Part II. The fact is, I blush to own it, but Sophia is a _regular

novel_; heroine and hero, and false accusation, and love, and marriage,

and all the rest of it--all planted in a big South Sea plantation run by

ex-English officers--_a la_ Stewart's plantation in Tahiti.[33] There is

a strong undercurrent of labour trade which gives it a kind of Uncle Tom

flavour, _absit omen!_

The first start is hard; it is hard to avoid a little tedium here, but I

think by beginning with the arrival of the three Miss Scarlets hot from

school and society in England, I may manage to slide in the information.

The problem is exactly a Balzac one, and I wish I had his fist--for I

have already a better method--the kinetic, whereas he continually

allowed himself to be led into the static. But then he had the fist, and

the most I can hope is to get out of it with a modicum of grace and

energy, but for sure without the strong impression, the full, dark

brush. Three people have had it, the real creator's brush: Scott, see

much of _The Antiquary_ and _The Heart of Midlothian_ (especially all

round the trial, before, during, and after)--Balzac--and Thackeray in

_Vanity Fair_. Everybody else either paints _thin_, or has to stop to

paint, or paints excitedly, so that you see the author skipping before

his canvas. Here is a long way from poor Sophia Scarlet!

This day is published

_Sophia Scarlet_

By

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

To J. M. BARRIE

The following is the first of several letters to Mr. J. M. Barrie,

for whose work Stevenson had a warm admiration, and with whom he soon

established by correspondence a cordial friendship.

_Vailima, Samoa, February 1892._

DEAR MR. BARRIE,--This is at least the third letter I have written you,

but my correspondence has a bad habit of not getting so far as the post.

That which I possess of manhood turns pale before the business of the

address and envelope. But I hope to be more fortunate with this: for,

besides the usual and often recurrent desire to thank you for your

work--you are one of four that have come to the front since I was

watching and had a corner of my own to watch, and there is no reason,

unless it be in these mysterious tides that ebb and flow, and make and

mar and murder the works of poor scribblers, why you should not do work

of the best order. The tides have borne away my sentence, of which I was

weary at any rate, and between authors I may allow myself so much

freedom as to leave it pending. We are both Scots besides, and I suspect

both rather Scotty Scots; my own Scotchness tends to intermittency, but

is at times erisypelitous--if that be rightly spelt. Lastly, I have

gathered we had both made our stages in the metropolis of the winds: our

Virgil's "grey metropolis," and I count that a lasting bond. No place so

brands a man.

Finally, I feel it a sort of duty to you to report progress. This may be

an error, but I believed I detected your hand in an article--it may be

an illusion, it may have been by one of those industrious insects who

catch up and reproduce the handling of each emergent man--but I'll still

hope it was yours--and hope it may please you to hear that the

continuation of _Kidnapped_ is under way. I have not yet got to Alan, so

I do not know if he is still alive, but David seems to have a kick or

two in his shanks. I was pleased to see how the Anglo-Saxon theory fell

into the trap: I gave my Lowlander a Gaelic name, and even commented on

the fact in the text; yet almost all critics recognised in David and

Alan a Saxon and a Celt. I know not about England; in Scotland at least,

where Gaelic was spoken in Fife little over the century ago, and in

Galloway not much earlier, I deny that there exists such a thing as a

pure Saxon, and I think it more than questionable if there be such a

thing as a pure Celt.

But what have you to do with this? and what have I? Let us continue to

inscribe our little bits of tales, and let the heathen rage!--Yours,

with sincere interest in your career,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

_[Vailima] Feb. 1892._

MY DEAR COLVIN,--This has been a busyish month for a sick man. First,

Faauma--the bronze candlestick, whom otherwise I called my

butler--bolted from the bed and bosom of Lafaele, the Archangel

Hercules, prefect of the cattle. There was a deuce to pay, and Hercules

was inconsolable, and immediately started out after a new wife, and has

had one up on a visit, but says she has "no conversation"; and I think

he will take back the erring and possibly repentant candlestick; whom we

all devoutly prefer, as she is not only highly decorative, but

good-natured, and if she does little work makes no rows. I tell this

lightly, but it really was a heavy business; many were accused of

complicity, and Rafael was really very sorry. I had to hold beds of

justice--literally--seated in my bed and surrounded by lying Samoans

seated on the floor; and there were many picturesque and still

inexplicable passages. It is hard to reach the truth in these islands.

The next incident overlapped with this. S. and Fanny found three strange

horses in the paddock: for long now the boys have been forbidden to

leave their horses here one hour because our grass is over-grazed. S.

came up with the news, and I saw I must now strike a blow. "To the pound

with the lot," said I. He proposed taking the three himself, but I

thought that too dangerous an experiment, said I should go too, and

hurried into my boots so as to show decision taken, in the necessary

interviews. They came of course--the interviews--and I explained what I

was going to do at huge length, and stuck to my guns. I am glad to say

the natives, with their usual (purely speculative) sense of justice,

highly approved the step after reflection. Meanwhile off went S. and I

with the three _corpora delicti_; and a good job I went! Once, when our

circus began to kick, we thought all was up; but we got them down all

sound in wind and limb. I judged I was much fallen off from my Elliot

forefathers, who managed this class of business with neatness and

despatch.

As we got down to town, we met the mother and daughter of my friend

----, bathed in tears; they had left the house over a row, which I have

not time or spirits to describe. This matter dashed me a good deal, and

the first decent-looking day I mounted and set off to see if I could not

patch things up. Half-way down it came on to rain tropic style, and I

came back from my second outing drenched like a drowned man--I was

literally blinded as I came back among these sheets of water; and the

consequence was I was laid down with diarrhoea and threatenings of

Samoa colic for the inside of another week. Meanwhile up came

Laulii,[34] in whose house Mrs. and Miss ---- have taken refuge. One of

Mrs. ----'s grievances is that her son has married one of these

"pork-eaters and cannibals." (As a matter of fact there is no memory of

cannibalism in Samoa.) And a strange thing it was to hear the "cannibal"

Laulii describe her sorrows. She is singularly pretty and sweet, her

training reflects wonderful credit on her husband; and when she began to

describe to us--to act to us, in the tone of an actress walking through

a rehearsal--the whole bearing of her angry guests; indicating the

really tragic notes when they came in, so that Fanny and I were ashamed

to laugh, and touching off the merely ludicrous with infinite tact and

sly humour; showing, in fact, in her whole picture of a couple of irate

barbarian women, the whole play and sympathy of what we call the

civilised mind; the contrast was seizing. I speak with feeling. To-day

again, being the first day humanly possible for me, I went down to Apia

with Fanny, and between two and three hours did I argue with that old

woman--not immovable, would she had been! but with a mechanical mind

like a piece of a musical snuff-box, that returned always to the same

starting-point; not altogether base, for she was long-suffering with me

and professed even gratitude, and was just (in a sense) to her son, and

showed here and there moments of genuine and not undignified emotion;

but O! on the other side, what lapses--what a mechanical movement of the

brain, what occasional trap-door devils of meanness, what a wooden front

of pride! I came out damped and saddened and (to say truth) a trifle

sick. My wife had better luck with the daughter; but O, it was a weary

business!

To add to my grief--but that's politics. Before I sleep to-night I have

a confession to make. When I was sick I tried to get to work to finish

that Samoa thing; wouldn't go; and at last, in the colic time, I slid

off into _David Balfour_,[35] some 50 pages of which are drafted, and

like me well. Really I think it is spirited; and there's a heroine that

(up to now) seems to have attractions: _absit omen!_ David, on the

whole, seems excellent. Alan does not come in till the tenth chapter,

and I am only at the eighth, so I don't know if I can find him again;

but David is on his feet, and doing well, and very much in love, and

mixed up with the Lord Advocate and the (untitled) Lord Lovat, and all

manner of great folk. And the tale interferes with my eating and

sleeping. The join is bad; I have not thought to strain too much for

continuity; so this part be alive, I shall be content. But there's no

doubt David seems to have changed his style, de'il ha'e him! And much I

care, if the tale travel!

_Friday, Feb.?? 19th?_--Two incidents to-day which I must narrate. After

lunch, it was raining pitilessly; we were sitting in my mother's

bedroom, and I was reading aloud Kinglake's Charge of the Light Brigade,

and we had just been all seized by the horses aligning with Lord George

Paget, when a figure appeared on the verandah; a little, slim, small

figure of a lad, with blond (_i.e._ limed) hair, a propitiatory smile,

and a nose that alone of all his features grew pale with anxiety. "I

come here stop," was about the outside of his English; and I began at

once to guess that he was a runaway labourer,[36] and that the

bush-knife in his hand was stolen. It proved he had a mate, who had

lacked his courage, and was hidden down the road; they had both made up

their minds to run away, and had "come here stop." I could not turn out

the poor rogues, one of whom showed me marks on his back, into the

drenching forest; I could not reason with them, for they had not enough

English, and not one of our boys spoke their tongue; so I bade them feed

and sleep here to-night, and to-morrow I must do what the Lord shall bid

me.

Near dinner time, I was told that a friend of Lafaele's had found human

remains in my bush. After dinner, a figure was seen skulking across

towards the waterfall, which produced from the verandah a shout, in my

most stentorian tones: "_O ai le ingoa?_" literally "Who the name?"

which serves here for "What's your business?" as well. It proved to be

Lafaele's friend; I bade a kitchen boy, Lauilo, go with him to see the

spot, for though it had ceased raining, the whole island ran and

dripped. Lauilo was willing enough, but the friend of the archangel

demurred; he had too much business; he had no time. "All right," I said,

"you too much frightened, I go along," which of course produced the

usual shout of delight from all those who did not require to go. I got

into my Saranac snow boots; Lauilo got a cutlass; Mary Carter, our

Sydney maid, joined the party for a lark, and off we set. I tell you our

guide kept us moving; for the dusk fell swift. Our woods have an

infamous reputation at the best, and our errand (to say the least of it)

was grisly. At last they found the remains; they were old, which was

all I cared to be sure of; it seemed a strangely small "pickle-banes" to

stand for a big, flourishing, buck-islander, and their situation in the

darkening and dripping bush was melancholy. All at once, I found there

was a second skull, with a bullet-hole I could have stuck my two thumbs

in--say anybody else's one thumb. My Samoans said it could not be, there

were not enough bones; I put the two pieces of skull together, and at

last convinced them. Whereupon, in a flash, they found the not

unromantic explanation. This poor brave had succeeded in the height of a

Samoan warrior's ambition; he had taken a head, which he was never

destined to show to his applauding camp. Wounded himself, he had crept

here into the bush to die with his useless trophy by his side. His date

would be about fifteen years ago, in the great battle between Laupepa

and Talavou, which took place on My Land, Sir. To-morrow we shall bury

the bones and fire a salute in honour of unfortunate courage.

