteristic even than the TRAVELS WITH A +DONKEY IN THE CEVENNES or the INLAND VOYAGE. These might be ranked +with the "Sentimental Journeys" that have sometimes been the +fashion - that was truly of a prosaic and risky order. The appeal +thus made to an element deep in the English nature will do much to +keep his memory green in the hearts that could not rise to +appreciation of his style and literary gifts at all. He loves the +roadways and the by-ways, and those to be met with there - like him +in this, though unlike him in most else. The love of the roadsides +and the greenwood - and the queer miscellany of life there unfolded +and ever changing - a kind of gipsy-like longing for the tent and +familiar contact with nature and rude human-nature in the open +dates from beyond Chaucer, and remains and will have gratification +- the longing for novelty and all the accidents, as it were, of +pilgrimage and rude social travel. You see it bubble up, like a +true and new nature-spring, through all the surface coatings of +culture and artificiality, in Stevenson. He anew, without +pretence, enlivens it - makes it first a part of himself, and then +a part of literature once more. Listen to him, as he sincerely +sings this passion for the pilgrimage - or the modern phase of it - +innocent vagabond roving: + + +"Give to me the life I love, +Let the lave go by me; +Give the jolly heaven above, +And the by-way nigh me: +Bed in the bush, with stars to see; +Bread I dip in the river - +Here's the life for a man like me, +Here's the life for ever.... + +"Let the blow fall soon or late; +Let what will be o'er me; +Give the face of earth around +And the road before me. +Health I ask not, hope nor love, +Nor a friend to know me: +All I ask the heaven above, +And the road below me." + + +True; this is put in the mouth of another, but Stevenson could not +have so voiced it, had he not been the born rover that he was, with +longing for the roadside, the high hills, and forests and newcomers +and varied miscellaneous company. Here he does more directly speak +in his own person and quite to the same effect: + + +"I will make you brooches and toys for your delight +Of bird song at morning, and star shine at night, +I will make a palace fit for you and me, +Of green days in forests and blue days at sea. + +"I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your room, +Where white flows the river, and bright blows the broom, +And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white, +In rainfall at morning and dew-fall at night. + +"And this shall be for music when no one else is near, +The fine song for singing, the rare song to hear! +That only I remember, that only you admire, +Of the broad road that stretches, and the roadside fire." + + +Here Stevenson, though original in his vein and way, but follows a +great and gracious company in which Fielding and Sterne and so many +others stand as pleasant proctors. Scott and Dickens have each in +their way essayed it, and made much of it beyond what mere +sentiment would have reached. PICKWICK itself - and we must always +regard Dickens as having himself gone already over every bit of +road, described every nook and corner, and tried every resource - +is a vagrant fellow, in a group of erratic and most quaint +wanderers or pilgrims. This is but a return phase of it; Vincent +Crummles and Mrs Crummles and the "Infant Phenomenon," yet another. +The whole interest lies in the roadways, and the little inns, and +the odd and unexpected RENCONTRES with oddly-assorted fellows there +experienced: glimpses of grim or grimy, or forbidding, or happy, +smiling smirking vagrants, and out-at-elbows fellow-passengers and +guests, with jests and quips and cranks, and hanky-panky even. On +high roads and in inns, and alehouses, with travelling players, +rogues and tramps, Dickens was quite at home; and what is yet more, +he made us all quite at home with them: and he did it as Chaucer +did it by thorough good spirits and "hail-fellow-well-met." And, +with all his faults, he has this merit as well as some others, that +he went willingly on pilgrimage always, and took others, promoting +always love of comrades, fun, and humorous by-play. The latest +great romancer, too, took his side: like Dickens, he was here full +brother of Dan Chaucer, and followed him. How characteristic it is +when he tells Mr Trigg that he preferred Samoa to Honolulu because +it was more savage, and therefore yielded more FUN. + + + +CHAPTER XXX - LORD ROSEBERY'S CASE + + + +IMMEDIATELY on reading Lord Rosebery's address as Chairman of the +meeting in Edinburgh to promote the erection of a monument to R. L. +Stevenson, I wrote to him politely asking him whether, since he +quoted a passage from a somewhat early essay by Stevenson naming +the authors who had chiefly influenced him in point of style, his +Lordship should not, merely in justice and for the sake of balance, +have referred to Thoreau. I also remarked that Stevenson's later +style sometimes showed too much self-conscious conflict of his +various models in his mind while he was in the act of writing, and +that this now and then imparted too much an air of artifice to his +later compositions, and that those who knew most would be most +troubled by it. Of that letter, I much regret now that I did not +keep any copy; but I think I did incidentally refer to the +friendship with which Stevenson had for so many years honoured me. +This is a copy of the letter received in reply: + + +"38 BERKELEY SQUARE, W., +17th DECEMBER 1896. + +"DEAR SIR, - I am much obliged for your letter, and can only state +that the name of Thoreau was not mentioned by Stevenson himself, +and therefore I could not cite it in my quotation. + +"With regard to the style of Stevenson's later works, I am inclined +to agree with you.