That fact is an adminicle of excuse for my delay.
And now, dear minister of the illegible name, thanks to you, and
greeting to your wife, and may you have good guidance in your
difficult labours, and a blessing on your life.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
(No just so young sae young's he was, though -
I'm awfae near forty, man.)
Address c/o CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,
743 BROADWAY, NEW YORK.
Don't put 'N.B.' in your paper: put SCOTLAND, and be done with it.
Alas, that I should be thus stabbed in the home of my friends! The
name of my native land is not NORTH BRITAIN, whatever may be the
name of yours.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO MISS FERRIER
[SARANAC LAKE, APRIL 1888.]
MY DEAREST COGGIE, - I wish I could find the letter I began to you
some time ago when I was ill; but I can't and I don't believe there
was much in it anyway. We have all behaved like pigs and beasts
and barn-door poultry to you; but I have been sunk in work, and the
lad is lazy and blind and has been working too; and as for Fanny,
she has been (and still is) really unwell. I had a mean hope you
might perhaps write again before I got up steam: I could not have
been more ashamed of myself than I am, and I should have had
another laugh.
They always say I cannot give news in my letters: I shall shake
off that reproach. On Monday, if she is well enough, Fanny leaves
for California to see her friends; it is rather an anxiety to let
her go alone; but the doctor simply forbids it in my case, and she
is better anywhere than here - a bleak, blackguard, beggarly
climate, of which I can say no good except that it suits me and
some others of the same or similar persuasions whom (by all rights)
it ought to kill. It is a form of Arctic St. Andrews, I should
imagine; and the miseries of forty degrees below zero, with a high
wind, have to be felt to be appreciated. The greyness of the
heavens here is a circumstance eminently revolting to the soul; I
have near forgot the aspect of the sun - I doubt if this be news;
it is certainly no news to us. My mother suffers a little from the
inclemency of the place, but less on the whole than would be
imagined. Among other wild schemes, we have been projecting yacht
voyages; and I beg to inform you that Cogia Hassan was cast for the
part of passenger. They may come off! - Again this is not news.
The lad? Well, the lad wrote a tale this winter, which appeared to
me so funny that I have taken it in hand, and some of these days
you will receive a copy of a work entitled 'A GAME OF BLUFF, by
Lloyd Osbourne and Robert Louis Stevenson.'
Otherwise he (the lad) is much as usual. There remains, I believe,
to be considered only R. L. S., the house-bond, prop, pillar,
bread-winner, and bully of the establishment. Well, I do think him
much better; he is making piles of money; the hope of being able to
hire a yacht ere long dances before his eyes; otherwise he is not
in very high spirits at this particular moment, though compared
with last year at Bournemouth an angel of joy.
And now is this news, Cogia, or is it not? It all depends upon the
point of view, and I call it news. The devil of it is that I can
think of nothing else, except to send you all our loves, and to
wish exceedingly you were here to cheer us all up. But we'll see
about that on board the yacht. - Your affectionate friend,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO SIDNEY COLVIN
[SARANAC LAKE], APRIL 9TH!! 1888
MY DEAR COLVIN, - I have been long without writing to you, but am
not to blame, I had some little annoyances quite for a private eye,
but they ran me so hard that I could not write without lugging them
in, which (for several reasons) I did not choose to do. Fanny is
off to San Francisco, and next week I myself flit to New York:
address Scribner's. Where we shall go I know not, nor (I was going
to say) care; so bald and bad is my frame of mind. Do you know our
- ahem! - fellow clubman, Colonel Majendie? I had such an
interesting letter from him. Did you see my sermon? It has evoked
the worst feeling: I fear people don't care for the truth, or else
I don't tell it. Suffer me to wander without purpose. I have sent
off twenty letters to-day, and begun and stuck at a twenty-first,
and taken a copy of one which was on business, and corrected
several galleys of proof, and sorted about a bushel of old letters;
so if any one has a right to be romantically stupid it is I - and I
am. Really deeply stupid, and at that stage when in old days I
used to pour out words without any meaning whatever and with my
mind taking no part in the performance. I suspect that is now the
case. I am reading with extraordinary pleasure the life of Lord
Lawrence: Lloyd and I have a mutiny novel -
(NEXT MORNING, AFTER TWELVE OTHER LETTERS) - mutiny novel on hand -
a tremendous work - so we are all at Indian books. The idea of the
novel is Lloyd's: I call it a novel. 'Tis a tragic romance, of
the most tragic sort: I believe the end will be almost too much
for human endurance - when the hero is thrown to the ground with
one of his own (Sepoy) soldier's knees upon his chest, and the
cries begin in the Beebeeghar. O truly, you know it is a howler!
The whole last part is - well the difficulty is that, short of
resuscitating Shakespeare, I don't know who is to write it.
I still keep wonderful. I am a great performer before the Lord on
the penny whistle. Dear sir, sincerely yours,
ANDREW JACKSON.
Letter: TO MISS ADELAIDE BOODLE
[SARANAC LAKE, APRIL 1888.] ADDRESS C/O MESSRS. SCRIBNER'S SONS,
743 BROADWAY, N.Y.
MY DEAR GAMEKEEPER, - Your p. c. (proving you a good student of
Micawber) has just arrived, and it paves the way to something I am
anxious to say. I wrote a paper the other day - PULVIS ET UMBRA; -
I wrote it with great feeling and conviction: to me it seemed
bracing and healthful, it is in such a world (so seen by me), that
I am very glad to fight out my battle, and see some fine sunsets,
and hear some excellent jests between whiles round the camp fire.
But I find that to some people this vision of mine is a nightmare,
and extinguishes all ground of faith in God or pleasure in man.