Do you think I have an empty life? or that a man jogging to his club has

so much to interest and amuse him?--touch and try him too, but that goes

along with the others: no pain, no pleasure, is the iron law. So here I

stop again, and leave, as I left yesterday, my political business

untouched. And lo! here comes my pupil, I believe, so I stop in time.

_March 2nd._--Since I last wrote, fifteen chapters of _David Balfour_

have been drafted, and five _tires au clair_. I think it pretty good;

there's a blooming maiden that costs anxiety--she is as virginal as

billy; but David seems there and alive, and the Lord Advocate is good,

and so I think is an episodic appearance of the Master of Lovat. In

Chapter XVII. I shall get David abroad--Alan went already in Chapter

XII. The book should be about the length of _Kidnapped_; this early part

of it, about D.'s evidence in the Appin case, is more of a story than

anything in _Kidnapped_, but there is no doubt there comes a break in

the middle, and the tale is practically in two divisions. In the first

James More and the M'Gregors, and Catriona, only show; in the second,

the Appin case being disposed of, and James Stewart hung, they rule the

roast and usurp the interest--should there be any left. Why did I take

up _David Balfour_? I don't know. A sudden passion.

Monday, I went down in the rain with a colic to take the chair at a

public meeting; dined with Haggard; sailed off to my meeting, and fought

with wild beasts for three anxious hours. All was lost that any sensible

man cared for, but the meeting did not break up--thanks a good deal to

R. L. S.--and the man who opposed my election, and with whom I was all

the time wrangling, proposed the vote of thanks to me with a certain

handsomeness; I assure you I had earned it.... Haggard and the great

Abdul, his high-caste Indian servant, imported by my wife, were sitting

up for me with supper, and I suppose it was twelve before I got to bed.

Tuesday raining, my mother rode down, and we went to the Consulate to

sign a Factory and Commission. Thence, I to the lawyers, to the printing

office, and to the mission. It was dinner time when I returned home.

This morning, our cook-boy having suddenly left--injured feelings--the

archangel was to cook breakfast. I found him lighting the fire before

dawn; his eyes blazed, he had no word of any language left to use, and I

saw in him (to my wonder) the strongest workings of gratified ambition.

Napoleon was no more pleased to sign his first treaty with Austria than

was Lafaele to cook that breakfast. All morning, when I had hoped to be

at this letter, I slept like one drugged, and you must take this (which

is all I can give you) for what it is worth--

D. B.

_Memoirs of his Adventures at Home and Abroad. The Second Part;

wherein are set forth the misfortunes in which he was involved upon

the Appin Murder; his troubles with Lord Advocate Prestongrange;

captivity on the Bass Rock; journey into France and Holland; and

singular relations with James More Drummond or Macgregor, a son of

the notorious Rob Roy._

Chapters.--I. A Beggar on Horseback. II. The Highland Writer. III. I go

to Pilrig. IV. Lord Advocate Prestongrange. V. Butter and Thunder. VI. I

make a fault in honour. VII. The Bravo. VIII. The Heather on Fire. IX. I

begin to be haunted with a red-headed man. X. The Wood by Silvermills.

XI. On the march again with Alan. XII. Gillane Sands. XIII. The Bass

Rock. XIV. Black Andie's Tale of Tod Lapraik. XV. I go to Inveraray.

That is it, as far as drafted. Chapters IV. V. VII. IX. and XIV. I am

specially pleased with; the last being an episodical bogie story about

the Bass Rock told there by the Keeper.

TO WILLIAM MORRIS

The following draft letter addressed to Mr. William Morris was found

among Stevenson's papers after his death. It has touches of

affectation and constraint not usual with him, and it is no doubt on

that account that he did not send it; but though not in his best

manner, it seems worth printing as illustrating the variety of his

interests and admirations in literature.

_Vailima, Samoa, Feb. 1892._

MASTER,--A plea from a place so distant should have some weight, and

from a heart so grateful should have some address. I have been long in

your debt, Master, and I did not think it could be so much increased as

you have now increased it. I was long in your debt and deep in your debt

for many poems that I shall never forget, and for _Sigurd_ before all,

and now you have plunged me beyond payment by the Saga Library. And so

now, true to human nature, being plunged beyond payment, I come and bark

at your heels.

For surely, Master, that tongue that we write, and that you have

illustrated so nobly, is yet alive. She has her rights and laws, and is

our mother, our queen, and our instrument. Now in that living tongue

_where_ has one sense, _whereas_ another. In the _Heathslayings Story_,

p. 241, line 13, it bears one of its ordinary senses. Elsewhere and

usually through the two volumes, which is all that has yet reached me of

this entrancing publication, _whereas_ is made to figure for _where_.

For the love of God, my dear and honoured Morris, use _where_, and let

us know _whereas_ we are, wherefore our gratitude shall grow, whereby

you shall be the more honoured wherever men love clear language, whereas

now, although we honour, we are troubled.

Whereunder, please find inscribed to this very impudent but yet very

anxious document, the name of one of the most distant but not the

youngest or the coldest of those who honour you

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO MRS. CHARLES FAIRCHILD

The projected visit of Mr. Kipling, with his wife and brother-in-law,

to Samoa, which is mentioned towards the close of this letter, never

took place, much to the regret of both authors.

[_Vailima, March 1892._]

MY DEAR MRS. FAIRCHILD,--I am guilty in your sight, but my affairs

besiege me. The chief-justiceship of a family of nineteen persons is in

itself no sinecure, and sometimes occupies me for days: two weeks ago

for four days almost entirely, and for two days entirely. Besides which,

I have in the last few months written all but one chapter of a _History

of Samoa_ for the last eight or nine years; and while I was unavoidably

delayed in the writing of this, awaiting material, put in one-half of

_David Balfour_, the sequel to _Kidnapped_. Add the ordinary impediments

of life, and admire my busyness. I am now an old, but healthy skeleton,

and degenerate much towards the machine. By six at work: stopped at

half-past ten to give a history lesson to a step-grandson; eleven,

lunch; after lunch we have a musical performance till two; then to work

again; bath, 4.40; dinner, five; cards in the evening till eight; and

then to bed--only I have no bed, only a chest with a mat and

blankets--and read myself to sleep. This is the routine, but often sadly

interrupted. Then you may see me sitting on the floor of my verandah

haranguing and being harangued by squatting chiefs on a question of a

road; or more privately holding an inquiry into some dispute among our

familiars, myself on my bed, the boys on the floor--for when it comes to

the judicial I play dignity--or else going down to Apia on some more or

less unsatisfactory errand. Altogether it is a life that suits me, but

it absorbs me like an ocean. That is what I have always envied and

admired in Scott; with all that immensity of work and study, his mind

kept flexible, glancing to all points of natural interest. But the lean

hot spirits, such as mine, become hypnotised with their bit

occupations--if I may use Scotch to you--it is so far more scornful than

any English idiom. Well, I can't help being a skeleton, and you are to

take this devious passage for an apology.

I thought _Aladdin_[37] capital fun; but why, in fortune, did he pretend

it was moral at the end? The so-called nineteenth century, _ou va-t-il

se nicher?_ 'Tis a trifle, but Pyle would do well to knock the passage

out, and leave his boguey tale a boguey tale, and a good one at that.

The arrival of your box was altogether a great success to the castaways.

You have no idea where we live. Do you know, in all these islands there

are not five hundred whites, and no postal delivery, and only one

village--it is no more--and would be a mean enough village in Europe? We

were asked the other day if Vailima were the name of our post town, and

we laughed. Do you know, though we are but three miles from the village

metropolis, we have no road to it, and our goods are brought on the

pack-saddle? And do you know--or I should rather say, can you

believe--or (in the famous old Tichborne trial phrase) would you be

surprised to learn, that all you have read of Vailima--or Subpriorsford,

as I call it--is entirely false, and we have no ice-machine, and no

electric light, and no water supply but the cistern of the heavens, and

but one public room, and scarce a bedroom apiece? But, of course, it is

well known that I have made enormous sums by my evanescent literature,

and you will smile at my false humility. The point, however, is much on

our minds just now. We are expecting an invasion of Kiplings; very glad

we shall be to see them; but two of the party are ladies, and I tell you

we had to hold a council of war to stow them. You European ladies are so

particular; with all of mine, sleeping has long become a public

function, as with natives and those who go down much into the sea in

ships.

Dear Mrs. Fairchild, I must go to my work. I have but two words to say

in conclusion.

First, civilisation is rot.

Second, console a savage with more of the milk of that over-civilised

being, your adorable schoolboy.

As I wrote these remarkable words, I was called down to eight o'clock

prayers, and have just worked through a chapter of Joshua and five

verses, with five treble choruses, of a Samoan hymn; but the music was

good, our boys and precentress ('tis always a woman that leads) did

better than I ever heard them, and to my great pleasure I understood it

all except one verse. This gave me the more time to try and identify

what the parts were doing, and further convict my dull ear. Beyond the

fact that the soprano rose to the tonic above, on one occasion I could

recognise nothing. This is sickening, but I mean to teach my ear better

before I am done with it or this vile carcase.

I think it will amuse you (for a last word) to hear that our

precentress--she is the washerwoman--is our shame. She is a good,

healthy, comely, strapping young wench, full of energy and seriousness,

a splendid workwoman, delighting to train our chorus, delighting in the

poetry of the hymns, which she reads aloud (on the least provocation)

with a great sentiment of rhythm. Well, then, what is curious? Ah, we

did not know! but it was told us in a whisper from the cook-house--she

is not of good family. Don't let it get out, please; everybody knows it,

of course, here; there is no reason why Europe and the States should

have the advantage of me also. And the rest of my house-folk are all

chief-people, I assure you. And my late overseer (far the best of his

race) is a really serious chief with a good "name." Tina is the name; it

is not in the Almanach de Gotha, it must have got dropped at press. The

odd thing is, we rather share the prejudice. I have almost

always--though not quite always--found the higher the chief the better

the man through all the islands; or, at least, that the best man came

always from a highish rank. I hope Helen will continue to prove a bright

exception.