-Believe me, yours very faithfully, +ROSEBERY. +"Dr ALEXANDER H. JAPP." + + +This I at once replied to as follows: + + +"NATIONAL LIBERAL CLUB, +WHITEHALL. PLACE, S.W., +19TH DECEMBER 1896. + + +"MY LORD, - It is true R. L. Stevenson did not refer to Thoreau in +the passage to which you allude, for the good reason that he could +not, since he did not know Thoreau till after it was written; but +if you will oblige me and be so good as to turn to p. xix. of +Preface, BY WAY OF CRITICISM, to FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND BOOKS +you will read: + +"'Upon me this pure, narrow, sunnily-ascetic Thoreau had exercised +a wondrous charm. I HAVE SCARCE WRITTEN TEN SENTENCES SINCE I WAS +INTRODUCED TO HIM, BUT HIS INFLUENCE MIGHT BE SOMEWHERE DETECTED BY +A CLOSE OBSERVER.' + +"It is very detectable in many passages of nature-description and +of reflection. I write, my Lord, merely that, in case opportunity +should arise, you might notice this fact. I am sure R. L. +Stevenson would have liked it recognised. - I remain, my Lord, +always yours faithfully, etc., + +ALEXANDER H. JAPP." + + +In reply to this Lord Rosebery sent me only the most formal +acknowledgment, not in the least encouraging me in any way to +further aid him in the matter with regard to suggestions of any +kind; so that I was helpless to press on his lordship the need for +some corrections on other points which I would most willingly have +tendered to him had he shown himself inclined or ready to receive +them. + +I might also have referred Lord Rosebery to the article in THE +BRITISH WEEKLY (1887), "Books that have Influenced Me," where, +after having spoken of Shakespeare, the VICOMTE DE BRAGELONNE, +Bunyan, Montaigne, Goethe, Martial, Marcus Aurelius's MEDITATIONS, +and Wordsworth, he proceeds: + + +"I suppose, when I am done, I shall find that I have forgotten much +that is influential, as I see already I have forgotten Thoreau." + + +I need but to add to what has been said already that, had Lord +Rosebery written and told me the result of his references and +encouraged me to such an exercise, I should by-and-by have been +very pleased to point out to him that he blundered, proving himself +no master in Burns' literature, precisely as Mr Henley blundered +about Burns' ancestry, when he gives confirmation to the idea that +Burns came of a race of peasants on both sides, and was himself +nothing but a peasant. + +When the opportunity came to correct such blunders, corrections +which I had even implored him to make, Lord Rosebery (who by +several London papers had been spoken of as "knowing more than all +the experts about all his themes"), that is, when his volume was +being prepared for press, did not act on my good advice given him +"FREE, GRATIS, FOR NOTHING"; no; he contented himself with simply +slicing out columns from the TIMES, or allowing another man to do +so for him, and reprinting them LITERATIM ET VERBATIM, all +imperfect and misleading, as they stood. SCRIPTA MANET alas! only +too truly exemplified to his disadvantage. But with that note of +mine in his hand, protesting against an ominous and fatal omission +as regards the confessed influences that had operated on Stevenson, +he goes on, or allows Mr Geake to go on, quite as though he had +verified matters and found that I was wrong as regards the facts on +which I based my appeal to him for recognition of Thoreau as having +influenced Stevenson in style. Had he attended to correcting his +serious errors about Stevenson, and some at least of those about +Burns, thus adding, say, a dozen or twenty pages to his book wholly +fresh and new and accurate, then the TIMES could not have got, even +if it had sought, an injunction against his publishers and him; and +there would have been no necessity that he should pad out other and +later speeches by just a little whining over what was entirely due +to his own disregard of good advice, his own neglect - his own +fault - a neglect and a fault showing determination not to revise +where revision in justice to his subject's own free and frank +acknowledgments made it most essential and necessary. + +Mr Justice North gave his decision against Lord Rosebery and his +publishers, while the Lords of Appeal went in his favour; but the +House of Lords reaffirmed the decision of Mr Justice North and +granted a perpetual injunction against this book. The copyright in +his speech is Lord Rosebery's, but the copyright in the TIMES' +report is the TIMES'. You see one of the ideas underlying the law +is that no manner of speech is quite perfect as the man speaks it, +or is beyond revision, improvement, or extension, and, if there is +but one VERBATIM report, as was the case of some of these speeches +and addresses, then it is incumbent on the author, if he wishes to +preserve his copyright, to revise and correct his speeches and +addresses, so as to make them at least in details so far differ +from the reported form. This thing ought Lord Rosebery to have +done, on ethical and literary GROUNDS, not to speak of legal and +self-interested grounds; and I, for one, who from the first held +exactly the view the House of Lords has affirmed, do confess that I +have no sympathy for Lord Rosebery, since he had before him the +suggestion and the materials for as substantial alterations and +additions from my own hands, with as much more for other portions +of his book, had he informed me of his appreciation, as would have +saved him and his book from such a sadly ironical fate as has +overtaken him and it. + +From the whole business - since "free, gratis, for nothing," I +offered him as good advice as any lawyer in the three kingdoms +could have done for large payment, and since he never deemed it +worth while, even to tell me the results of his reference to +FAMILIAR STUDIES, I here and now say deliberately that his conduct +to me was scarcely so courteous and grateful and graceful as it +might have been. How different - very different - the way in which +the late R. L. Stevenson rewarded me for a literary service no whit +greater or more essentially valuable to him than this service +rendered to Lord Rosebery might have been to him. + +This chapter would most probably not have been printed, had not Mr +Coates re-issued the inadequate and most misleading paragraph about +Mr Stevenson and style in his Lord Rosebery's LIFE AND SPEECHES +exactly as it was before, thus perpetuating at once the error and +the wrong, in spite of all my trouble, warnings, and protests. It +is a tragicomedy, if not a farce altogether, considering who are +the principal actors in it. And let those who have copies of the +queer prohibited book cherish them and thank me; for that I do by +this give a new interest and value to it as a curiosity, law- +inhibited, if not as high and conscientious literature - which it +is not. + +I remember very well about the time Lord Rosebery spoke on Burns, +and Stevenson, and London, that certain London papers spoke of his +deliverances as indicating more knowledge - fuller and exacter +knowledge - of all these subjects than the greatest professed +experts possessed. That is their extravagant and most reckless +way, especially if the person spoken about is a "great politician" +or a man of rank. They think they are safe with such superlatives +applied to a brilliant and clever peer (with large estates and many +interests), and an ex-Prime Minister! But literature is a +republic, and it must here be said, though all unwillingly, that +Lord Rosebery is but an amateur - a superficial