Truth I think not so much of; for I do not know it. And I could
wish in my heart that I had not published this paper, if it
troubles folk too much: all have not the same digestion, nor the
same sight of things. And it came over me with special pain that
perhaps this article (which I was at the pains to send to her)
might give dismalness to my GAMEKEEPER AT HOME. Well, I cannot
take back what I have said; but yet I may add this. If my view be
everything but the nonsense that it may be - to me it seems self-
evident and blinding truth - surely of all things it makes this
world holier. There is nothing in it but the moral side - but the
great battle and the breathing times with their refreshments. I
see no more and no less. And if you look again, it is not ugly,
and it is filled with promise.
Pray excuse a desponding author for this apology. My wife is away
off to the uttermost parts of the States, all by herself. I shall
be off, I hope, in a week; but where? Ah! that I know not. I keep
wonderful, and my wife a little better, and the lad flourishing.
We now perform duets on two D tin whistles; it is no joke to make
the bass; I think I must really send you one, which I wish you
would correct . . . I may be said to live for these instrumental
labours now, but I have always some childishness on hand. - I am,
dear Gamekeeper, your indulgent but intemperate Squire,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO CHARLES BAXTER
UNION HOUSE, MANASQUAN, N.J., BUT ADDRESS TO SCRIBNER'S, 11TH MAY
1888.
MY DEAR CHARLES, - I have found a yacht, and we are going the full
pitch for seven months. If I cannot get my health back (more or
less), 'tis madness; but, of course, there is the hope, and I will
play big. . . . If this business fails to set me up, well, 2000
pounds is gone, and I know I can't get better. We sail from San
Francisco, June 15th, for the South Seas in the yacht CASCO. - With
a million thanks for all your dear friendliness, ever yours
affectionately,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: To HOMER ST. GAUDENS
MANASQUAN, NEW JERSEY, 27TH MAY 1888.
DEAR HOMER ST. GAUDENS, - Your father has brought you this day to
see me, and he tells me it is his hope you may remember the
occasion. I am going to do what I can to carry out his wish; and
it may amuse you, years after, to see this little scrap of paper
and to read what I write. I must begin by testifying that you
yourself took no interest whatever in the introduction, and in the
most proper spirit displayed a single-minded ambition to get back
to play, and this I thought an excellent and admirable point in
your character. You were also (I use the past tense, with a view
to the time when you shall read, rather than to that when I am
writing) a very pretty boy, and (to my European views) startlingly
self-possessed. My time of observation was so limited that you
must pardon me if I can say no more: what else I marked, what
restlessness of foot and hand, what graceful clumsiness, what
experimental designs upon the furniture, was but the common
inheritance of human youth. But you may perhaps like to know that
the lean flushed man in bed, who interested you so little, was in a
state of mind extremely mingled and unpleasant: harassed with work
which he thought he was not doing well, troubled with difficulties
to which you will in time succeed, and yet looking forward to no
less a matter than a voyage to the South Seas and the visitation of
savage and desert islands. -Your father's friend,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO HENRY JAMES
MANASQUAN (AHEM!), NEW JERSEY, MAY 28TH, 1888.
MY DEAR JAMES, - With what a torrent it has come at last! Up to
now, what I like best is the first number of a LONDON LIFE. You
have never done anything better, and I don't know if perhaps you
have ever done anything so good as the girl's outburst: tip-top.
I have been preaching your later works in your native land. I had
to present the Beltraffio volume to Low, and it has brought him to
his knees; he was AMAZED at the first part of Georgina's Reasons,
although (like me) not so well satisfied with Part II. It is
annoying to find the American public as stupid as the English, but
they will waken up in time: I wonder what they will think of TWO
NATIONS? . .
This, dear James, is a valedictory. On June 15th the schooner
yacht CASCO will (weather and a jealous providence permitting)
steam through the Golden Gates for Honolulu, Tahiti, the Galapagos,
Guayaquil, and - I hope NOT the bottom of the Pacific. It will
contain your obedient 'umble servant and party. It seems too good
to be true, and is a very good way of getting through the green-
sickness of maturity which, with all its accompanying ills, is now
declaring itself in my mind and life. They tell me it is not so
severe as that of youth; if I (and the CASCO) are spared, I shall
tell you more exactly, as I am one of the few people in the world
who do not forget their own lives.
Good-bye, then, my dear fellow, and please write us a word; we
expect to have three mails in the next two months: Honolulu,
Tahiti, and Guayaquil. But letters will be forwarded from
Scribner's, if you hear nothing more definite directly. In 3
(three) days I leave for San Francisco. - Ever yours most
cordially,
R. L. S.
CHAPTER X - PACIFIC VOYAGES, JUNE 1888-NOVEMBER 1890
TO SIDNEY COLVIN
YACHT 'CASCO,' ANAHO BAY, NUKAHIVA, MARQUESAS ISLANDS [JULY 1888].
MY DEAR COLVIN, - From this somewhat (ahem) out of the way place, I
write to say how d'ye do. It is all a swindle: I chose these
isles as having the most beastly population, and they are far
better, and far more civilised than we. I know one old chief Ko-o-
amua, a great cannibal in his day, who ate his enemies even as he
walked home from killing 'em, and he is a perfect gentleman and
exceedingly amiable and simple-minded: no fool, though.
The climate is delightful; and the harbour where we lie one of the
loveliest spots imaginable. Yesterday evening we had near a score
natives on board; lovely parties. We have a native god; very rare
now. Very rare and equally absurd to view.
