In the early months of this year a hurt knee kept Stevenson more
indoors than was good for him.
[_Chalet am Stein, Davos-Platz, February 1882._]
MY DEAR HENLEY,--Here comes the letter as promised last night. And first
two requests: Pray send the enclosed to c/o Blackmore's publisher, 'tis
from Fanny; second, pray send us Routledge's shilling book, Edward
Mayhew's _Dogs_, by return if it can be managed.
Our dog is very ill again, poor fellow, looks very ill too, only sleeps
at night because of morphine; and we do not know what ails him, only
fear it to be canker of the ear. He makes a bad, black spot in our life,
poor, selfish, silly, little tangle; and my wife is wretched. Otherwise
she is better, steadily and slowly moving up through all her relapses.
My knee never gets the least better; it hurts to-night, which it has not
done for long. I do not suppose my doctor knows any least thing about
it. He says it is a nerve that I struck, but I assure you he does not
know.
I have just finished a paper, _A Gossip on Romance_, in which I have
tried to do, very popularly, about one-half of the matter you wanted me
to try. In a way, I have found an answer to the question. But the
subject was hardly fit for so chatty a paper, and it is all loose ends.
If ever I do my book on the Art of Literature, I shall gather them
together and be clear.
To-morrow, having once finished off the touches still due on this, I
shall tackle _San Francisco_ for you. Then the tide of work will fairly
bury me, lost to view and hope. You have no idea what it costs me to
wring out my work now. I have certainly been a fortnight over this
_Romance_, sometimes five hours a day; and yet it is about my usual
length--eight pages or so, and would be a d----d sight the better for
another curry. But I do not think I can honestly re-write it all; so I
call it done, and shall only straighten words in a revision currently.
I had meant to go on for a great while, and say all manner of
entertaining things. But all's gone. I am now an idiot.--Yours ever,