though a clever +amateur after all, and their extravagances do not change the fact. +I declare him an amateur in Burns' literature and study because of +what I have said elsewhere, and there are many points to add to +that if need were. I have proved above from his own words that he +was crassly and unpardonably ignorant of some of the most important +points in R. L. Stevenson's development when he delivered that +address in Edinburgh on Stevenson - a thing very, very pardonable - +seeing that he is run after to do "speakings" of this sort; but to +go on, in face of such warning and protest, printing his most +misleading errors is not pardonable, and the legal recorded result +is my justification and his condemnation, the more surely that even +that would not awaken him so far as to cause him to restrain Mr +Coates from reproducing in his LIFE AND SPEECHES, just as it was +originally, that peccant passage. I am fully ready to prove also +that, though Chairman of the London County Council for a period, +and though he made a very clever address at one of Sir W. Besant's +lectures, there is much yet - very much - he might learn from Sir +W. Besant's writings on London. It isn't so easy to outshine all +the experts - even for a clever peer who has been Prime Minister, +though it is very, very easy to flatter Lord Rosebery, with a +purpose or purposes, as did at least once also with rarest tact, at +Glasgow, indicating so many other things and possibilities, a +certain very courtly ex-Moderator of the Church of Scotland. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI - MR GOSSE AND MS. OF TREASURE ISLAND + + + +MR EDMUND GOSSE has been so good as to set down, with rather an air +of too much authority, that both R. L. Stevenson and I deceived +ourselves completely in the matter of my little share in the +TREASURE ISLAND business, and that too much credit was sought by me +or given to me, for the little service I rendered to R. L. +Stevenson, and to the world, say, in helping to secure for it an +element of pleasure through many generations. I have not SOUGHT +any recognition from the world in this matter, and even the mention +of it became so intolerable to me that I eschewed all writing about +it, in the face of the most stupid and misleading statements, till +Mr Sidney Colvin wrote and asked me to set down my account of the +matter in my own words. This I did, as it would have been really +rude to refuse a request so graciously made, and the reader has it +in the ACADEMY of 10th March 1900. Nevertheless, Mr Gosse's +statements were revived and quoted, and the thing seemed ever to +revolve again in a round of controversy. + +Now, with regard to the reliability in this matter of Mr Edmund +Gosse, let me copy here a little note made at request some time +ago, dealing with two points. The first is this: + + +1. MOST ASSUREDLY I carried away from Braemar in my portmanteau, as +R. L. Stevenson says in IDLER'S article and in chapter of MY FIRST +BOOK reprinted in EDINBURGH EDITION, several chapters of TREASURE +ISLAND. On that point R. L. Stevenson, myself, and Mr James +Henderson, to whom I took these, could not all be wrong and co- +operating to mislead the public. These chapters, at least vii. or +viii., as Mr Henderson remembers, would include the FIRST THREE, +that is, FINALLY REVISED VERSIONS FOR PRESS. Mr Gosse could not +then HAVE HEARD R. L. STEVENSON READ FROM THESE FINAL VERSIONS BUT +FROM FIRST DRAUGHTS ONLY, and I am positively certain that with +some of the later chapters R. L. Stevenson wrote them off-hand, and +with great ease, and did not revise them to the extent of at all +needing to re-write them, as I remember he was proud to tell me, +being then fully in the vein, as he put it, and pleased to credit +me with a share in this good result, and saying "my enthusiasm over +it had set him up steep." There was then, in my idea, a necessity +that Stevenson should fill up a gap by verbal summary to Mr Gosse +(which Mr Gosse has forgotten), bringing the incident up to a +further point than Mr Gosse now thinks. I am certain of my facts +under this head; and as Mr Gosse clearly fancies he heard R. L. +Stevenson read all from final versions and is mistaken - COMPLETELY +mistaken there - he may be just as wrong and the victim of error or +bad memory elsewhere after the lapse of more than twenty years. + +2. I gave the pencilled outline of incident and plot to Mr +Henderson - a fact he distinctly remembers. This fact completely +meets and disposes of Mr Robert Leighton's quite imaginative BILLY +BO'SUN notion, and is absolute as to R. L. Stevenson before he left +Braemar on the 21st September 1881, or even before I left it on +26th August 1881, having clear in his mind the whole scheme of the +work, though we know very well that the absolute re-writing out +finally for press of the concluding part of the book was done at +Davos. Mr Henderson has always made it the strictest rule in his +editorship that the complete outline of the plot and incident of +the latter part of a story must be supplied to him, if the whole +story is not submitted to him in MS.; and the agreement, if I am +not much mistaken, was entered into days before R. L. Stevenson +left Braemar, and when he came up to London some short time after +to go to Weybridge, the only arrangement then needed to be made was +about the forwarding of proofs to him. + +The publication of TREASURE ISLAND in YOUNG FOLKS began on the 1st +October 1881, No. 565 and ran on in the following order: + + +OCTOBER 1, 1881. +THE PROLOGUE + +No. 565. + +I. The Old Sea Dog at the Admiral Benbow. +II. Black Dog Appears and Disappears. + +No. 566. + +Dated OCTOBER 8, 1881. + +III. The Black Spot. + +No. 567. + +Dated OCTOBER 15, 1881. + +IV. The Sea Chart. +V. The Last of the Blind Man. +VI. The Captain's Papers. + +No. 568. + +Dated OCTOBER 22, 1881. + +THE STORY + +I. I go to Bristol. +II. The Sea-Cook. +Ill. Powder and Arms. + + +Now, as the numbers of YOUNG FOLKS were printed about a fortnight +in advance of the date they bear under the title, it is clear that +not only must the contract have been executed days before the +middle of September, but that a large proportion of the COPY must +have been in Mr Henderson's hands at that date too, as he must have +been entirely satisfied that the story would go on and be finished +in a definite time. On no other terms would he have begun the +publication of it. He was not in the least likely to have accepted +a story from a man who, though known as an essayist, had not yet +published anything in the way of a long story, on the ground merely +of three chapters of prologue. Mr Gosse left Braemar on 5th +September, when