This sort of work is not favourable to correspondence: it takes me
all the little strength I have to go about and see, and then come
home and note, the strangeness around us. I shouldn't wonder if
there came trouble here some day, all the same. I could name a
nation that is not beloved in certain islands - and it does not
know it! Strange: like ourselves, perhaps, in India! Love to all
and much to yourself.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO CHARLES BAXTER
YACHT 'CASCO,' AT SEA, NEAR THE PAUMOTUS, 7 A.M., SEPTEMBER 6TH,
1888, WITH A DREADFUL PEN.
MY DEAR CHARLES, - Last night as I lay under my blanket in the
cockpit, courting sleep, I had a comic seizure. There was nothing
visible but the southern stars, and the steersman there out by the
binnacle lamp; we were all looking forward to a most deplorable
landfall on the morrow, praying God we should fetch a tuft of palms
which are to indicate the Dangerous Archipelago; the night was as
warm as milk, and all of a sudden I had a vision of - Drummond
Street. It came on me like a flash of lightning: I simply
returned thither, and into the past. And when I remember all I
hoped and feared as I pickled about Rutherford's in the rain and
the east wind; how I feared I should make a mere shipwreck, and yet
timidly hoped not; how I feared I should never have a friend, far
less a wife, and yet passionately hoped I might; how I hoped (if I
did not take to drink) I should possibly write one little book,
etc. etc. And then now - what a change! I feel somehow as if I
should like the incident set upon a brass plate at the corner of
that dreary thoroughfare for all students to read, poor devils,
when their hearts are down. And I felt I must write one word to
you. Excuse me if I write little: when I am at sea, it gives me a
headache; when I am in port, I have my diary crying 'Give, give.'
I shall have a fine book of travels, I feel sure; and will tell you
more of the South Seas after very few months than any other writer
has done - except Herman Melville perhaps, who is a howling cheese.
Good luck to you, God bless you. - Your affectionate friend,
R. L. S.
Letter: TO SIDNEY COLVIN
FAKARAVA, LOW ARCHIPELAGO, SEPTEMBER 21ST, 1888.
MY DEAR COLVIN, - Only a word. Get out your big atlas, and imagine
a straight line from San Francisco to Anaho, the N.E. corner of
Nukahiva, one of the Marquesas Islands; imagine three weeks there:
imagine a day's sail on August 12th round the eastern end of the
island to Tai-o-hae, the capital; imagine us there till August
22nd: imagine us skirt the east side of Ua-pu - perhaps Rona-Poa
on your atlas - and through the Bondelais straits to Taaka-uku in
Hiva-Oa, where we arrive on the 23rd; imagine us there until
September 4th, when we sailed for Fakarava, which we reached on the
9th, after a very difficult and dangerous passage among these
isles. Tuesday, we shall leave for Taiti, where I shall knock off
and do some necessary work ashore. It looks pretty bald in the
atlas; not in fact; nor I trust in the 130 odd pages of diary which
I have just been looking up for these dates: the interest, indeed,
has been INCREDIBLE: I did not dream there were such places or
such races. My health has stood me splendidly; I am in for hours
wading over the knees for shells; I have been five hours on
horseback: I have been up pretty near all night waiting to see
where the CASCO would go ashore, and with my diary all ready -
simply the most entertaining night of my life. Withal I still have
colds; I have one now, and feel pretty sick too; but not as at
home: instead of being in bed, for instance, I am at this moment
sitting snuffling and writing in an undershirt and trousers; and as
for colour, hands, arms, feet, legs, and face, I am browner than
the berry: only my trunk and the aristocratic spot on which I sit
retain the vile whiteness of the north.
Please give my news and kind love to Henley, Henry James, and any
whom you see of well-wishers. Accept from me the very best of my
affection: and believe me ever yours,
THE OLD MAN VIRULENT.
TAITI, OCTOBER 7TH, 1888.
Never having found a chance to send this off, I may add more of my
news. My cold took a very bad turn, and I am pretty much out of
sorts at this particular, living in a little bare one-twentieth-
furnished house, surrounded by mangoes, etc. All the rest are
well, and I mean to be soon. But these Taiti colds are very severe
and, to children, often fatal; so they were not the thing for me.
Yesterday the brigantine came in from San Francisco, so we can get
our letters off soon. There are in Papeete at this moment, in a
little wooden house with grated verandahs, two people who love you
very much, and one of them is
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO CHARLES BAXTER
TAITI, AS EVER WAS, 6TH OCTOBER 1888.
MY DEAR CHARLES, - . . . You will receive a lot of mostly very bad
proofs of photographs: the paper was so bad. Please keep them
very private, as they are for the book. We send them, having
learned so dread a fear of the sea, that we wish to put our eggs in
different baskets. We have been thrice within an ace of being
ashore: we were lost (!) for about twelve hours in the Low
Archipelago, but by God's blessing had quiet weather all the time;
and once, in a squall, we cam' so near gaun heels ower hurdies,
that I really dinnae ken why we didnae athegither. Hence, as I
say, a great desire to put our eggs in different baskets,
particularly on the Pacific (aw-haw-haw) Pacific Ocean.
You can have no idea what a mean time we have had, owing to
incidental beastlinesses, nor what a glorious, owing to the
intrinsic interest of these isles. I hope the book will be a good
one; nor do I really very much doubt that - the stuff is so
curious; what I wonder is, if the public will rise to it. A copy
of my journal, or as much of it as is made, shall go to you also;
it is, of course, quite imperfect, much being to be added and
corrected; but O, for the eggs in the different baskets.