With love to Fairchild and the Huge Schoolboy, I am, my dear Mrs.

Fairchild, yours very sincerely,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

_[Vailima] March 9th [1892]._

MY DEAR S. C.,--Take it not amiss if this is a wretched letter. I am

eaten up with business. Every day this week I have had some business

impediment--I am even now waiting a deputation of chiefs about the

road--and my precious morning was shattered by a polite old scourge of a

_faipule_--parliament man--come begging. All the time _David Balfour_ is

skelping along. I began it the 13th of last month; I have now 12

chapters, 79 pages ready for press, or within an ace, and, by the time

the month is out, one-half should be completed, and I'll be back at

drafting the second half. What makes me sick is to think of Scott

turning out _Guy Mannering_ in three weeks! What a pull of work:

heavens, what thews and sinews! And here am I, my head spinning from

having only re-written seven not very difficult pages--and not very good

when done. Weakling generation. It makes me sick of myself, to make such

a fash and bobbery over a rotten end of an old nursery yarn, not worth

spitting on when done. Still, there is no doubt I turn out my work more

easily than of yore; and I suppose I should be singly glad of that. And

if I got my book done in six weeks, seeing it will be about half as long

as a Scott, and I have to write everything twice, it would be about the

same rate of industry. It is my fair intention to be done with it in

three months, which would make me about one-half the man Sir Walter was

for application and driving the dull pen. Of the merit we shall not

talk; but I don't think Davie is _without_ merit.

_March 12th._--And I have this day triumphantly finished 15 chapters,

100 pages--being exactly one-half (as near as anybody can guess) of

_David Balfour_; the book to be about a fifth as long again (altogether)

as _Treasure Island:_ could I but do the second half in another month!

But I can't, I fear; I shall have some belated material arriving by next

mail, and must go again at the History. Is it not characteristic of my

broken tenacity of mind, that I should have left Davie Balfour some five

years in the British Linen Company's Office, and then follow him at last

with such vivacity? But I leave you again; the last (15th) chapter ought

to be re-wrote, or part of it, and I want the half completed in the

month, and the month is out by midnight; though, to be sure, last month

was February, and I might take grace. These notes are only to show I

hold you in mind, though I know they can have no interest for man or God

or animal.

I should have told you about the Club. We have been asked to try and

start a sort of weekly ball for the half-castes and natives, ourselves

to be the only whites; and we consented, from a very heavy sense of

duty, and with not much hope. Two nights ago we had twenty people up,

received them in the front verandah, entertained them on cake and

lemonade, and I made a speech--embodying our proposals, or conditions,

if you like--for I suppose thirty minutes. No joke to speak to such an

audience, but it is believed I was thoroughly intelligible. I took the

plan of saying everything at least twice in a different form of words,

so that if the one escaped my hearers, the other might be seized. One

white man came with his wife, and was kept rigorously on the front

verandah below! You see what a sea of troubles this is like to prove;

but it is the only chance--and when it blows up, it must blow up! I have

no more hope in anything than a dead frog; I go into everything with a

composed despair, and don't mind--just as I always go to sea with the

conviction I am to be drowned, and like it before all other pleasures.

But you should have seen the return voyage, when nineteen horses had to

be found in the dark, and nineteen bridles, all in a drench of rain, and

the club, just constituted as such, sailed away in the wet, under a

cloudy moon like a bad shilling, and to descend a road through the

forest that was at that moment the image of a respectable mountain

brook. My wife, who is president _with power to expel_, had to begin her

functions....

_25th March._--Heaven knows what day it is, but I am ashamed, all the

more as your letter from Bournemouth of all places--poor old

Bournemouth!--is to hand, and contains a statement of pleasure in my

letters which I wish I could have rewarded with a long one. What has

gone on? A vast of affairs, of a mingled, strenuous, inconclusive,

desultory character; much waste of time, much riding to and fro, and

little transacted or at least peracted.

Let me give you a review of the present state of our live stock.--Six

boys in the bush; six souls about the house. Talolo, the cook, returns

again to-day, after an absence which has cost me about twelve hours of

riding, and I suppose eight hours' solemn sitting in council. "I am

sorry indeed for the Chief Justice of Samoa," I said; "it is more than I

am fit for to be Chief Justice of Vailima."--Lauilo is steward. Both

these are excellent servants; we gave a luncheon party when we buried

the Samoan bones, and I assure you all was in good style, yet we never

interfered. The food was good, the wine and dishes went round as by

mechanism.--Steward's assistant and washman, Arrick, a New Hebridee

black boy, hired from the German firm; not so ugly as most, but not

pretty neither; not so dull as his sort are, but not quite a Crichton.

When he came first, he ate so much of our good food that he got a

prominent belly. Kitchen assistant, Tomas (Thomas in English), a Fiji

man, very tall and handsome, moving like a marionette with sudden

bounds, and rolling his eyes with sudden effort.--Washerwoman and

precentor, Helen, Tomas's wife. This is our weak point; we are ashamed

of Helen; the cook-house blushes for her; they murmur there at her

presence. She seems all right; she is not a bad-looking, strapping

wench, seems chaste, is industrious, has an excellent taste in

hymns--you should have heard her read one aloud the other day, she

marked the rhythm with so much gloating, dissenter sentiment. What is

wrong, then? says you. Low in your ear--and don't let the papers get

hold of it--she is of no family. None, they say; literally a common

woman. Of course, we have out-islanders, who _may_ be villeins; but we

give them the benefit of the doubt, which is impossible with Helen of

Vailima; our blot, our pitted speck. The pitted speck I have said is our

precentor. It is always a woman who starts Samoan song; the men who sing

second do not enter for a bar or two. Poor, dear Faauma, the unchaste,

the extruded Eve of our Paradise, knew only two hymns; but Helen seems

to know the whole repertory, and the morning prayers go far more lively

in consequence.--Lafaele, provost of the cattle. The cattle are Jack, my

horse, quite converted, my wife rides him now, and he is as steady as a

doctor's cob; Tifaga Jack, a circus horse, my mother's piebald, bought

from a passing circus; Belle's mare, now in childbed or next door,

confound the slut! Musu--amusingly translated the other day "don't want

to," literally cross, but always in the sense of stubbornness and

resistance--my wife's little dark-brown mare, with a white star on her

forehead, whom I have been riding of late to steady her--she has no

vices, but is unused, skittish and uneasy, and wants a lot of attention

and humouring; lastly (of saddle horses) Luna--not the Latin _moon_, the

Hawaiian _overseer_, but it's pronounced the same--a pretty little mare

too, but scarce at all broken, a bad bucker, and has to be ridden with a

stock-whip and be brought back with her rump criss-crossed like a clan

tartan; the two cart horses, now only used with pack-saddles; two cows,

one in the straw (I trust) to-morrow, a third cow, the Jersey--whose

milk and temper are alike subjects of admiration--she gives good

exercise to the farming saunterer, and refreshes him on his return with

cream; two calves, a bull, and a cow; God knows how many ducks and

chickens, and for a wager not even God knows how many cats; twelve

horses, seven horses, five kine: is not this Babylon the Great which I

have builded? Call it _Subpriorsford_.

Two nights ago the club had its first meeting; only twelve were present,

but it went very well. I was not there, I had ridden down the night

before after dinner on my endless business, took a cup of tea in the

mission like an ass, then took a cup of coffee like a fool at Haggard's,

then fell into a discussion with the American Consul.... I went to bed

at Haggard's, came suddenly broad awake, and lay sleepless the live

night. It felt chill, I had only a sheet, and had to make a light and

range the house for a cover--I found one in the hall, a macintosh. So

back to my sleepless bed, and to lie there till dawn. In the morning I

had a longish ride to take in a day of a blinding, staggering sun, and

got home by eleven, our luncheon hour, with my head rather swimmy; the

only time I have _feared_ the sun since I was in Samoa. However, I got

no harm, but did not go to the club, lay off, lazied, played the pipe,

and read a novel by James Payn--sometimes quite interesting, and in one

place really very funny with the quaint humour of the man. Much

interested the other day. As I rode past a house, I saw where a Samoan

had written a word on a board, and there was an [inverted A], perfectly

formed, but upside down. You never saw such a thing in Europe; but it is

as common as dirt in Polynesia. Men's names are tattooed on the forearm;

it is common to find a subverted letter tattooed there. Here is a

tempting problem for psychologists.

I am now on terms again with the German consulate, I know not for how

long; not, of course, with the President, which I find a relief; still,

with the Chief Justice and the English consul. For Haggard, I have a

genuine affection; he is a loveable man.

Wearyful man! "Here is the yarn of Loudon Dodd, _not as he told it, but

as it was afterwards written_."[38] These words were left out by some

carelessness, and I think I have been thrice tackled about them. Grave

them in your mind and wear them on your forehead.

The Lang story will have very little about the treasure; the Master[39]

will appear; and it is to a great extent a tale of Prince Charlie

_after_ the '45, and a love story forbye: the hero is a melancholy

exile, and marries a young woman who interests the prince, and there is

the devil to pay. I think the Master kills him in a duel, but don't know

yet, not having yet seen my second heroine. No--the Master doesn't kill

him, they fight, he is wounded, and the Master plays _deus ex machina_.

_I think_ just now of calling it _The Tail of the Race_; no--heavens! I

never saw till this moment--but of course nobody but myself would ever

understand Mill-Race, they would think of a quarter-mile. So--I am

nameless again. My melancholy young man is to be quite a Romeo. Yes,

I'll name the book from him: _Dyce of Ythan_--pronounce Eethan.

Dyce of Ythan

by R. L. S.

O, Shovel--Shovel waits his turn, he and his ancestors. I would have

tackled him before, but my _State Trials_ have never come. So that I

have now quite planned:--

Dyce of Ythan. (Historical, 1750.)