he says nine chapters were written, and Mr +Henderson had offered terms for the story before the last of these +could have reached him. That is on seeing, say six chapters of +prologue. But when Mr Gosse speaks about three chapters only +written, does he mean three of the prologue or three of the story, +in addition to prologue, or what does he mean? The facts are +clear. I took away in my portmanteau a large portion of the MS., +together with a very full outline of the rest of the story, so that +Mr Stevenson was, despite Mr Gosse's cavillings, SUBSTANTIALLY +right when he wrote in MY FIRST BOOK in the IDLER, etc., that "when +he (Dr Japp) left us he carried away the manuscript in his +portmanteau." There was nothing of the nature of an abandonment of +the story at any point, nor any difficulty whatever arose in this +respect in regard to it. + + + +CHAPTER XXXII - STEVENSON PORTRAITS + + + +OF the portraits of Stevenson a word or two may be said. There is +a very good early photograph of him, taken not very long before the +date of my visit to him at Braemar in 1881, and is an admirable +likeness - characteristic not only in expression, but in pose and +attitude, for it fixes him in a favourite position of his; and is, +at the same time, very easy and natural. The velvet jacket, as I +have remarked, was then his habitual wear, and the thin fingers +holding the constant cigarette an inseparable associate and +accompaniment. + +He acknowledged himself that he was a difficult subject to paint - +not at all a good sitter - impatient and apt to rebel at posing and +time spent in arrangement of details - a fact he has himself, as we +shall see, set on record in his funny verses to Count Nerli, who +painted as successful a portrait as any. The little miniature, +full-length, by Mr J. S. Sarjent, A.R.A., which was painted at +Bournemouth in 1885, is confessedly a mere sketch and much of a +caricature: it is in America. Sir W. B. Richmond has an +unfinished portrait, painted in 1885 or 1886 - it has never passed +out of the hands of the artist, - a photogravure from it is our +frontispiece. + +There is a medallion done by St Gauden's, representing Stevenson in +bed propped up by pillows. It is thought to be a pretty good +likeness, and it is now in Mr Sidney Colvin's possession. Others, +drawings, etc., are not of much account. + +And now we come to the Nerli portrait, of which so much has been +written. Stevenson himself regarded it as the best portrait of him +ever painted, and certainly it also is characteristic and +effective, and though not what may be called a pleasant likeness, +is probably a good representation of him in the later years of his +life. Count Nerli actually undertook a voyage to Samoa in 1892, +mainly with the idea of painting this portrait. He and Stevenson +became great friends, as Stevenson naively tells in the verses we +have already referred to, but even this did not quite overcome +Stevenson's restlessness. He avenged himself by composing these +verses as he sat: + + +Did ever mortal man hear tell o' sic a ticklin' ferlie +As the comin' on to Apia here o' the painter Mr Nerli? +He cam'; and, O, for o' human freen's o' a' he was the pearlie - +The pearl o' a' the painter folk was surely Mr Nerli. +He took a thraw to paint mysel'; he painted late and early; +O wow! the many a yawn I've yawned i' the beard o' Mr Nerli. +Whiles I wad sleep and whiles wad wake, an' whiles was mair than +surly; +I wondered sair as I sat there fornent the eyes o' Nerli. +O will he paint me the way I want, as bonnie as a girlie? +O will he paint me an ugly tyke? - and be d-d to Mr Nerli. +But still an' on whichever it be, he is a canty kerlie, +The Lord protect the back an' neck o' honest Mr Nerli. + + +Mr Hammerton gives this account of the Nerli portrait: + + +"The history of the Nerli portrait is peculiar. After being +exhibited for some time in New Zealand it was bought, in the course +of this year, by a lady who was travelling there, for a hundred +guineas. She then offered it for that sum to the Scottish National +Portrait Gallery; but the Trustees of the Board of Manufactures - +that oddly named body to which is entrusted the fostering care of +Art in Scotland, and, in consequence, the superintendence of the +National Portrait Gallery - did not see their way to accept the +offer. Some surprise has been expressed at the action of the +Trustees in thus declining to avail themselves of the opportunity +of obtaining the portrait of one of the most distinguished Scotsmen +of recent times. It can hardly have been for want of money, for +though the funds at their disposal for the purchase of ordinary +works of art are but limited, no longer ago than last year they +were the recipients of a very handsome legacy from the late Mr J. +M. Gray, the accomplished and much lamented Curator of the Scottish +National Portrait Gallery - a legacy left them for the express +purpose of acquiring portraits of distinguished Scotsmen, and the +income of which was amply sufficient to have enabled them to +purchase this portrait. One is therefore almost shut up to the +conclusion that the Trustees were influenced in their decision by +one of the two following reasons: + +"1. That they did not consider Stevenson worthy of a place in the +gallery. This is a position so incomprehensible and so utterly +opposed to public sentiment that one can hardly credit it having +been the cause of this refusal. Whatever may be the place which +Stevenson may ultimately take as an author, and however opinions +may differ as to the merits of his work, no one can deny that he +was one of the most popular writers of his day, and that as a mere +master of style, if for nothing else, his works will be read so +long as there are students of English Literature. Surely the +portrait of one for whom such a claim may legitimately be made +cannot be considered altogether unworthy of a place in the National +Collection, as one of Scotland's most distinguished sons. + +"2. The only other reason which can be suggested as having weighed +with the Trustees in their decision is one which in some cases +might be held to be worthy of consideration. It is conceivable +that in the case of some men the Trustees might be of opinion that +there was plenty of time to consider the matter, and that in the +meantime there was always the chance of some generous donor +presenting them with a portrait. But, as has been shown above, the +portraits of Stevenson are practically confined to two: one of +these is in America, and there is not the least chance of its ever +coming here; and the other they have refused. And, as it is +understood that the Trustees