All the rest are well enough, and all have enjoyed the cruise so
far, in spite of its drawbacks. We have had an awfae time in some
ways, Mr. Baxter; and if I wasnae sic a verra patient man (when I
ken that I HAVE to be) there wad hae been a braw row; and ance if I
hadnae happened to be on deck about three in the marnin', I THINK
there would have been MURDER done. The American Mairchant Marine
is a kent service; ye'll have heard its praise, I'm thinkin'; an'
if ye never did, ye can get TWA YEARS BEFORE THE MAST, by Dana,
whaur forbye a great deal o' pleisure, ye'll get a' the needcessary
information. Love to your father and all the family. - Ever your
affectionate friend,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO MISS ADELAIDE BOODLE
TAITI, OCTOBER 10TH, 1888.
DEAR GIVER, - I am at a loss to conceive your object in giving me
to a person so locomotory as my proprietor. The number of thousand
miles that I have travelled, the strange bed-fellows with which I
have been made acquainted, I lack the requisite literary talent to
make clear to your imagination. I speak of bed-fellows; pocket-
fellows would be a more exact expression, for the place of my abode
is in my master's righthand trouser-pocket; and there, as he waded
on the resounding beaches of Nukahiva, or in the shallow tepid
water on the reef of Fakarava, I have been overwhelmed by and
buried among all manner of abominable South Sea shells, beautiful
enough in their way, I make no doubt, but singular company for any
self-respecting paper-cutter. He, my master - or as I more justly
call him, my bearer; for although I occasionally serve him, does
not he serve me daily and all day long, carrying me like an African
potentate on my subject's legs? - HE is delighted with these isles,
and this climate, and these savages, and a variety of other things.
He now blows a flageolet with singular effects: sometimes the poor
thing appears stifled with shame, sometimes it screams with agony;
he pursues his career with truculent insensibility. Health appears
to reign in the party. I was very nearly sunk in a squall. I am
sorry I ever left England, for here there are no books to be had,
and without books there is no stable situation for, dear Giver,
your affectionate
WOODEN PAPER-CUTTER.
A neighbouring pair of scissors snips a kiss in your direction.
Letter: TO SIDNEY COLVIN
TAITI, OCTOBER 16TH, 1888.
MY DEAR COLVIN, - The cruiser for San Francisco departs to-morrow
morning bearing you some kind of a scratch. This much more
important packet will travel by way of Auckland. It contains a
ballant; and I think a better ballant than I expected ever to do.
I can imagine how you will wag your pow over it; and how ragged you
will find it, etc., but has it not spirit all the same? and though
the verse is not all your fancy painted it, has it not some life?
And surely, as narrative, the thing has considerable merit! Read
it, get a typewritten copy taken, and send me that and your opinion
to the Sandwiches. I know I am only courting the most excruciating
mortification; but the real cause of my sending the thing is that I
could bear to go down myself, but not to have much MS. go down with
me. To say truth, we are through the most dangerous; but it has
left in all minds a strong sense of insecurity, and we are all for
putting eggs in various baskets.
We leave here soon, bound for Uahiva, Reiatea, Bora-Bora, and the
Sandwiches.
O, how my spirit languishes
To step ashore on the Sanguishes;
For there my letters wait,
There shall I know my fate.
O, how my spirit languidges
To step ashore on the Sanguidges.
18TH. - I think we shall leave here if all is well on Monday. I am
quite recovered, astonishingly recovered. It must be owned these
climates and this voyage have given me more strength than I could
have thought possible. And yet the sea is a terrible place,
stupefying to the mind and poisonous to the temper, the sea, the
motion, the lack of space, the cruel publicity, the villainous
tinned foods, the sailors, the captain, the passengers - but you
are amply repaid when you sight an island, and drop anchor in a new
world. Much trouble has attended this trip, but I must confess
more pleasure. Nor should I ever complain, as in the last few
weeks, with the curing of my illness indeed, as if that were the
bursting of an abscess, the cloud has risen from my spirits and to
some degree from my temper. Do you know what they called the CASCO
at Fakarava? The SILVER SHIP. Is that not pretty? Pray tell Mrs.
Jenkin, DIE SILBERNE FRAU, as I only learned it since I wrote her.
I think of calling the book by that name: THE CRUISE OF THE SILVER
SHIP - so there will be one poetic page at least - the title. At
the Sandwiches we shall say farewell to the S. S. with mingled
feelings. She is a lovely creature: the most beautiful thing at
this moment in Taiti.
Well, I will take another sheet, though I know I have nothing to
say. You would think I was bursting: but the voyage is all stored
up for the book, which is to pay for it, we fondly hope; and the
troubles of the time are not worth telling; and our news is little.
Here I conclude (Oct. 24th, I think), for we are now stored, and
the Blue Peter metaphorically flies.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO WILLIAM AND THOMAS ARCHER
TAITI, OCTOBER 17TH, 1888.
DEAR ARCHER, - Though quite unable to write letters, I nobly send
you a line signifying nothing. The voyage has agreed well with
all; it has had its pains, and its extraordinary pleasures; nothing
in the world can equal the excitement of the first time you cast
anchor in some bay of a tropical island, and the boats begin to
surround you, and the tattooed people swarm aboard. Tell
Tomarcher, with my respex, that hide-and-seek is not equal to it;
no, nor hidee-in-the-dark; which, for the matter of that, is a game
for the unskilful: the artist prefers daylight, a good-sized
garden, some shrubbery, an open paddock, and - come on, Macduff.