Sophia Scarlet. (To-day.)

The Shovels of Newton French. (Historical, 1650 to 1830.)

And quite planned and part written:--

The Pearl Fisher. (To-day.) (With Lloyd: a machine.)[40]

David Balfour. (Historical, 1751.)

And, by a strange exception for R. L. S., all in the third person except

D. B.

I don't know what day this is now (the 29th), but I have finished my two

chapters, ninth and tenth, of _Samoa_ in time for the mail, and feel

almost at peace. The tenth was the hurricane, a difficult problem; it so

tempted one to be literary; and I feel sure the less of that there is in

my little handbook, the more chance it has of some utility. Then the

events are complicated, seven ships to tell of, and sometimes three of

them together; O, it was quite a job. But I think I have my facts pretty

correct, and for once, in my sickening yarn, they are handsome facts:

creditable to all concerned; not to be written of--and I should think,

scarce to be read--without a thrill. I doubt I have got no hurricane

into it, the intricacies of the yarn absorbing me too much. But

there--it's done somehow, and time presses hard on my heels. The book,

with my best expedition, may come just too late to be of use. In which

case I shall have made a handsome present of some months of my life for

nothing and to nobody. Well, through Her the most ancient heavens are

fresh and strong.[41]

_30th._--After I had written you, I re-read my hurricane, which is very

poor; the life of the journalist is hard, another couple of writings and

I could make a good thing, I believe, and it must go as it is! But, of

course, this book is not written for honour and glory, and the few who

will read it may not know the difference. Very little time. I go down

with the mail shortly, dine at the Chinese restaurant, and go to the

club to dance with islandresses. Think of my going out once a week to

dance.

Politics are on the full job again, and we don't know what is to come

next. I think the whole treaty _raj_ seems quite played out! They have

taken to bribing the _faipule_ men (parliament men) to stay in Mulinuu,

we hear; but I have not yet sifted the rumour. I must say I shall be

scarce surprised if it prove true; these rumours have the knack of being

right.--Our weather this last month has been tremendously hot, not by

the thermometer, which sticks at 86 deg., but to the sensation: no rain, no

wind, and this the storm month. It looks ominous, and is certainly

disagreeable.

No time to finish.--Yours ever,

R. L. S.

TO E. L. BURLINGAME

The first sentences of the following refer to _A Footnote to

History_, Chapter x. of which, relating to the hurricane of 1889, was

first published in the Scots Observer, edited by Mr. Henley.

[_Vailima, March 1892._]

MY DEAR BURLINGAME,--Herewith Chapters IX. and X., and I am left face to

face with the horrors and dilemmas of the present regimen: pray for

those that go down to the sea in ships. I have promised Henley shall

have a chance to publish the hurricane chapter if he like, so please let

the slips be sent _quam primum_ to C. Baxter, W.S., 11 S. Charlotte

Street, Edinburgh. I got on mighty quick with that chapter--about five

days of the toughest kind of work. God forbid I should ever have such

another pirn to wind! When I invent a language, there shall be a direct

and an indirect pronoun differently declined--then writing would be some

fun.

DIRECT INDIRECT

He Tu

Him Tum

His Tus

Ex.: _He_ seized _tum_ by _tus_ throat; but _tu_ at the same moment

caught _him_ by his hair. A fellow could write hurricanes with an

inflection like that! Yet there would be difficulties too.

Please add to my former orders--

_Le Chevalier Des Touches_ } by Barbey d'Aurevilly.

_Les Diabohques_ }

_Correspondence de Henri Beyle_ (Stendahl).

Yours sincerely,

R. L. STEVENSON.

TO THE REV. S. J. WHITMEE

In this letter the essential points of Stevenson's policy for Samoa

are defined more clearly than anywhere else. His correspondent, an

experienced missionary who had been absent from the islands and

lately returned, and whom Stevenson describes as being of a nature

essentially "childlike and candid," had been induced to support the

idea of a one-man power as necessary for putting an end to the

existing confusion, and to suggest the Chief Justice, Mr.

Cedercrantz, as the person to wield such power. In the present letter

and a subsequent conversation Stevenson was able to persuade his

correspondent to abandon at least that part of his proposal which

concerned the Chief Justice.

_[Vailima] Sunday. Better Day, Better Deed. April 24th, 1892._

Private and confidential.

DEAR MR. WHITMEE,--I have reflected long and fully on your paper, and at

your kind request give you the benefit of my last thoughts.

I. I cannot bring myself to welcome your idea of one man. I fear we are

too far away from any moderative influence; and suppose it to be true

that the paper is bought, we should not even have a voice. Could we be

sure to get a Gordon or a Lawrence, ah! very well. But in this

out-of-the-way place, are these extreme experiments wise? Remember

Baker; with much that he has done, I am in full sympathy; and the man,

though wholly insincere, is a thousand miles from ill-meaning; and see

to what excesses he was forced or led.

II. But I willingly admit the idea is possible with the right man, and

this brings me with greater conviction to my next point. I cannot

endorse, and I would rather beg of you to reconsider, your

recommendation of the Chief Justice. I told you the man has always

attracted me, yet as I have earnestly reconsidered the points against

him, I find objection growing....

But there is yet another argument I have to lay before you. We are both

to write upon this subject. Many of our opinions coincide, and, as I

said the other day, on these we may reasonably suppose that we are not

far wrong. Now here is a point on which we shall directly counter. No

doubt but this will lessen the combined weight of our arguments where

they coincide. And to avoid this effect, it might seem worth while to

you to modify or cancel the last paragraph of your article.

III. But I now approach what seems to me by far the most important.

White man here, white man there, Samoa is to stand or fall (bar actual

seizure) on the Samoan question. And upon this my mind is now really

made up. I do not believe in Laupepa alone; I do not believe in Mataafa

alone. I know that their conjunction implies peace; I am persuaded that

their separation means either war or paralysis. It is the result of the

past, which we cannot change, but which we must accept and use or suffer

by. I have now made up my mind to do all that I may be able--little as

it is--to effect a reconciliation between these two men Laupepa and

Mataafa; persuaded as I am that there is the one door of hope. And it is

my intention before long to approach both in this sense. Now, from the

course of our interview, I was pleased to see that you were, if not

equally strong with myself, at least inclined to much the same opinion.

And in a carefully weighed paper, such as that you read me, I own I

should be pleased to have this cardinal matter touched upon. At home it

is not, it cannot be, understood: Mataafa is thought a rebel; the

Germans profit by the thought to pursue their career of vengeance for

Fagalii; the two men are perpetually offered as alternatives--they are

no such thing--they are complementary; authority, supposing them to

survive, will be impossible without both. They were once friends, fools

and meddlers set them at odds, they must be friends again or have so

much wisdom and public virtue as to pretend a friendship. There is my

policy for Samoa. And I wish you would at least touch upon that point, I

care not how; because, although I am far from supposing you feel it to

be necessary in the same sense or to the same degree as I do, I am well

aware that no man knows Samoa but must see its huge advantages. Excuse

this long and tedious lecture, which I see I have to mark private and

confidential, or I might get into deep water, and believe me, yours very

truly,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO CHARLES BAXTER

The maps herein bespoken do not adorn the ordinary editions of

_Catriona_, only the Edinburgh edition, for which they were executed

by Messrs. Bartholomew in a manner that would have rejoiced the

writer's heart.

_[Vailima] April 28, 1892._

MY DEAR CHARLES,--I have just written the dedication of _David Balfour_

to you, and haste to put a job in your hands. This is a map of the

environs of Edinburgh _circa_ 1750. It must contain Hope Park, Hunter's

Bog, Calton Hill, the Mouter Hill, Lang Dykes, Nor' Loch, West Kirk,

Village of Dean, pass down the water to Stockbridge, Silver Mills, the

two mill lakes there, with a wood on the south side of the south one

which I saw marked on a plan in the British Museum, Broughton, Picardy,

Leith Walk, Leith, Pilrig, Lochend, Figgate Whins. And I would like a

piece in a corner, giving for the same period Figgate Whins,

Musselburgh, Inveresk, Prestonpans, battlefield of Gladsmuir, Cockenzie,

Gullane--which I spell Gillane--Fidra, Dirleton, North Berwick Law,

Whitekirk, Tantallon Castle and Castleton, Scougal and Auldhame, the

Bass, the Glenteithy rocks, Satan's Bush, Wildfire rocks, and, if

possible, the May. If need were, I would not stick at two maps. If there

is but one, say, _Plan to illustrate David Balfour's adventures in the

Lothians_. If two, call the first _Plan to illustrate David Balfour's

adventures about the city of Edinburgh_, and the second, _Plan to

illustrate David Balfour's adventures in East Lothian_. I suppose there

must be a map-maker of some taste in Edinburgh; I wish few other names

in, but what I have given, as far as possible. As soon as may be I will

let you have the text, when you might even find some amusement in

seeing that the maps fill the bill. If your map-maker be a poor

creature, plainness is best; if he were a fellow of some genuine go, he

might give it a little of the bird's-eye quality. I leave this to your

good taste. If I have time I will copy the dedication to go herewith; I

am pleased with it. The first map (suppose we take two) would go in at

the beginning, the second at Chapter XI. The topography is very much

worked into the story, and I have alluded in the dedication to our

common fancy for exploring Auld Reekie.