have a rule that they do not accept +any portrait which has not been painted from the life, they +preclude themselves from acquiring a copy of any existing picture +or even a portrait done from memory. + +"It is rumoured that the Nerli portrait may ultimately find a +resting-place in the National Collection of Portraits in London. +If this should prove to be the case, what a commentary on the old +saying: 'A prophet is not without honour save in his own +country.'" + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII - LAPSES AND ERRORS IN CRITICISM + + + +NOTHING could perhaps be more wearisome than to travel o'er the +wide sandy area of Stevenson criticism and commentary, and expose +the many and sad and grotesque errors that meet one there. Mr +Baildon's slip is innocent, compared with many when he says (p. +106) TREASURE ISLAND appeared in YOUNG FOLKS as THE SEA-COOK. It +did nothing of the kind; it is on plain record in print, even in +the pages of the EDINBURGH EDITION, that Mr James Henderson would +not have the title THE SEA-COOK, as he did not like it, and +insisted on its being TREASURE ISLAND. To him, therefore, the +vastly better title is due. Mr Henley was in doubt if Mr Henderson +was still alive when he wrote the brilliant and elevated article on +"Some Novels" in the NORTH AMERICAN, and as a certain dark bird +killed Cock Robin, so he killed off Dr Japp, and not to be outdone, +got in an ideal "Colonel" JACK; so Mr Baildon there follows Henley, +unaware that Mr Henderson did not like THE SEA-COOK, and was still +alive, and that a certain Jack in the fatal NORTH AMERICAN has +Japp's credit. + +Mr Baildon's words are: + + +"This was the famous book of adventure, TREASURE ISLAND, appearing +first as THE SEA-COOK in a boy's paper, where it made no great +stir. But, on its publication in volume form, with the vastly +better title, the book at once 'boomed,' as the phrase goes, to an +extent then, in 1882, almost unprecedented. The secret of its +immense success may almost be expressed in a phrase by saying that +it is a book like GULLIVER'S TRAVELS, THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS, and +ROBINSON CRUSOE itself for all ages - boys, men, and women." + + +Which just shows how far lapse as to a fact may lead to critical +misreadings also. + +Mr Hammerton sometimes lets good folks say in his pages, without +correction, what is certainly not correct. Thus at one place we +are told that Stevenson was only known as Louis in print, whereas +that was the only name by which he was known in his own family. +Then Mr Gosse, at p. 34, is allowed to write: + + +"Professor Blackie was among them on the steamer from the Hebrides, +a famous figure that calls for no description, and a voluble shaggy +man, clad in homespun, with spectacles forward upon his nose, who +it was whispered to us, was Mr Sam Bough, the Scottish Academician, +A WATER-COLOUR PAINTER OF SOME REPUTE, who was to die in 1878." + + +Mr Sam Bough WAS "a water-colour painter of some repute," but a +painter in oils of yet greater repute - a man of rare strength, +resource, and facility - never, perhaps, wholly escaping from some +traces of his early experiences in scene-painting, but a true +genius in his art. Ah, well I remember him, though an older man, +yet youthful in the band of young Scotch artists among whom as a +youngster I was privileged to move in Edinburgh - Pettie, Chalmers, +M'Whirter, Peter Graham, MacTaggart, MacDonald, John Burr, and +Bough. Bough could be voluble on art; and many a talk I had with +him as with the others named, especially with John Burr. Bough and +he both could talk as well as paint, and talk right well. Bough +had a slight cast in the eye; when he got a WEE excited on his +subject he would come close to you with head shaking, and +spectacles displaced, and forelock wagging, and the cast would seem +to die away. Was this a fact, or was it an illusion on my part? I +have often asked myself that question, and now I ask it of others. +Can any of my good friends in Edinburgh say; can Mr Caw help me +here, either to confirm or to correct me? I venture to insert here +an anecdote, with which my friend of old days, Mr Wm. MacTaggart, +R.S.A., in a letter kindly favours me: + + +"Sam Bough was a very sociable man; and, when on a sketching tour, +liked to have a young artist or two with him. Jack Nisbett played +the violin, and Sam the 'cello, etc. Jack was fond of telling that +Sam used to let them all choose the best views, and then he would +take what was left; and Jack, with mild astonishment, would say, +that 'it generally turned out to be the best - on the canvas!'" + + +In Mr Hammerton's copy of the verses in reply to Mr Crockett's +dedication of THE STICKIT MINISTER to Stevenson, in which occurred +the fine phrase "The grey Galloway lands, where about the graves of +the martyrs the whaups are crying, his heart remembers how": + + +"Blows the wind to-day and the sun and the rain are flying: +Blows the wind on the moors to-day and now, +Where about the graves of the martyrs the whaups are crying, +My heart remembers how. + +"Grey recumbent tombs of the dead in desert places, +Standing stones on the vacant wine-red moor, +Hills of sheep, and the HOMES of the silent vanished races, +And winds austere and pure. + +"Be it granted me to behold you again in dying, +Hills of home! and to hear again the call - +Hear about the graves of the martyrs the pee-weet crying, +And hear no more at all." + + +Mr Hammerton prints HOWES instead of HOMES, which I have italicised +above. And I may note, though it does not affect the poetry, if it +does a little affect the natural history, that the PEE-WEETS and +the whaups are not the same - the one is the curlew, and the other +is the lapwing - the one most frequenting wild, heathery or peaty +moorland, and the other pasture or even ploughed land - so that it +is a great pity for unity and simplicity alike that Stevenson did +not repeat the "whaup," but wrote rather as though pee-weet or pee- +weets were the same as whaups - the common call of the one is KER- +LEE, KER-LEE, and of the other PEE-WEET, PEE-WEET, hence its common +name. + +It is a pity, too, that Mr Hammerton has no records of some +portions of the life at Davos Platz. Not only was Stevenson ill +there in April 1892, but his wife collapsed, and the tender concern +for her made havoc with some details of his literary work. It is +good to know this. Such errata or omissions throw a finer light on +his character than controlling perfection would do. Ah, I remember +how my old friend W. B. Rands ("Matthew Browne" and "Henry +Holbeach") was wont to declare that were men perfect they would