TOMARCHER, I am now a distinguished litterytour, but that was not
the real bent of my genius. I was the best player of hide-and-seek
going; not a good runner, I was up to every shift and dodge, I
could jink very well, I could crawl without any noise through
leaves, I could hide under a carrot plant, it used to be my
favourite boast that I always WALKED into the den. You may care to
hear, Tomarcher, about the children in these parts; their parents
obey them, they do not obey their parents; and I am sorry to tell
you (for I dare say you are already thinking the idea a good one)
that it does not pay one halfpenny. There are three sorts of
civilisation, Tomarcher: the real old-fashioned one, in which
children either had to find out how to please their dear papas, or
their dear papas cut their heads off. This style did very well,
but is now out of fashion. Then the modern European style: in
which children have to behave reasonably well, and go to school and
say their prayers, or their dear papas WILL KNOW THE REASON WHY.
This does fairly well. Then there is the South Sea Island plan,
which does not do one bit. The children beat their parents here;
it does not make their parents any better; so do not try it.
Dear Tomarcher, I have forgotten the address of your new house, but
will send this to one of your papa's publishers. Remember us all
to all of you, and believe me, yours respectably,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO CHARLES BAXTER
TAUTIRA (THE GARDEN OF THE WORLD), OTHERWISE CALLED HANS-CHRISTIAN-
ANDERSEN-VILLE [NOVEMBER 1888].
MY DEAR CHARLES, - Whether I have a penny left in the wide world, I
know not, nor shall know, till I get to Honolulu, where I
anticipate a devil of an awakening. It will be from a mighty
pleasant dream at least: Tautira being mere Heaven. But suppose,
for the sake of argument, any money to be left in the hands of my
painful doer, what is to be done with it? Save us from exile would
be the wise man's choice, I suppose; for the exile threatens to be
eternal. But yet I am of opinion - in case there should be SOME
dibs in the hand of the P.D., I.E. painful doer; because if there
be none, I shall take to my flageolet on the high-road, and work
home the best way I can, having previously made away with my family
- I am of opinion that if - and his are in the customary state, and
you are thinking of an offering, and there should be still some
funds over, you would be a real good P.D. to put some in with yours
and tak' the credit o't, like a wee man! I know it's a beastly
thing to ask; but it, after all, does no earthly harm, only that
much good. And besides, like enough there's nothing in the till,
and there is an end. Yet I live here in the full lustre of
millions; it is thought I am the richest son of man that has yet
been to Tautira: I! - and I am secretly eaten with the fear of
lying in pawn, perhaps for the remainder of my days, in San
Francisco. As usual, my colds have much hashed my finances.
Do tell Henley I write this just after having dismissed Ori the
sub-chief, in whose house I live, Mrs. Ori, and Pairai, their
adopted child, from the evening hour of music: during which I
Publickly (with a k) Blow on the Flageolet. These are words of
truth. Yesterday I told Ori about W. E. H., counterfeited his
playing on the piano and the pipe, and succeeded in sending the six
feet four there is of that sub-chief somewhat sadly to his bed;
feeling that his was not the genuine article after all. Ori is
exactly like a colonel in the Guards. - I am, dear Charles, ever
yours affectionately,
R. L. S.
Letter: TAUTIRA, 10TH NOVEMBER '88.
MY DEAR CHARLES, - Our mainmast is dry-rotten, and we are all to
the devil; I shall lie in a debtor's jail. Never mind, Tautira is
first chop. I am so besotted that I shall put on the back of this
my attempt at words to Wandering Willie; if you can conceive at all
the difficulty, you will also conceive the vanity with which I
regard any kind of result; and whatever mine is like, it has some
sense, and Burns's has none.
Home no more home to me, whither must I wander?
Hunger my driver, I go where I must.
Cold blows the winter wind over hill and heather;
Thick drives the rain, and my roof is in the dust.
Loved of wise men was the shade of my roof-tree.
The true word of welcome was spoken in the door -
Dear days of old, with the faces in the firelight,
Kind folks of old, you come again no more.
Home was home then, my dear, full of kindly faces,
Home was home then, my dear, happy for the child.
Fire and the windows bright glittered on the moorland;
Song, tuneful song, built a palace in the wild.
Now, when day dawns on the brow of the moorland,
Lone stands the house, and the chimney-stone is cold.
Lone let it stand, now the friends are all departed,
The kind hearts, the true hearts, that loved the place of old.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO J. A. SYMONDS
NOVEMBER 11TH 1888.
One November night, in the village of Tautira, we sat at the high
table in the hall of assembly, hearing the natives sing. It was
dark in the hall, and very warm; though at times the land wind blew
a little shrewdly through the chinks, and at times, through the
larger openings, we could see the moonlight on the lawn. As the
songs arose in the rattling Tahitian chorus, the chief translated
here and there a verse. Farther on in the volume you shall read
the songs themselves; and I am in hopes that not you only, but all
who can find a savour in the ancient poetry of places, will read
them with some pleasure. You are to conceive us, therefore, in
strange circumstances and very pleasing; in a strange land and
climate, the most beautiful on earth; surrounded by a foreign race
that all travellers have agreed to be the most engaging; and taking
a double interest in two foreign arts.
We came forth again at last, in a cloudy moonlight, on the forest
lawn which is the street of Tautira. The Pacific roared outside
upon the reef. Here and there one of the scattered palm-built
lodges shone out under the shadow of the wood, the lamplight
bursting through the crannies of the wall. We went homeward
slowly, Ori a Ori carrying behind us the lantern and the chairs,
properties with which we had just been enacting our part of the
distinguished visitor. It was one of those moments in which minds
not altogether churlish recall the names and deplore the absence of
congenial friends; and it was your name that first rose upon our
lips. 'How Symonds would have enjoyed this evening!' said one, and
then another. The word caught in my mind; I went to bed, and it
was still there. The glittering, frosty solitudes in which your
days are cast arose before me: I seemed to see you walking there
in the late night, under the pine-trees and the stars; and I
received the image with something like remorse.