The list of books came duly, for which many thanks. I am plunged to the

nostrils in various business.--Yours ever,

R. L. S.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

_[Vailima] May 1st, 1892._

MY DEAR COLVIN,--As I rode down last night about six, I saw a sight I

must try to tell you of. In front of me, right over the top of the

forest into which I was descending, was a vast cloud. The front of it

accurately represented the somewhat rugged, long-nosed, and

beetle-browed profile of a man, crowned by a huge Kalmuck cap; the flesh

part was of a heavenly pink, the cap, the moustache, the eyebrows were

of a bluish grey; to see this with its childish exactitude of design and

colour, and hugeness of scale--it covered at least 25 deg.--held me

spell-bound. As I continued to gaze, the expression began to change; he

had the exact air of closing one eye, dropping his jaw, and drawing down

his nose; had the thing not been so imposing, I could have smiled; and

then almost in a moment, a shoulder of leaden-coloured bank drove in

front and blotted it. My attention spread to the rest of the cloud, and

it was a thing to worship. It rose from the horizon, and its top was

within thirty degrees of the zenith; the lower parts were like a glacier

in shadow, varying from dark indigo to a clouded white in exquisite

gradations. The sky behind, so far as I could see, was all of a blue

already enriched and darkened by the night, for the hill had what

lingered of the sunset. But the top of my Titanic cloud flamed in broad

sunlight, with the most excellent softness and brightness of fire and

jewels, enlightening all the world. It must have been far higher than

Mount Everest, and its glory, as I gazed up at it out of the night, was

beyond wonder. Close by rode the little crescent moon; and right over

its western horn, a great planet of about equal lustre with itself. The

dark woods below were shrill with that noisy business of the birds'

evening worship. When I returned, after eight, the moon was near down;

she seemed little brighter than before, but now that the cloud no longer

played its part of a nocturnal sun, we could see that sight, so rare

with us at home that it was counted a portent, so customary in the

tropics, of the dark sphere with its little gilt band upon the belly.

The planet had been setting faster, and was now below the crescent. They

were still of an equal brightness.

I could not resist trying to reproduce this in words, as a specimen of

these incredibly beautiful and imposing meteors of the tropic sky that

make so much of my pleasure here; though a ship's deck is the place to

enjoy them. O what _awful_ scenery, from a ship's deck, in the tropics!

People talk about the Alps, but the clouds of the trade wind are alone

for sublimity.

Now to try and tell you what has been happening. The state of these

islands, and of Mataafa and Laupepa (Malietoas _ambo_), had been much on

my mind. I went to the priests and sent a message to Mataafa, at a time

when it was supposed he was about to act. He did not act, delaying in

true native style, and I determined I should go to visit him. I have

been very good not to go sooner; to live within a few miles of a rebel

camp, to be a novelist, to have all my family forcing me to go, and to

refrain all these months, counts for virtue. But hearing that several

people had gone and the government done nothing to punish them, and

having an errand there which was enough to justify myself in my own

eyes, I half determined to go, and spoke of it with the half-caste

priest. And here (confound it) up came Laupepa and his guards to call on

me; we kept him to lunch, and the old gentleman was very good and

amiable. He asked me why I had not been to see him? I reminded him a law

had been made, and told him I was not a small boy to go and ask leave of

the consuls, and perhaps be refused. He told me to pay no attention to

the law but come when I would, and begged me to name a day to lunch. The

next day (I think it was) early in the morning, a man appeared; he had

metal buttons like a policeman--but he was none of our Apia force; he

was a rebel policeman, and had been all night coming round inland

through the forest from Malie. He brought a letter addressed

_I lana susuga_ To his Excellency

_Misi Mea_. Mr. Thingumbob.

(So as not to compromise me.) I can read Samoan now, though not speak

it. It was to ask me for last Wednesday. My difficulty was great; I had

no man here who was fit, or who would have cared, to write for me; and I

had to postpone the visit. So I gave up half-a-day with a groan, went

down to the priests, arranged for Monday week to go to Malie, and named

Thursday as my day to lunch with Laupepa. I was sharply ill on

Wednesday, mail day. But on Thursday I had to trail down and go through

the dreary business of a feast, in the King's wretched shanty, full in

view of the President's fine new house; it made my heart burn.

This gave me my chance to arrange a private interview with the king, and

I decided to ask Mr. Whitmee to be my interpreter. On Friday, being too

much exhausted to go down, I begged him to come up. He did. I told him

the heads of what I meant to say; and he not only consented, but said,

if we got on well with the king, he would even proceed with me to Malie.

Yesterday, in consequence, I rode down to W.'s house by eight in the

morning; waited till ten; received a message that the king was stopped

by a meeting with the president and _faipule_; made another engagement

for seven at night; came up; went down; waited till eight, and came away

again, _bredouille_, and a dead body. The poor, weak, enslaved king had

not dared to come to me even in secret. Now I have to-day for a rest,

and to-morrow to Malie. Shall I be suffered to embark? It is very

doubtful; they are on the trail. On Thursday, a policeman came up to me

and began that a boy had been to see him, and said I was going to see

Mataafa.--"And what did you say?" said I.--"I told him I did not know

about where you were going," said he.--"A very good answer," said I, and

turned away. It is lashing rain to-day, but to-morrow, rain or shine, I

must at least make the attempt; and I am so weary, and the weather looks

so bad. I could half wish they would arrest me on the beach. All this

bother and pother to try and bring a little chance of peace; all this

opposition and obstinacy in people who remain here by the mere

forbearance of Mataafa, who has a great force within six miles of their

government buildings, which are indeed only the residences of white

officials. To understand how I have been occupied, you must know that

"Misi Mea" has had another letter, and this time had to answer himself;

think of doing so in a language so obscure to me, with the aid of a

Bible, concordance, and dictionary! What a wonderful Baboo compilation

it must have been! I positively expected to hear news of its arrival in

Malie by the sound of laughter. I doubt if you will be able to read this

scrawl, but I have managed to scramble somehow up to date; and

to-morrow, one way or another, should be interesting. But as for me, I

am a wreck, as I have no doubt style and handwriting both testify.

8 P.M.--Wonderfully rested; feel almost fit for to-morrow's dreary

excursion--not that it will be dreary if the weather favour, but

otherwise it will be death; and a native feast, and I fear I am in for a

big one, is a thing I loathe. I wonder if you can really conceive me as

a politician in this extra-mundane sphere--presiding at public meetings,

drafting proclamations, receiving mis-addressed letters that have been

carried all night through tropical forests? It seems strange indeed, and

to you, who know me really, must seem stranger. I do not say I am free

from the itch of meddling, but God knows this is no tempting job to

meddle in; I smile at picturesque circumstances like the Misi Mea

(_Monsieur Chose_ is the exact equivalent) correspondence, but the

business as a whole bores and revolts me. I do nothing and say nothing;

and then a day comes, and I say "this can go on no longer."

9.30 P.M.--The wretched native dilatoriness finds me out. News has just

come that we must embark at six to-morrow; I have divided the night in

watches, and hope to be called to-morrow at four and get under way by

five. It is a great chance if it be managed; but I have given directions

and lent my own clock to the boys, and hope the best. If I get called at

four we shall do it nicely. Good-night; I must turn in.

_May 3rd._--Well, we did get off by about 5.30, or, by'r lady! quarter

to six; myself on Donald, the huge grey cart-horse, with a ship-bag

across my saddle bow, Fanny on Musu and Belle on Jack. We were all

feeling pretty tired and sick, and I looked like heaven knows what on

the cart-horse: "death on the pale horse," I suggested--and young Hunt

the missionary, who met me to-day on the same charger, squinted up at my

perch and remarked, "There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft."

The boat was ready and we set off down the lagoon about seven, four

oars, and Talolo, my cook, steering.

_May 9th_ (_Monday anyway_).--And see what good resolutions came to!

Here is all this time past, and no speed made. Well, we got to Malie and

were received with the most friendly consideration by the rebel chief.

Belle and Fanny were obviously thought to be my two wives; they were

served their kava together, as were Mataafa and myself. Talolo utterly

broke down as interpreter; long speeches were made to me by Mataafa and

his orators, of which he could make nothing but they were "very much

surprised"--his way of pronouncing obliged--and as he could understand

nothing that fell from me except the same form of words, the dialogue

languished and all business had to be laid aside. We had kava,[42] and

then a dish of arrowroot; one end of the house was screened off for us

with a fine tapa, and we lay and slept, the three of us, heads and

tails, upon the mats till dinner. After dinner his illegitimate majesty

and myself had a walk, and talked as well as my twopenny Samoan would

admit. Then there was a dance to amuse the ladies before the house, and

we came back by moonlight, the sky piled full of high faint clouds that

long preserved some of the radiance of the sunset. The lagoon was very

shallow; we continually struck, for the moon was young and the light

baffling; and for a long time we were accompanied by, and passed and

repassed, a huge whale-boat from Savaii, pulling perhaps twelve oars,

and containing perhaps forty people who sang in time as they went. So

to the hotel, where we slept, and returned the next Tuesday morning on

the three same steeds.

Meanwhile my business was still untransacted. And on Saturday morning, I

sent down and arranged with Charlie Taylor to go down that afternoon. I

had scarce got the saddle-bags fixed and had not yet mounted, when the

rain began. But it was no use delaying now; off I went in a wild

waterspout to Apia; found Charlie (Sale) Taylor--a sesquipedalian young

half-caste--not yet ready, had a snack of bread and cheese at the hotel

while waiting him, and then off to Malie. It rained all the way, seven

miles; the road, which begins in triumph, dwindles down to a nasty,

boggy, rocky footpath with weeds up to a horseman's knees; and there are

eight pig fences to jump, nasty beastly jumps--the next morning we found

one all messed with blood where a horse had come to grief--but my Jack

is a clever fencer; and altogether we made good time, and got to Malie

about dark. It is a village of very fine native houses, high, domed,

oval buildings, open at the sides, or only closed with slatted

Venetians. To be sure, Mataafa's is not the worst. It was already quite

dark within, only a little fire of cocoa-shell blazed in the midst and

showed us four servants; the chief was in his chapel, whence we heard

the sound of chaunting. Presently he returned; Taylor and I had our

soaking clothes changed, family worship was held, kava brewed, I was

exhibited to the chiefs as a man who had ridden through all that rain

and risked deportation to serve their master; they were bidden learn my

face, and remember upon all occasions to help and serve me. Then dinner,

and politics, and fine speeches until twelve at night--O, and some more

kava--when I could sit up no longer; my usual bed-time is eight, you

must remember. Then one end of the house was screened off for me alone,

and a bed made--you never saw such a couch--I believe of nearly fifty

(half at least) fine mats, by Mataafa's daughter, Kalala. Here I

reposed alone; and on the other side of the tapa, Majesty and his

household. Armed guards and a drummer patrolled about the house all

night; they had no shift, poor devils; but stood to arms from sun-down

to sun-up.