be +isolated, if not idiotic, that we are united to each other by our +defects - that even physical beauty would be dead like later Greek +statues, were these not departures from the perfect lines. The +letter given by me at p. 28 transfigures in its light, some of his +work at that time. + +And then what an opportunity, we deeply regret to say, Mr Hammerton +wholly missed, when he passed over without due explanation or +commentary that most significant pamphlet - the ADDRESS TO THE +SCOTTISH CLERGY. If Mr Hammerton had but duly and closely studied +that and its bearings and suggestions in many directions, then he +would have written such a chapter for true enlightenment and for +interest as exactly his book - attractive though it is in much - +yet specially lacks. It is to be hoped that Mr Sidney Colvin will +not once more miss the chance which is thus still left open to him +to perfect his LIFE OF STEVENSON, and make it more interpretive +than anything yet published. If he does this, then, a dreadful +LACUNA in the EDINBURGH EDITION will also be supplied. + +Carefully reading over again Mr Arthur Symons' STUDIES IN TWO +LITERATURES - published some years ago - I have come across +instances of apparent contradiction which, so far as I can see, he +does not critically altogether reconcile, despite his ingenuity and +great charm of style. One relates to Thoreau, who, while still +"sturdy" as Emerson says, "and like an elm tree," as his sister +Sophia says, showed exactly the same love of nature and power of +interpreting her as he did after in his later comparatively short +period of "invalidity," while Mr Symons says his view of Nature +absolutely was that of the invalid, classing him unqualifiedly with +Jefferies and Stevenson, as invalid. Thoreau's mark even in the +short later period of "invalidity" was complete and robust +independence and triumph over it - a thing which I have no doubt +wholly captivated Stevenson, as scarce anything else would have +done, as a victory in the exact ROLE he himself was most ambitious +to fill. For did not he too wrestle well with the "wolverine" he +carried on his back - in this like Addington Symonds and Alexander +Pope? Surely I cannot be wrong here to reinforce my statement by a +passage from a letter written by Sophia Thoreau to her good friend +Daniel Ricketson, after her brother's death, the more that R. L. +Stevenson would have greatly exulted too in its cheery and +invincible stoicism: + + +"Profound joy mingles with my grief. I feel as if something very +beautiful had happened - not death; although Henry is with us no +longer, yet the memory of his sweet and virtuous soul must ever +cheer and comfort me. My heart is filled with praise to God for +the gift of such a brother, and may I never distrust the love and +wisdom of Him who made him and who has now called him to labour in +more glorious fields than earth affords. You ask for some +particulars relating to Henry's illness. I feel like saying that +Henry was never affected, never reached by it. I never before saw +such a manifestation of the power of spirit over matter. Very +often I heard him tell his visitors that he enjoyed existence as +well as ever. The thought of death, he said, did not trouble him. +His thoughts had entertained him all his life and did still.... He +considered occupation as necessary for the sick as for those in +health, and accomplished a vast amount of labour in those last few +months." + + +A rare "invalidity" this - a little confusing easy classifications. +I think Stevenson would have felt and said that brother and sister +were well worthy of each other; and that the sister was almost as +grand and cheery a stoic, with no literary profession of it, as was +the brother. + +The other thing relates to Stevenson's HUMAN SOUL. I find Mr +Symons says, at p. 243, that Stevenson "had something a trifle +elfish and uncanny about him, as of a bewitched being who was not +actually human - had not actually a human soul" - in which there +may be a glimmer of truth viewed from his revelation of artistic +curiosities in some aspects, but is hardly true of him otherwise; +and this Mr Symons himself seems to have felt, when, at p. 246, he +writes: "He is one of those writers who speak TO US ON EASY TERMS, +with whom we MAY EXCHANGE AFFECTIONS." How "affections" could be +exchanged on easy terms between the normal human being and an +elfish creature actually WITHOUT A HUMAN SOUL (seeing that +affections are, as Mr Matthew Arnold might have said, at least, +three-fourths of soul) is more, I confess, than I can quite see at +present; but in this rather MALADROIT contradiction Mr Symons does +point at one phase of the problem of Stevenson - this, namely that +to all the ordinary happy or pleasure-endings he opposes, as it +were of set purpose, gloom, as though to certain things he was +quite indifferent, and though, as we have seen, his actual life and +practice were quite opposed to this. + +I am sorry I CANNOT find the link in Mr Symons' essay, which would +quite make these two statements consistently coincide critically. +As an enthusiastic, though I hope still a discriminating, +Stevensonian, I do wish Mr Symons would help us to it somehow +hereafter. It would be well worth his doing, in my opinion. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV - LETTERS AND POEMS IN TESTIMONY + + + +AMONG many letters received by me in acknowledgment of, or in +commentary on, my little tributes to R. L. Stevenson, in various +journals and magazines, I find the following, which I give here for +reasons purely personal, and because my readers may with me, join +in admiration of the fancy, grace and beauty of the poems. I must +preface the first poem by a letter, which explains the genesis of +the poem, and relates a striking and very touching incident: + + +"37 ST DONATT'S ROAD, +LEWISHAM HIGH ROAD, S.E., +1ST MARCH 1895. + +"DEAR SIR, - As you have written so much about your friend, the +late Robert Louis Stevenson, and quoted many tributes to his genius +from contemporary writers, I take the liberty of sending you +herewith some verses of mine which appeared in THE WEEKLY SUN of +November last. I sent a copy of these verses to Samoa, but +unfortunately the great novelist died before they reached it. I +have, however, this week, received a little note from Mrs Strong, +which runs as follows: + +"'Your poem of "Greeting" came too late. I can only thank you by +sending a little moss that I plucked from a tree overhanging his +grave on Vaea Mountain.' + +"I trust you will appreciate my motive in sending you the poem. I +do not wish to obtrude my claims as a verse-writer upon your +notice, but I