There is a modern attitude towards fortune; in this place I will
not use a graver name. Staunchly to withstand her buffets and to
enjoy with equanimity her favours was the code of the virtuous of
old. Our fathers, it should seem, wondered and doubted how they
had merited their misfortunes: we, rather how we have deserved our
happiness. And we stand often abashed and sometimes revolted, at
those partialities of fate by which we profit most. It was so with
me on that November night: I felt that our positions should be
changed. It was you, dear Symonds, who should have gone upon that
voyage and written this account. With your rich stores of
knowledge, you could have remarked and understood a thousand things
of interest and beauty that escaped my ignorance; and the brilliant
colours of your style would have carried into a thousand sickrooms
the sea air and the strong sun of tropic islands. It was otherwise
decreed. But suffer me at least to connect you, if only in name
and only in the fondness of imagination, with the voyage of the
'SILVER SHIP.'
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
DEAR SYMONDS, - I send you this (November 11th), the morning of its
completion. If I ever write an account of this voyage, may I place
this letter at the beginning? It represents - I need not tell you,
for you too are an artist - a most genuine feeling, which kept me
long awake last night; and though perhaps a little elaborate, I
think it a good piece of writing. We are IN HEAVEN HERE. Do not
forget
R. L. S.
Please keep this: I have no perfect copy.
TAUTIRA, ON THE PENINSULA OF TAHITI.
Letter: TO THOMAS ARCHER
TAUTIRA, ISLAND OF TAHITI [NOVEMBER 1888].
DEAR TOMARCHER, - This is a pretty state of things! seven o'clock
and no word of breakfast! And I was awake a good deal last night,
for it was full moon, and they had made a great fire of cocoa-nut
husks down by the sea, and as we have no blinds or shutters, this
kept my room very bright. And then the rats had a wedding or a
school-feast under my bed. And then I woke early, and I have
nothing to read except Virgil's AENEID, which is not good fun on an
empty stomach, and a Latin dictionary, which is good for naught,
and by some humorous accident, your dear papa's article on
Skerryvore. And I read the whole of that, and very impudent it is,
but you must not tell your dear papa I said so, or it might come to
a battle in which you might lose either a dear papa or a valued
correspondent, or both, which would be prodigal. And still no
breakfast; so I said 'Let's write to Tomarcher.'
This is a much better place for children than any I have hitherto
seen in these seas. The girls (and sometimes the boys) play a very
elaborate kind of hopscotch. The boys play horses exactly as we do
in Europe; and have very good fun on stilts, trying to knock each
other down, in which they do not often succeed. The children of
all ages go to church and are allowed to do what they please,
running about the aisles, rolling balls, stealing mamma's bonnet
and publicly sitting on it, and at last going to sleep in the
middle of the floor. I forgot to say that the whips to play
horses, and the balls to roll about the church - at least I never
saw them used elsewhere - grow ready made on trees; which is rough
on toy-shops. The whips are so good that I wanted to play horses
myself; but no such luck! my hair is grey, and I am a great, big,
ugly man. The balls are rather hard, but very light and quite
round. When you grow up and become offensively rich, you can
charter a ship in the port of London, and have it come back to you
entirely loaded with these balls; when you could satisfy your mind
as to their character, and give them away when done with to your
uncles and aunts. But what I really wanted to tell you was this:
besides the tree-top toys (Hush-a-by, toy-shop, on the tree-top!),
I have seen some real MADE toys, the first hitherto observed in the
South Seas.
This was how. You are to imagine a four-wheeled gig; one horse; in
the front seat two Tahiti natives, in their Sunday clothes, blue
coat, white shirt, kilt (a little longer than the Scotch) of a blue
stuff with big white or yellow flowers, legs and feet bare; in the
back seat me and my wife, who is a friend of yours; under our feet,
plenty of lunch and things: among us a great deal of fun in broken
Tahitian, one of the natives, the sub-chief of the village, being a
great ally of mine. Indeed we have exchanged names; so that he is
now called Rui, the nearest they can come to Louis, for they have
no L and no S in their language. Rui is six feet three in his
stockings, and a magnificent man. We all have straw hats, for the
sun is strong. We drive between the sea, which makes a great
noise, and the mountains; the road is cut through a forest mostly
of fruit trees, the very creepers, which take the place of our ivy,
heavy with a great and delicious fruit, bigger than your head and
far nicer, called Barbedine. Presently we came to a house in a
pretty garden, quite by itself, very nicely kept, the doors and
windows open, no one about, and no noise but that of the sea. It
looked like a house in a fairy-tale, and just beyond we must ford a
river, and there we saw the inhabitants. Just in the mouth of the
river, where it met the sea waves, they were ducking and bathing
and screaming together like a covey of birds: seven or eight
little naked brown boys and girls as happy as the day was long; and
on the banks of the stream beside them, real toys - toy ships, full
rigged, and with their sails set, though they were lying in the
dust on their beam ends. And then I knew for sure they were all
children in a fairy-story, living alone together in that lonely
house with the only toys in all the island; and that I had myself
driven, in my four-wheeled gig, into a corner of the fairy-story,
and the question was, should I get out again? But it was all
right; I guess only one of the wheels of the gig had got into the
fairy-story; and the next jolt the whole thing vanished, and we
drove on in our sea-side forest as before, and I have the honour to
be Tomarcher's valued correspondent, TERIITEPA, which he was
previously known as
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO SIDNEY COLVIN
YACHT 'CASCO,' AT SEA, 14TH JANUARY, 1889.