About four in the morning, I was awakened by the sound of a whistle pipe

blown outside on the dark, very softly and to a pleasing simple air; I

really think I have hit the first phrase:

[Illustration: Andante tranquillo]

It sounded very peaceful, sweet and strange in the dark; and I found

this was a part of the routine of my rebel's night, and it was done (he

said) to give good dreams. By a little before six, Taylor and I were in

the saddle again fasting. My riding boots were so wet I could not get

them on, so I must ride barefoot. The morning was fair but the roads

very muddy, the weeds soaked us nearly to the waist, Sale was twice

spilt at the fences, and we got to Apia a bedraggled enough pair. All

the way along the coast, the pate (small wooden drum) was beating in the

villages and the people crowding to the churches in their fine clothes.

Thence through the mangrove swamp, among the black mud and the green

mangroves, and the black and scarlet crabs, to Mulinuu, to the doctor's,

where I had an errand, and so to the inn to breakfast about nine. After

breakfast I rode home. Conceive such an outing, remember the pallid

brute that lived in Skerryvore like a weevil in a biscuit, and receive

the intelligence that I was rather the better for my journey. Twenty

miles' ride, sixteen fences taken, ten of the miles in a drenching rain,

seven of them fasting and in the morning chill, and six stricken hours'

political discussions by an interpreter; to say nothing of sleeping in

a native house, at which many of our excellent literati would look

askance of itself.

You are to understand: if I take all this bother, it is not only from a

sense of duty, or a love of meddling--damn the phrase, take your

choice--but from a great affection for Mataafa. He is a beautiful, sweet

old fellow, and he and I grew quite fulsome on Saturday night about our

sentiments. I had a messenger from him to-day with a flannel undershirt

which I had left behind like a gibbering idiot; and perpetrated in reply

another Baboo letter. It rains again to-day without mercy; blessed,

welcome rains, making up for the paucity of the late wet season; and

when the showers slacken, I can hear my stream roaring in the hollow,

and tell myself that the cacaos are drinking deep. I am desperately

hunted to finish my Samoa book before the mail goes; this last chapter

is equally delicate and necessary. The prayers of the congregation are

requested. Eheu! and it will be ended before this letter leaves and

printed in the States ere you can read this scribble. The first dinner

gong has sounded; _je vous salue, monsieur et cher confrere. Tofa,

soifua!_ Sleep! long life! as our Samoan salutation of farewell runs.

_Friday, May_ 13_th._--Well, the last chapter, by far the most difficult

and ungrateful, is well under way, I have been from six to seven hours

upon it daily since I last wrote; and that is all I have done forbye

working at Samoan rather hard, and going down on Wednesday evening to

the club. I make some progress now at the language; I am teaching Belle,

which clears and exercises myself. I am particularly taken with the

_finesse_ of the pronouns. The pronouns are all dual and plural, and the

first person, both in the dual and plural, has a special exclusive and

inclusive form. You can conceive what fine effects of precision and

distinction can be reached in certain cases. Take Ruth, i. _vv._ 8 to

13, and imagine how those pronouns come in; it is exquisitely elegant,

and makes the mouth of the _litterateur_ to water. I am going to

exercitate my pupil over those verses to-day for pronoun practice.

_Tuesday._--Yesterday came yours. Well, well, if the dears prefer a

week, why, I'll give them ten days, but the real document, from which I

have scarcely varied, ran for one night.[43] I think you seem scarcely

fair to Wiltshire, who had surely, under his beast-ignorant ways, right

noble qualities. And I think perhaps you scarce do justice to the fact

that this is a place of realism _a outrance_; nothing extenuated or

coloured. Looked at so, is it not, with all its tragic features,

wonderfully idyllic, with great beauty of scene and circumstance? And

will you please to observe that almost all that is ugly is in the

whites? I'll apologise for Papa Randal if you like; but if I told you

the whole truth--for I did extenuate there!--and he seemed to me

essential as a figure, and essential as a pawn in the game, Wiltshire's

disgust for him being one of the small, efficient motives in the story.

Now it would have taken a fairish dose to disgust Wiltshire.--Again, the

idea of publishing the _Beach_ substantively is dropped--at once, both

on account of expostulation, and because it measured shorter than I had

expected. And it was only taken up, when the proposed volume, _Beach de

Mar_, petered out. It petered out thus: the chief of the short stories

got sucked into _Sophia Scarlet_--and _Sophia_ is a book I am much taken

with, and mean to get to, as soon as--but not before--I have done _David

Balfour_ and _The Young Chevalier_. So you see you are like to hear no

more of the Pacific or the nineteenth century for a while. _The Young

Chevalier_ is a story of sentiment and passion, which I mean to write a

little differently from what I have been doing--if I can hit the key;

rather more of a sentimental tremolo to it. It may thus help to prepare

me for _Sophia_, which is to contain three ladies, and a kind of a love

affair between the heroine and a dying planter who is a poet! large

orders for R. L. S.

O the German taboo is quite over; no soul attempts to support the C. J.

or the President, they are past hope; the whites have just refused their

taxes--I mean the council has refused to call for them, and if the

council consented, nobody would pay; 'tis a farce, and the curtain is

going to fall briefly. Consequently in my History, I say as little as

may be of the two dwindling stars. Poor devils! I liked the one, and the

other has a little wife, now lying in! There was no man born with so

little animosity as I. When I heard the C. J. was in low spirits and

never left his house, I could scarce refrain from going to him.

It was a fine feeling to have finished the History; there ought to be a

future state to reward that grind! It's not literature, you know; only

journalism, and pedantic journalism. I had but the one desire, to get

the thing as right as might be, and avoid false concords--even if that!

And it was more than there was time for. However, there it is: done. And

if Samoa turns up again, my book has to be counted with, being the only

narrative extant. Milton and I--if you kindly excuse the

juxtaposition--harnessed ourselves to strange waggons, and I at least

will be found to have plodded very soberly with my load. There is not

even a good sentence in it, but perhaps--I don't know--it may be found

an honest, clear volume.

_Wednesday._--Never got a word set down, and continues on Thursday, 19th

May, his own marriage day as ever was. News; yes. The C. J. came up to

call on us! After five months' cessation on my side, and a decidedly

painful interchange of letters, I could not go down--_could_ not--to see

him. My three ladies received him, however; he was very agreeable as

usual, but refused wine, beer, water, lemonade, chocolate, and at last a

cigarette. Then my wife asked him, "So you refuse to break bread?" and

he waved his hands amiably in answer. All my three ladies received the

same impression that he had serious matters in his mind: now we hear he

is quite cock-a-hoop since the mail came, and going about as before his

troubles darkened. But what did he want with me? 'Tis thought he had

received a despatch--and that he misreads it (so we fully believe) to

the effect that they are to have war ships at command and can make their

little war after all. If it be so, and they do it, it will be the

meanest wanton slaughter of poor men for the salaries of two white

failures. But what was his errand with me? Perhaps to warn me that

unless I behave he now hopes to be able to pack me off in the _Curacoa_

when she comes.

I have celebrated my holiday from _Samoa_ by a plunge at the beginning

of _The Young Chevalier_. I am afraid my touch is a little broad in a

love story; I can't mean one thing and write another. As for women, I am

no more in any fear of them; I can do a sort all right; age makes me

less afraid of a petticoat, but I am a little in fear of grossness.

However, this David Balfour's love affair, that's all right--might be

read out to a mother's meeting--or a daughters' meeting. The difficulty

in a love yarn, which dwells at all on love, is the dwelling on one

string; it is manifold, I grant, but the root fact is there unchanged,

and the sentiment being very intense, and already very much handled in

letters, positively calls for a little pawing and gracing. With a writer

of my prosaic literalness and pertinency of point of view, this all

shoves toward grossness--positively even toward the far more damnable

_closeness_. This has kept me off the sentiment hitherto, and now I am

to try: Lord! Of course Meredith can do it, and so could Shakespeare;

but with all my romance, I am a realist and a prosaist, and a most

fanatical lover of plain physical sensations plainly and expressly

rendered; hence my perils. To do love in the same spirit as I did (for

instance) D. Balfour's fatigue in the heather; my dear sir, there were

grossness--ready made! And hence, how to sugar? However, I have nearly

done with Marie-Madeleine, and am in good hopes of Marie-Salome, the

real heroine; the other is only a prologuial heroine to introduce the

hero.

_Friday._--Anyway, the first prologuial episode is done, and Fanny likes

it. There are only four characters: Francis Blair of Balmile (Jacobite

Lord Gladsmuir) my hero; the Master of Ballantrae; Paradou, a

wine-seller of Avignon; Marie-Madeleine his wife. These two last I am

now done with, and I think they are successful, and I hope I have

Balmile on his feet; and the style seems to be found. It is a little

charged and violent; sins on the side of violence; but I think will

carry the tale. I think it is a good idea so to introduce my hero, being

made love to by an episodic woman. This queer tale--I mean queer for

me--has taken a great hold upon me. Where the devil shall I go next?

This is simply the tale of a _coup de tete_ of a young man and a young

woman; with a nearly, perhaps a wholly, tragic sequel, which I desire to

make thinkable right through, and sensible; to make the reader, as far

as I shall be able, eat and drink and breathe it. Marie-Salome des

Saintes-Maries is, I think, the heroine's name; she has got to _be_ yet:

_sursum corda_! So has the young Chevalier, whom I have not yet touched,

and who comes next in order. Characters: Balmile, or Lord Gladsmuir,

_comme vous voulez_; Prince Charlie; Earl Marischal; Master of

Ballantrae; and a spy, and Dr. Archie Campbell, and a few nondescripts;

then, of women, Marie-Salome and Flora Blair; seven at the outside;

really four full lengths, and I suppose a half-dozen episodic profiles.

How I must bore you with these ineptitudes! Have patience. I am going to

bed; it is (of all hours) eleven. I have been forced in (since I began

to write to you) to blatter to Fanny on the subject of my heroine, there

being two _cruces_ as to her life and history: how came she alone? and

how far did she go with the Chevalier? The second must answer itself

when I get near enough to see. The first is a back-breaker. Yet I know

there are many reasons why a _fille de famille_, romantic, adventurous,

ambitious, innocent of the world, might run from her home in these days;

might she not have been threatened with a convent? might there not be

some Huguenot business mixed in? Here am I, far from books; if you can

help me with a suggestion, I shall say God bless you. She has to be new

run away from a strict family, well-justified in her own wild but honest

eyes, and meeting these three men, Charles Edward, Marischal, and

Balmile, through the accident of a fire at an inn. She must not run from

a marriage, I think; it would bring her in the wrong frame of mind. Once

I can get her, _sola_, on the highway, all were well with my narrative.

