*S. R. CROCKETT*
LONDON
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
PATERNOSTER ROW
MCM
_Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury._
_To
The Well-Beloved Memory
of_
_R. L. S._
_to whom, eight years ago, I
dedicated the first series of
the "Stickit Minister" stories_
Eight years ago "The Stickit Minister" stood friendless without the door
of letters. He knew no one within, and feared greatly lest no hand of
welcome should be held out to him from those already within, so that,
being encouraged, he too might pluck up heart of grace to enter.
Yet when the time came, the Stickit One found not one, but two right
hands outstretched to greet him, which, after all, is as many as any man
may grasp at once. One was reached out to me from far-away Samoa. The
other belonged to a man whom, at that time, I knew only as one of the
most thoughtful, sympathetic, and brilliant of London journalists, but
who has since become my friend, and at whose instance, indeed, this
Second Series of "The Stickit Minister" stories has been written. To
these two men, the London man of letters and the Samoan exile, I owe the
first and greatest of an author's literary debts--that of a first
encouragement.
They were both men I had never seen; and neither was under any
obligation to help me. Concerning the former, still strenuously and
gallantly at work among us, I will in this place say nothing further.
But, after having kept silence for eight years lest I should appear as
one that vaunted himself, I may be permitted a word of that other who
sleeps under the green tangle of Vaea Mountain.
Mr. Stevenson and I had been in occasional communication since about the
year 1886, when, in a small volume of verse issued during the early part
of that year, the fragment of a "Transcript from the Song of Songs,
which is Solomon's," chanced to attract his attention. He wrote
immediately, with that beautiful natural generosity of appreciation of
his, to ask the author to finish his translation in verse, and to
proceed to other dramatic passages, some of which, chiefly from Isaiah
and Job, he specified. I remember that "When the morning stars sang
together" was one of those indicated, and "O, thou afflicted, tossed
with tempest and not comforted," another. "I have tried my hand at them
myself," he added kindly; "but they were not so good as your Shulamite."
After this he made me more than once the channel of his practical
charity to certain poor miner folk, whom disaster had rendered homeless
and penniless on the outskirts of his beloved Glencorse.
A year or two afterwards, having in the intervals of other work written
down certain countryside stories, which managed to struggle into print
in rather obscure corners, I collected these into a volume, under the
title of "The Stickit Minister and Some Common Men." Then after the
volume was through the press, in a sudden gulp of venturesomeness I
penned a dedication.