thought the incident I have recited would be +interesting to one who is so devoted a collector of Stevensoniana. +- Respectfully yours, + +F. J. COX." + + +GREETING + +(TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, IN SAMOA) + +We, pent in cities, prisoned in the mart, +Can know you only as a man apart, +But ever-present through your matchless art. + +You have exchanged the old, familiar ways +For isles, where, through the range of splendid days, +Her treasure Nature lavishly displays. + +There, by the gracious sweep of ampler seas, +That swell responsive to the odorous breeze. +You have the wine of Life, and we the lees! + +You mark, perchance, within your island bowers, +The slow departure of the languorous hours, +And breathe the sweetness of the strange wild-flowers. + +And everything your soul and sense delights - +But in the solemn wonder of your nights, +When Peace her message on the landscape writes; + +When Ocean scarcely flecks her marge with foam - +Your thoughts must sometimes from your island roam, +To centre on the sober face of Home. + +Though many a league of water rolls between +The simple beauty of an English scene, +From all these wilder charms your love may wean. + +Some kindly sprite may bring you as a boon +Sweets from the rose that crowns imperial June, +Or reminiscence of the throstle's tune; + +Yea, gladly grant you, with a generous hand, +Far glimpses of the winding, wind-swept strand, +The glens and mountains of your native land, + +Until you hear the pipes upon the breeze - +But wake unto the wild realities +The tangled forests and the boundless seas! + +For lo! the moonless night has passed away, +A sudden dawn dispels the shadows grey, +The glad sea moves and hails the quickening day. + +New life within the arbours of your fief +Awakes the blossom, quivers in the leaf, +And splendour flames upon the coral reef. + +If such a prospect stimulate your art, +More than our meadows where the shadows dart, +More than the life which throbs in London's heart, + +Then stay, encircled by your Southern bowers, +And weave, amid the incense of the flowers, +The skein of fair romance - the gain is ours! + +F. J. COX. + +WEEKLY SUN, 11TH November 1904. + + + +R. L. S., IN MEMORIAM. + + + +AN elfin wight as e'er from faeryland +Came to us straight with favour in his eyes, +Of wondrous seed that led him to the prize +Of fancy, with the magic rod in hand. +Ah, there in faeryland we saw him stand, +As for a while he walked with smiles and sighs, +Amongst us, finding still the gem that buys +Delight and joy at genius's command. + +And now thy place is empty: fare thee well; +Thou livest still in hearts that owe thee more +Than gold can reckon; for thy richer store +Is of the good that with us aye most dwell. +Farewell; sleep sound on Vaea's windy shrine, +While round the songsters join their song to thine. + +A. C. R. + + + +APPENDIX + + + +The following appeared some time ago in one of the London evening +papers, and I make bold, because of its truth and vigour, to insert +it here: + + +THE LAND OF STEVENSON, + +ON AN AFTERNOON'S WALK + + +WILL there be a "Land of Stevenson," as there is already a "Land of +Burns," or a "Land of Scott," known to the tourist, bescribbled by +the guide-book maker? This the future must tell. Yet will it be +easy to mark out the bounds of "Robert Louis Stevenson's Country"; +and, taking his native and well-loved city for a starting-point, a +stout walker may visit all its principal sites in an afternoon. +The house where he was born is within a bowshot of the Water of +Leith; some five miles to the south are Caerketton and Allermuir, +and other crests of the Pentlands, and below them Swanston Farm, +where year after year, in his father's time, he spent the summer +days basking on the hill slopes; two or three miles to the westward +of Swanston is Colinton, where his mother's father, Dr Balfour, was +minister; and here again you are back to the Water of Leith, which +you can follow down to the New Town. In this triangular space +Stevenson's memories and affections were firmly rooted; the fibres +could not be withdrawn from the soil, and "the voice of the blood" +and the longing for this little piece of earth make themselves +plaintively heard in his last notes. By Lothian Road, after which +Stevenson quaintly thought of naming the new edition of his works, +and past Boroughmuirhead and the "Bore Stane," where James +FitzJames set up his standard before Flodden, wends your southward +way to the hills. The builder of suburban villas has pushed his +handiwork far into the fields since Stevenson was wont to tramp +between the city and the Pentlands; and you may look in vain for +the flat stone whereon, as the marvelling child was told, there +once rose a "crow-haunted gibbet." Three-quarters of an hour of +easy walking, after you have cleared the last of the houses will +bring you to Swanston; and half an hour more will take the stiff +climber, a little breathless, to + + +THE TOP OF CAERKETTON CRAGS. + + +You may follow the high road - indeed there is a choice of two, +drawn at different levels - athwart the western skirts of the Braid +Hills, now tenanted, crown and sides of them, by golf; then to the +crossroads of Fairmilehead, whence the road dips down, to rise +again and circumvent the most easterly wing of the Pentlands. You +would like to pursue this route, were it only to look down on Bow +Bridge and recall how the last-century gauger used to put together +his flute and play "Over the hills and far away" as a signal to his +friend in the distillery below, now converted into a dairy farm, to +stow away his barrels. Better it is, however, to climb the stile +just past the poor-house gate, and follow the footpath along the +smoothly scooped banks of the Braid Burn to "Cockmylane" and to +Comiston. The wind has been busy all the morning spreading the +snow over a glittering world. The drifts are piled shoulder-high +in the lane as it approaches Comiston, and each old tree grouped +around the historic mansion is outlined in snow so virgin pure that +were the Ghost - "a lady in white, with the most beautiful clear +shoes on her feet" - to step out through the back gate, she would +be invisible, unless, indeed, she were between you and the ivy- +draped dovecot wall. Near by, at the corner of the Dreghorn Woods, +is the Hunters' Tryst, on the roof of which, when it was still a +wayside inn, the Devil was wont to dance on windy nights. In the +field through which you trudge knee-deep in drift rises the "Kay +Stane," looking to-day like a tall monolith of whitest marble. +Stevenson was mistaken when he said that it was from its top a +neighbouring laird, on