Perpend. And help if you can.

Lafaele, long (I hope) familiar to you, has this day received the visit

of his _son_ from Tonga; and the _son_ proves to be a very pretty,

attractive young daughter! I gave all the boys kava in honour of her

arrival; along with a lean, side-whiskered Tongan, dimly supposed to be

Lafaele's step-father; and they have been having a good time; in the end

of my verandah, I hear Simi, my present incapable steward, talking

Tongan with the nondescript papa. Simi, our out-door boy, burst a

succession of blood-vessels over our work, and I had to make a position

for the wreck of one of the noblest figures of a man I ever saw. I

believe I may have mentioned the other day how I had to put my horse to

the trot, the canter and (at last) the gallop to run him down. In a

photograph I hope to send you (perhaps with this) you will see Simi

standing in the verandah in profile. As a steward, one of his chief

points is to break crystal; he is great on fracture--what do I

say?--explosion! He cleans a glass, and the shards scatter like a

comet's bowels.

_N.B._--If I should by any chance be deported, the first of the rules

hung up for that occasion is to communicate with you by

telegraph.--Mind, I do not fear it, but it _is_ possible.

_Monday, 25th._--We have had a devil of a morning of upset and bustle;

the bronze candlestick Faauma has returned to the family, in time to

take her position of step-mamma, and it is pretty to see how the child

is at once at home, and all her terrors ended.

_27th. Mail day._--And I don't know that I have much to report. I may

have to leave for Malie as soon as these mail packets are made up. 'Tis

a necessity (if it be one) I rather deplore. I think I should have liked

to lazy; but I dare say all it means is the delay of a day or so in

harking back to David Balfour; that respectable youth chides at being

left (where he is now) in Glasgow with the Lord Advocate, and after five

years in the British Linen, who shall blame him? I was all forenoon

yesterday down in Apia, dictating, and Lloyd typewriting, the conclusion

of _Samoa_; and then at home correcting till the dinner bell; and in the

evening again till eleven of the clock. This morning I have made up most

of my packets, and I think my mail is all ready but two more, and the

tag of this. I would never deny (as D. B. might say) that I was rather

tired of it. But I have a damned good dose of the devil in my pipe-stem

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; the Samoa book can only

increase that--I can't help it, that book is not written for me but for

Miss Manners; 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 ower the lave o't! I can do without

glory and perhaps the time is not far off when I can do without coin. 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.

I fancy this gloomy ramble is caused by a twinge of age; I put on an

under-shirt yesterday (it was the only one I could find) that barely

came under my trousers; and just below it, a fine healthy rheumatism has

now settled like a fire in my hip. From such small causes do these

valuable considerations flow!

I shall now say adieu, dear Sir, having ten rugged miles before me and

the horrors of a native feast and parliament without an interpreter, for

to-day I go alone.--Yours ever,

R. L. S.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

Describing a family expedition to visit Mataafa at Malie.

_[Vailima] Sunday, 29th May [1892]._

How am I to overtake events? On Wednesday, as soon as my mail was

finished, I had a wild whirl to look forward to. Immediately after

dinner, Belle, Lloyd, and I set out on horseback, they to the club, I to

Haggard's, thence to the hotel, where I had supper ready for them. All

next day we hung round Apia with our whole house-crowd in Sunday array,

hoping for the mail steamer with a menagerie on board. No such luck; the

ship delayed; and at last, about three, I had to send them home again, a

failure of a day's pleasuring that does not bear to be discussed. Lloyd

was so sickened that he returned the same night to Vailima, Belle and I

held on, sat most of the evening on the hotel verandah stricken silly

with fatigue and disappointment, and genuine sorrow for our poor boys

and girls, and got to bed with rather dismal appreciations of the

morrow.

These were more than justified, and yet I never had a jollier day than

Friday 27th. By 7.30 Belle and I had breakfast; we had scarce done

before my mother was at the door on horseback, and a boy at her heels to

take her not very dashing charger home again. By 8.10 we were all on the

landing pier, and it was 9.20 before we had got away in a boat with two

inches of green wood on the keel of her, no rudder, no mast, no sail, no

boat flag, two defective rowlocks, two wretched apologies for oars, and

two boys--one a Tongan half-caste, one a white lad, son of the Tonga

schoolmaster, and a sailor lad--to pull us. All this was our first taste

of the tender mercies of Taylor (the sesquipedalian half-caste

introduced two letters back, I believe). We had scarce got round Mulinuu

when Sale Taylor's heart misgave him; he thought we had missed the tide;

called a halt, and set off ashore to find canoes. Two were found; in one

my mother and I were embarked with the two biscuit tins (my present to

the feast), and the bag with our dry clothes, on which my mother was

perched--and her cap was on the top of it--feminine hearts please

sympathise; all under the guidance of Sale. In the other Belle and our

guest; Tauilo, a chief-woman, the mother of my cook, were to have

followed. And the boys were to have been left with the boat. But Tauilo

refused. And the four, Belle, Tauilo, Frank the sailor-boy, and Jimmie

the Tongan half-caste, set off in the boat across that rapidly shoaling

bay of the lagoon.

How long the next scene lasted, I could never tell. Sale was always

trying to steal away with our canoe and leave the other four, probably

for six hours, in an empty, leaky boat, without so much as an orange or

a cocoanut on board, and under the direct rays of the sun. I had at last

to stop him by taking the spare paddle off the outrigger and sticking it

in the ground--depth, perhaps two feet--width of the bay, say three

miles. At last I bid him land me and my mother and go back for the other

ladies. "The coast is so rugged," said Sale.--"What?" I said, "all

these villages and no landing-place?"--"Such is the nature of Samoans,"

said he. Well, I'll find a landing-place, I thought; and presently I

said, "Now we are going to land there."--"We can but try," said the

bland Sale, with resignation. Never saw a better landing-place in my

life. Here the boat joined us. My mother and Sale continued in the canoe

alone, and Belle and I and Tauilo set off on foot for Malie. Tauilo was

about the size of both of us put together and a piece over; she used us

like a nurse with children. I had started barefoot; Belle had soon to

pull off her gala shoes and stockings; the mud was as deep as to our

knees, and so slippery that (moving, as we did, in Indian file, between

dense scratching tufts of sensitive) Belle and I had to take hands to

support each other, and Tauilo was steadying Belle from the rear. You

can conceive we were got up to kill, Belle in an embroidered white dress

and white hat, I in a suit of Bedford cords hot from the Sydney tailors;

and conceive us, below, ink-black to the knees with adhesive clay, and

above, streaming with heat. I suppose it was better than three miles,

but at last we made the end of Malie. I asked if we could find no water

to wash our feet; and our nursemaid guided us to a pool. We sat down on

the pool side, and our nursemaid washed our feet and legs for us--ladies

first, I suppose out of a sudden respect to the insane European fancies:

such a luxury as you can scarce imagine. I felt a new man after it. But

before we got to the King's house we were sadly muddied once more. It

was 1 P.M. when we arrived, the canoe having beaten us by about five

minutes, so we made fair time over our bog-holes.

But the war dances were over, and we came in time to see only the tail

end (some two hours) of the food presentation. In Mataafa's house three

chairs were set for us covered with fine mats. Of course, a native house

without the blinds down is like a verandah. All the green in front was

surrounded with sheds, some of flapping canvas, some of green palm

boughs, where (in three sides of a huge oblong) the natives sat by

villages in a fine glow of many-hued array. There were folks in tapa,

and folks in patchwork; there was every colour of the rainbow in a spot

or a cluster; there were men with their heads gilded with powdered

sandal-wood, others with heads all purple, stuck full of the petals of a

flower. In the midst there was a growing field of outspread food,

gradually covering acres; the gifts were brought in, now by chanting

deputations, now by carriers in a file; they were brandished aloft and

reclaimed over, with polite sacramental exaggerations, by the official

receiver. He, a stalwart, well-oiled quadragenarian, shone with sweat

from his exertions, brandishing cooked pigs. At intervals, from one of

the squatted villages, an orator would arise. The field was almost

beyond the reach of any human speaking voice; the proceedings besides

continued in the midst; yet it was possible to catch snatches of this

elaborate and cut-and-dry oratory--it was possible for me, for instance,

to catch the description of my gift and myself as the _alii Tusitala, O

le alii o malo tetele_--the chief Write Information, the chief of the

great Governments. Gay designation? In the house, in our three curule

chairs, we sat and looked on. On our left a little group of the family.

In front of us, at our feet, an ancient Talking-man, crowned with green

leaves, his profile almost exactly Dante's; Popo his name. He had

worshipped idols in his youth; he had been full grown before the first

missionary came hither from Tahiti; this makes him over eighty. Near by

him sat his son and colleague. In the group on our left, his little

grandchild sat with her legs crossed and her hands turned, the model

already (at some three years old) of Samoan etiquette. Still further off

to our right, Mataafa sat on the ground through all the business; and

still I saw his lips moving, and the beads of his rosary slip stealthily

through his hand. We had kava, and the King's drinking was hailed by the

Popos (father and son) with a singular ululation, perfectly new to my

ears; it means, to the expert, "Long live Tuiatua"; to the inexpert, is

a mere voice of barbarous wolves. We had dinner, retired a bit behind

the central pillar of the house; and, when the King was done eating, the

ululation was repeated. I had my eyes on Mataafa's face, and I saw pride

and gratified ambition spring to life there and be instantly sucked in

again. It was the first time, since the difference with Laupepa, that

Popo and his son had openly joined him, and given him the due cry as

Tuiatua--one of the eight royal names of the islands, as I hope you will

know before this reaches you.