MY DEAR COLVIN, - Twenty days out from Papeete. Yes, sir, all
that, and only (for a guess) in 4 degrees north or at the best 4
degrees 30 minutes, though already the wind seems to smell a little
of the North Pole. My handwriting you must take as you get, for we
are speeding along through a nasty swell, and I can only keep my
place at the table by means of a foot against the divan, the
unoccupied hand meanwhile gripping the ink-bottle. As we begin (so
very slowly) to draw near to seven months of correspondence, we are
all in some fear; and I want to have letters written before I shall
be plunged into that boiling pot of disagreeables which I
constantly expect at Honolulu. What is needful can be added there.
We were kept two months at Tautira in the house of my dear old
friend, Ori a Ori, till both the masts of this invaluable yacht had
been repaired. It was all for the best: Tautira being the most
beautiful spot, and its people the most amiable, I have ever found.
Besides which, the climate suited me to the ground; I actually went
sea-bathing almost every day, and in our feasts (we are all huge
eaters in Taiarapu) have been known to apply four times for pig.
And then again I got wonderful materials for my book, collected
songs and legends on the spot; songs still sung in chorus by
perhaps a hundred persons, not two of whom can agree on their
translation; legends, on which I have seen half a dozen seniors
sitting in conclave and debating what came next. Once I went a
day's journey to the other side of the island to Tati, the high
chief of the Tevas - MY chief that is, for I am now a Teva and
Teriitera, at your service - to collect more and correct what I had
already. In the meanwhile I got on with my work, almost finished
the MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, which contains more human work than
anything of mine but KIDNAPPED, and wrote the half of another
ballad, the SONG OF RAHERO, on a Taiarapu legend of my own clan,
sir - not so much fire as the FEAST OF FAMINE, but promising to be
more even and correct. But the best fortune of our stay at Tautira
was my knowledge of Ori himself, one of the finest creatures
extant. The day of our parting was a sad one. We deduced from it
a rule for travellers: not to stay two months in one place - which
is to cultivate regrets.
At last our contemptible ship was ready; to sea we went, bound for
Honolulu and the letter-bag, on Christmas Day; and from then to now
have experienced every sort of minor misfortune, squalls, calms,
contrary winds and seas, pertinacious rains, declining stores, till
we came almost to regard ourselves as in the case of Vanderdecken.
Three days ago our luck seemed to improve, we struck a leading
breeze, got creditably through the doldrums, and just as we looked
to have the N.E. trades and a straight run, the rains and squalls
and calms began again about midnight, and this morning, though
there is breeze enough to send us along, we are beaten back by an
obnoxious swell out of the north. Here is a page of complaint,
when a verse of thanksgiving had perhaps been more in place. For
all this time we must have been skirting past dangerous weather, in
the tail and circumference of hurricanes, and getting only
annoyance where we should have had peril, and ill-humour instead of
fear.
I wonder if I have managed to give you any news this time, or
whether the usual damn hangs over my letter? 'The midwife
whispered, Be thou dull!' or at least inexplicit. Anyway I have
tried my best, am exhausted with the effort, and fall back into the
land of generalities. I cannot tell you how often we have planned
our arrival at the Monument: two nights ago, the 12th January, we
had it all planned out, arrived in the lights and whirl of
Waterloo, hailed a hansom, span up Waterloo Road, over the bridge,
etc. etc., and hailed the Monument gate in triumph and with
indescribable delight. My dear Custodian, I always think we are
too sparing of assurances: Cordelia is only to be excused by Regan
and Goneril in the same nursery; I wish to tell you that the longer
I live, the more dear do you become to me; nor does my heart own
any stronger sentiment. If the bloody schooner didn't send me
flying in every sort of direction at the same time, I would say
better what I feel so much; but really, if you were here, you would
not be writing letters, I believe; and even I, though of a more
marine constitution, am much perturbed by this bobbery and wish - O
ye Gods, how I wish! - that it was done, and we had arrived, and I
had Pandora's Box (my mail bag) in hand, and was in the lively hope
of something eatable for dinner instead of salt horse, tinned
mutton, duff without any plums, and pie fruit, which now make up
our whole repertory. O Pandora's Box! I wonder what you will
contain. As like as not you will contain but little money: if
that be so, we shall have to retire to 'Frisco in the CASCO, and
thence by sea VIA Panama to Southampton, where we should arrive in
April. I would like fine to see you on the tug: ten years older
both of us than the last time you came to welcome Fanny and me to
England. If we have money, however, we shall do a little
differently: send the CASCO away from Honolulu empty of its high-
born lessees, for that voyage to 'Frisco is one long dead beat in
foul and at last in cold weather; stay awhile behind, follow by
steamer, cross the States by train, stay awhile in New York on
business, and arrive probably by the German Line in Southampton.
But all this is a question of money. We shall have to lie very
dark awhile to recruit our finances: what comes from the book of
the cruise, I do not want to touch until the capital is repaid.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO E. L. BURLINGAME
HONOLULU, JANUARY 1889.
MY DEAR BURLINGAME, - Here at last I have arrived. We could not
get away from Tahiti till Christmas Day, and then had thirty days
of calms and squalls, a deplorable passage. This has thrown me all
out of gear in every way. I plunge into business.
1. THE MASTER: Herewith go three more parts. You see he grows in
balk; this making ten already, and I am not yet sure if I can
finish it in an eleventh; which shall go to you QUAM PRIMUM - I
hope by next mail.