pain of losing his lands, had to "wind a +blast of bugle horn" each time the King + + +VISITED HIS FOREST OF PENTLAND. + + +That honour belongs to another on the adjacent farm of Buckstane. +The ancient monument carries you further back, and there are Celtic +authorities that translate its name the "Stone of Victory." The +"Pechtland Hills" - their elder name - were once a refuge for the +Picts; and Caerketton - probably Caer-etin, the giant's strong-hold +- is one of them. Darkly its cliffs frown down upon you, while all +else is flashing white in the winter sunlight. For once, in this +last buttress thrown out into the plain of Lothian towards the +royal city, the outer folds of the Pentlands loses its boldly- +rounded curves, and drops an almost sheer descent of black rock to +the little glen below. In a wrinkle of the foothills Swanston farm +and hamlet are snugly tucked away. The spirit that breathes about +it in summer time is gently pastoral. It is sheltered from the +rougher blasts; it is set about with trees and green hills. It was +with this aspect of the place that Stevenson, coming hither on +holiday, was best acquainted. The village green, whereon the +windows of the neat white cottages turn a kindly gaze under low +brows of thatch, is then a perfect place in which to rest, and, +watching the smoke rising and listening to "the leaves ruffling in +the breeze," to muse on men and things; especially on Sabbath +mornings, when the ploughman or shepherd, "perplext wi' leisure," +it is time to set forth on the three-mile walk along the hill- +skirts to Colinton kirk. But Swanston in winter time must also + + +HAVE BEEN FAMILIAR TO STEVENSON. + + +Snow-wreathed Pentlands, the ribbed and furrowed front of +Caerketton, the low sun striking athwart the sloping fields of +white, the shadows creeping out from the hills, and the frosty +yellow fog drawing in from the Firth - must often have flashed back +on the thoughts of the exile of Samoa. Against this wintry +background the white farmhouse, old and crow-stepped, looks dingy +enough; the garden is heaped with the fantastic treasures of the +snow; and when you toil heavily up the waterside to the clump of +pines and beeches you find yourself in a fairy forest. One need +not search to-day for the pool where the lynx-eyed John Todd, "the +oldest herd on the Pentlands," watched from behind the low scrag of +wood the stranger collie come furtively to wash away the tell-tale +stains of lamb's blood. The effacing hand of the snow has +smothered it over. Higher you mount, mid leg-deep in drift, up the +steep and slippery hill-face, to the summit. Edinburgh has been +creeping nearer since Stevenson's musing fancy began to draw on the +memories of the climbs up "steep Caerketton." But this light gives +it a mystic distance; and it is all glitter and shadow. Arthur +Seat is like some great sea monster stranded near a city of dreams; +from the fog-swathed Firth gleams the white walls of Inchkeith +lighthouse, a mark never missed by Stevenson's father's son; above +Fife rise the twin breasts of the Lomonds. Or turn round and look +across the Esk valley to the Moorfoots; or more westerly, where the +back range of the Pentlands - Caernethy, the Scald, and the knife- +edged Kips - draw a sharp silhouette of Arctic peaks against the +sky. In the cloven hollow between is Glencarse Loch, an ancient +chapel and burying ground hidden under its waters; on the slope +above it, not a couple miles away, is Rullion Green, where, as +Stevenson told in THE PENTLAND RISING (his first printed work) + + +THE WESTLAND WHIGS WERE SCATTERED + + +as chaff on the hills. Were "topmost Allermuir," that rises close +beside you, removed from his place, we might see the gap in the +range through which Tom Dalyell and his troopers spurred from +Currie to the fray. The air on these heights is invigorating as +wine; but it is also keen as a razor. Without delaying long yon +plunge down to the "Windy Door Nick"; follow the "nameless trickle +that springs from the green bosom of Allermuir," past the rock and +pool, where, on summer evenings, the poet "loved to sit and make +bad verses"; and cross Halkerside and the Shearers' Knowe, those +"adjacent cantons on a single shoulder of a hill," sometimes +floundering to the neck in the loose snow of a drain, sometimes +scaring the sheep huddling in the wreaths, or putting up a covey of +moorfowl that circle back without a cry to cover in the ling. In +an hour you are at Colinton, whose dell has on one side the manse +garden, where a bright-eyed boy, who was to become famous, spent so +much of his time when he came thither on visits to his stern +Presbyterian grandfather; on the other the old churchyard. The +snow has drawn its cloak of ermine over the sleepers, it has run +its fingers over the worn lettering; and records almost effaced +start out from the stone. In vain these "voices of generations +dead" summon their wandering child, though you might deem that his +spirit would rest more quietly where the cold breeze from Pentland +shakes the ghostly trees in Colinton Dell than "under the flailing +fans and shadows of the palm." + + + +Footnotes: + +(1) Professor Charles Warren Stoddard, Professor of English +Literature at the Catholic University of Washington, in KATE +FIELD'S WASHINGTON. + +(2) In his portrait-sketch of his father, Stevenson speaks of him +as a "man of somewhat antique strain, and with a blended sternness +and softness that was wholly Scottish, and at first sight somewhat +bewildering," as melancholy, and with a keen sense of his +unworthiness, yet humorous in company; shrewd and childish; a +capital adviser. + +(3) INFERNO, Canto XV. + +(4) Alas, I never was told that remark - when I saw my friend +afterwards there was always too much to talk of else, and I forgot +to ask. + +(5) Quoted by Hammerton, pp. 2 and 3. + +(6) Tusitala, as the reader must know, is the Samoan for Teller of +Tales. + +(7) WISDOM OF GOETHE, p. 38. + +(8) THE FOREIGNER AT HOME, in MEMORIES AND PORTRAITS. + +(9) A great deal has been made of the "John Bull element" in De +Quincey since his MEMOIR was written by me (see MASSON'S +CONDENSATION, p. 95); so now perhaps a little more may be made of +the rather conceited Calvinistic Scot element in R. L. Stevenson! + +(10) It was Mr George Moore who said this. + +(11) FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW, October, 1903. + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg eText Robert Louis Stevenson, A +Record, An Estimate, A Memorial. + diff --git a/old/rlsjp10.zip b/old/rlsjp10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..99f00be --- /dev/null +++ b/old/rlsjp10.zip |