Not long after we had dined, the food-bringing was over. The gifts

(carefully noted and tallied as they came in) were now announced by a

humorous orator, who convulsed the audience, introducing singing notes,

now on the name of the article, now on the number; six thousand odd

heads of taro, three hundred and nineteen cooked pigs; and one thing

that particularly caught me (by good luck), a single turtle "for the

king"--_le tasi mo le tupu_. Then came one of the strangest sights I

have yet witnessed. The two most important persons there (bar Mataafa)

were Popo and his son. They rose, holding their long shod rods of

talking men, passed forth from the house, broke into a strange dance,

the father capering with outstretched arms and rod, the son crouching

and gambolling beside him in a manner indescribable, and presently began

to extend the circle of this dance among the acres of cooked food.

_Whatever they leaped over, whatever they called for, became theirs._ To

see mediaeval Dante thus demean himself struck a kind of a chill of

incongruity into our Philistine souls; but even in a great part of the

Samoan concourse, these antique and (I understand) quite local manners

awoke laughter. One of my biscuit tins and a live calf were among the

spoils he claimed, but the large majority of the cooked food (having

once proved his dignity) he re-presented to the king.

Then came the turn of _le alii Tusitala_. He would not dance, but he

was given--five live hens, four gourds of oil, four fine tapas, a

hundred heads of taro, two cooked pigs, a cooked shark, two or three

cocoanut branches strung with kava, and the turtle, who soon after

breathed his last, I believe, from sunstroke. It was a royal present for

"the chief of the great powers." I should say the gifts were, on the

proper signal, dragged out of the field of food by a troop of young men,

all with their lava-lavas kilted almost into a loin-cloth. The art is to

swoop on the food-field, pick up with unerring swiftness the right

things and quantities, swoop forth again on the open, and separate,

leaving the gifts in a new pile: so you may see a covey of birds in a

corn-field. This reminds me of a very inhumane but beautiful passage I

had forgotten in its place. The gift-giving was still in full swing,

when there came a troop of some ninety men all in tapa lava-lavas of a

purplish colour; they paused, and of a sudden there went up from them

high into the air a flight of live chickens, which, as they came down

again, were sent again into the air, for perhaps a minute, from the

midst of a singular turmoil of flying arms and shouting voices; I assure

you, it was very beautiful to see, but how many chickens were killed?

No sooner was my food set out than I was to be going. I had a little

serious talk with Mataafa on the floor, and we went down to the boat,

where we got our food aboard, such a cargo--like the Swiss Family

Robinson, we said. However, a squall began, Tauilo refused to let us go,

and we came back to the house for half an hour or so, when my ladies

distinguished themselves by walking through a Fono (council), my mother

actually taking up a position between Mataafa and Popo! It was about

five when we started--turtle, pigs, taro, etc., my mother, Belle,

myself, Tauilo, a portly friend of hers with the voice of an angel, and

a pronunciation so delicate and true that you could follow Samoan as she

sang, and the two tired boys Frank and Jimmie, with the two bad oars and

the two slippery rowlocks to impel the whole. Sale Taylor took the

canoe and a strong Samoan to paddle him. Presently after he went

inshore, and passed us a little after, with his arms folded, and _two_

strong Samoans impelling him Apia-ward. This was too much for Belle, who

hailed, taunted him, and made him return to the boat with one of the

Samoans, setting Jimmie instead in the canoe. Then began our torment,

Sale and the Samoan took the oars, sat on the same thwart (where they

could get no swing on the boat had they tried), and deliberately ladled

at the lagoon. We lay enchanted. Night fell; there was a light visible

on shore; it did not move. The two women sang, Belle joining them in the

hymns she has learned at family worship. Then a squall came up; we sat a

while in roaring midnight under rivers of rain, and, when it blew by,

there was the light again, immovable. A second squall followed, one of

the worst I was ever out in; we could scarce catch our breath in the

cold, dashing deluge. When it went, we were so cold that the water in

the bottom of the boat (which I was then baling) seemed like a warm

footbath in comparison, and Belle and I, who were still barefoot, were

quite restored by laving in it.

All this time I had kept my temper, and refrained as far as might be

from any interference, for I saw (in our friend's mulish humour) he

always contrived to twist it to our disadvantage. But now came the acute

point. Young Frank now took an oar. He was a little fellow, near as

frail as myself, and very short; if he weighed nine stone, it was the

outside; but his blood was up. He took stroke, moved the big Samoan

forward to bow, and set to work to pull him round in fine style.

Instantly, a kind of race competition--almost race hatred--sprang up. We

jeered the Samoan. Sale declared it was the trim of the boat; "if this

lady was aft" (Tauilo's portly friend) "he would row round Frank." We

insisted on her coming aft, and Frank still rowed round the Samoan. When

the Samoan caught a crab (the thing was continual with these wretched

oars and rowlocks), _we_ shouted and jeered; when Frank caught one, Sale

and the Samoan jeered and yelled. But anyway the boat moved, and

presently we got up with Mulinuu, where I finally lost my temper, when I

found that Sale proposed to go ashore and make a visit--in fact, we all

three did. It is not worth while going into, but I must give you one

snatch of the subsequent conversation as we pulled round Apia bay. "This

Samoan," said Sale, "received seven German bullets in the field of

Fangalii." "I am delighted to hear it," said Belle. "His brother was

killed there," pursued Sale; and Belle, prompt as an echo, "Then there

are no more of the family? how delightful!" Sale was sufficiently

surprised to change the subject; he began to praise Frank's rowing with

insufferable condescension: "But it is after all not to be wondered at,"

said he, "because he has been for some time a sailor. My good man, is it

three or five years that you have been to sea?" And Frank, in a defiant

shout: "Two!" Whereupon, so high did the ill-feeling run, that we three

clapped and applauded and shouted, so that the President (whose house we

were then passing) doubtless started at the sounds. It was nine when we

got to the hotel; at first no food was to be found, but we skirmished up

some bread and cheese and beer and brandy; and (having changed our wet

clothes for the rather less wet in our bags) supped on the verandah.

On Saturday, 28th, I was wakened about 6.30, long past my usual hour, by

a benevolent passer-by. My turtle lay on the verandah at my door, and

the man woke me to tell me it was dead, as it had been when we put it on

board the day before. All morning I ran the gauntlet of men and women

coming up to me: "Mr. Stevenson, your turtle is dead." I gave half of it

to the hotel keeper, so that his cook should cut it up; and we got a

damaged shell, and two splendid meals, beefsteak one day and soup the

next. The horses came for us about 9.30. It was waterspouting; we were

drenched before we got out of the town; the road was a fine going

Highland trout stream; it thundered deep and frequent, and my mother's

horse would not better on a walk. At last she took pity on us, and very

nobly proposed that Belle and I should ride ahead. We were mighty glad

to do so, for we were cold. Presently, I said I should ride back for my

mother, but it thundered again; Belle is afraid of thunder, and I

decided to see her through the forest before I returned for my other

hen--I may say, my other wet hen. About the middle of the wood, where it

is roughest and steepest, we met three pack-horses with barrels of

lime-juice. I piloted Belle past these--it is not very easy in such a

road--and then passed them again myself, to pilot my mother. This

effected, it began to thunder again, so I rode on hard after Belle. When

I caught up with her, she was singing Samoan hymns to support her

terrors! We were all back, changed, and at table by lunch time, 11 A.M.

Nor have any of us been the worse for it sin-syne. That is pretty good

for a woman of my mother's age and an invalid of my standing; above all,

as Tauilo was laid up with a bad cold, probably increased by rage.

_Friday, 3rd June._--On Wednesday the club could not be held, and I must

ride down town and to and fro all afternoon delivering messages, then

dined and rode up by the young moon. I had plenty news when I got back;

there is great talk in town of my deportation: it is thought they have

written home to Downing Street requesting my removal, which leaves me

not much alarmed; what I do rather expect is that H. J. Moors and I may

be haled up before the C. J. to stand a trial for _lese_-majesty. Well,

we'll try and live it through.

The rest of my history since Monday has been unadulterated _David

Balfour_. In season and out of season, night and day, David and his

innocent harem--let me be just, he never has more than the two--are on

my mind. Think of David Balfour with a pair of fair ladies--very nice

ones too--hanging round him. I really believe David is as good a

character as anybody has a right to ask for in a novel. I have finished

drafting Chapter XX. to-day, and feel it all ready to froth when the

spigot is turned.

O, I forgot--and do forget. What did I mean? A waft of cloud has fallen

on my mind, and I will write no more.

_Wednesday, I believe, 8th June._--Lots of David, and lots of David, and

the devil any other news. Yesterday we were startled by great guns

firing a salute, and to-day Whitmee (missionary) rode up to lunch, and

we learned it was the _Curacoa_ come in, the ship (according to rumour)

in which I was to be deported. I went down to meet my fate, and the

captain is to dine with me Saturday, so I guess I am not going this

voyage. Even with the particularity with which I write to you, how much

of my life goes unexpressed; my troubles with a madman by the name of

----, a genuine living lunatic, I believe, and jolly dangerous; my

troubles about poor ----, all these have dropped out; yet for moments

they were very instant, and one of them is always present with me.

I have finished copying Chapter XXI. of David--"_solus cum sola_; we

travel together." Chapter XXII., "_Solus cum sola_; we keep house

together," is already drafted. To the end of XXI. makes more than 150

pages of my manuscript--damn this hair--and I only designed the book to

run to about 200; but when you introduce the female sect, a book does

run away with you. I am very curious to see what you will think of my

two girls. My own opinion is quite clear; I am in love with both. I

foresee a few pleasant years of spiritual flirtations. The creator (if I

may name myself, for the sake of argument, by such a name) is

essentially unfaithful. For the duration of the two chapters in which I

dealt with Miss Grant, I totally forgot my heroine, and even--but this

is a flat secret--tried to win away David. I think I must try some day

to marry Miss Grant. I'm blest if I don't think I've got that hair out!

which seems triumph enough; so I conclude.

_Tuesday._--Your infinitesimal correspondence has reached me, and I have

the honour to refer to it with scorn. It contains only one statement of

conceivable interest, that your health is better; the rest is null, and

so far as disquisitory unsound. I am all right, but David Balfour is

ailing; this came from my visit to the man-of-war, where I had a cup of

tea, and the most of that night walked the verandah with extraordinary

convictions of guilt and ruin, many of which (but not all) proved to

have fled with the day, taking David along with them; he R.I.P. in