2. ILLUSTRATIONS TO M. I totally forgot to try to write to Hole.
It was just as well, for I find it impossible to forecast with
sufficient precision. You had better throw off all this and let
him have it at once. PLEASE DO: ALL, AND AT ONCE: SEE FURTHER;
and I should hope he would still be in time for the later numbers.
The three pictures I have received are so truly good that I should
bitterly regret having the volume imperfectly equipped. They are
the best illustrations I have seen since I don't know when.
3. MONEY. To-morrow the mail comes in, and I hope it will bring
me money either from you or home, but I will add a word on that
point.
4. My address will be Honolulu - no longer Yacht CASCO, which I am
packing off - till probably April.
5. As soon as I am through with THE MASTER, I shall finish the
GAME OF BLUFF - now rechristened THE WRONG BOX. This I wish to
sell, cash down. It is of course copyright in the States; and I
offer it to you for five thousand dollars. Please reply on this by
return. Also please tell the typewriter who was so good as to be
amused by our follies that I am filled with admiration for his
piece of work.
6. MASTER again. Please see that I haven't the name of the
Governor of New York wrong (1764 is the date) in part ten. I have
no book of reference to put me right. Observe you now have up to
August inclusive in hand, so you should begin to feel happy.
Is this all? I wonder, and fear not. Henry the Trader has not yet
turned up: I hope he may to-morrow, when we expect a mail. Not
one word of business have I received either from the States or
England, nor anything in the shape of coin; which leaves me in a
fine uncertainty and quite penniless on these islands. H.M. (who
is a gentleman of a courtly order and much tinctured with letters)
is very polite; I may possibly ask for the position of palace
doorkeeper. My voyage has been a singular mixture of good and ill-
fortune. As far as regards interest and material, the fortune has
been admirable; as far as regards time, money, and impediments of
all kinds, from squalls and calms to rotten masts and sprung spars,
simply detestable. I hope you will be interested to hear of two
volumes on the wing. The cruise itself, you are to know, will make
a big volume with appendices; some of it will first appear as (what
they call) letters in some of M'Clure's papers. I believe the book
when ready will have a fair measure of serious interest: I have
had great fortune in finding old songs and ballads and stories, for
instance, and have many singular instances of life in the last few
years among these islands.
The second volume is of ballads. You know TICONDEROGA. I have
written another: THE FEAST OF FAMINE, a Marquesan story. A third
is half done: THE SONG OF RAHERO, a genuine Tahitian legend. A
fourth dances before me. A Hawaiian fellow this, THE PRIEST'S
DROUGHT, or some such name. If, as I half suspect, I get enough
subjects out of the islands, TICONDEROGA shall be suppressed, and
we'll call the volume SOUTH SEA BALLADS. In health, spirits,
renewed interest in life, and, I do believe, refreshed capacity for
work, the cruise has proved a wise folly. Still we're not home,
and (although the friend of a crowned head) are penniless upon
these (as one of my correspondents used to call them) 'lovely but
FATIL islands.' By the way, who wrote the LION OF THE NILE? My
dear sir, that is Something Like. Overdone in bits, it has a true
thought and a true ring of language. Beg the anonymous from me, to
delete (when he shall republish) the two last verses, and end on
'the lion of the Nile.' One Lampman has a good sonnet on a 'Winter
Evening' in, I think, the same number: he seems ill named, but I
am tempted to hope a man is not always answerable for his name.
For instance, you would think you knew mine. No such matter. It
is - at your service and Mr. Scribner's and that of all of the
faithful - Teriitera (pray pronounce Tayree-Tayra) or (GALLICE)
Teri-tera.
R. L. S.
More when the mail shall come.
I am an idiot. I want to be clear on one point. Some of Hole's
drawings must of course be too late; and yet they seem to me so
excellent I would fain have the lot complete. It is one thing for
you to pay for drawings which are to appear in that soul-swallowing
machine, your magazine: quite another if they are only to
illustrate a volume. I wish you to take a brisk (even a fiery)
decision on the point; and let Hole know. To resume my desultory
song, I desire you would carry the same fire (hereinbefore
suggested) into your decision on the WRONG BOX; for in my present
state of benighted ignorance as to my affairs for the last seven
months - I know not even whether my house or my mother's house have
been let - I desire to see something definite in front of me -
outside the lot of palace doorkeeper. I believe the said WRONG BOX
is a real lark; in which, of course, I may be grievously deceived;
but the typewriter is with me. I may also be deceived as to the
numbers of THE MASTER now going and already gone; but to me they
seem First Chop, sir, First Chop. I hope I shall pull off that
damned ending; but it still depresses me: this is your doing, Mr.
Burlingame: you would have it there and then, and I fear it - I
fear that ending.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO CHARLES BAXTER
HONOLULU, FEBRUARY 8TH, 1889.
MY DEAR CHARLES, - Here we are at Honolulu, and have dismissed the
yacht, and lie here till April anyway, in a fine state of haze,
which I am yet in hopes some letter of yours (still on the way) may
dissipate. No money, and not one word as to money! However, I
have got the yacht paid off in triumph, I think; and though we stay
here impignorate, it should not be for long, even if you bring us
no extra help from home. The cruise has been a great success, both
as to matter, fun, and health; and yet, Lord, man! we're pleased to
be ashore! Yon was a very fine voyage from Tahiti up here, but -
the dry land's a fine place too, and we don't mind squalls any
longer, and eh, man, that's a great thing. Blow, blow, thou wintry
wind, thou hast done me no appreciable harm beyond a few grey
hairs! Altogether, this foolhardy venture is achieved; and if I
have but nine months of life and any kind of health, I shall have
both eaten my cake and got it back again with usury. But, man,
there have been days when I felt guilty, and thought I was in no
position for the head of a house.