The Letters
of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume II
CHAPTER VIII - LIFE AT BOURNEMOUTH, CONTINUED, JANUARY 1886-JULY 1887
Letter: TO MRS. DE MATTOS
[SKERRYVORE, BOURNEMOUTH], JANUARY 1ST, 1886.
DEAREST KATHARINE, - Here, on a very little book and accompanied
with lame verses, I have put your name. Our kindness is now
getting well on in years; it must be nearly of age; and it gets
more valuable to me with every time I see you. It is not possible
to express any sentiment, and it is not necessary to try, at least
between us. You know very well that I love you dearly, and that I
always will. I only wish the verses were better, but at least you
like the story; and it is sent to you by the one that loves you -
Jekyll, and not Hyde.
R. L. S.
AVE!
Bells upon the city are ringing in the night;
High above the gardens are the houses full of light;
On the heathy Pentlands is the curlew flying free;
And the broom is blowing bonnie in the north countrie.
We cannae break the bonds that God decreed to bind,
Still we'll be the children of the heather and the wind;
Far away from home, O, still for you and me
That the broom is blowing bonnie in the north countrie!
R. L. S.
Letter: TO ALISON CUNNINGHAM
[SKERRYVORE, BOURNEMOUTH], 1ST, 1886.
MY DEAR KINNICUM, - I am a very bad dog, but not for the first
time. Your book, which is very interesting, came duly; and I
immediately got a very bad cold indeed, and have been fit for
nothing whatever. I am a bit better now, and aye on the mend; so I
write to tell you, I thought of you on New Year's Day; though, I
own, it would have been more decent if I had thought in time for
you to get my letter then. Well, what can't be cured must be
endured, Mr. Lawrie; and you must be content with what I give. If
I wrote all the letters I ought to write, and at the proper time, I
should be very good and very happy; but I doubt if I should do
anything else.
I suppose you will be in town for the New Year; and I hope your
health is pretty good. What you want is diet; but it is as much
use to tell you that as it is to tell my father. And I quite admit
a diet is a beastly thing. I doubt, however, if it be as bad as
not being allowed to speak, which I have tried fully, and do not
like. When, at the same time, I was not allowed to read, it passed
a joke. But these are troubles of the past, and on this day, at
least, it is proper to suppose they return. But we are not
put here to enjoy ourselves: it was not God's purpose; and I am
prepared to argue, it is not our sincere wish. As for our deserts,
the less said of them the better, for somebody might hear, and
nobody cares to be laughed at. A good man is a very noble thing to
see, but not to himself; what he seems to God is, fortunately, not
our business; that is the domain of faith; and whether on the first
of January or the thirty-first of December, faith is a good word to
end on.
My dear Cummy, many happy returns to you and my best love. - The
worst correspondent in the world,
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO MR. AND MRS. THOMAS STEVENSON
[SKERRYVORE, BOURNEMOUTH], JANUARY 1ST, 1886.
MY DEAR PEOPLE, - Many happy returns of the day to you all; I am
fairly well and in good spirits; and much and hopefully occupied
with dear Jenkin's life. The inquiry in every detail, every letter
that I read, makes me think of him more nobly. I cannot imagine
how I got his friendship; I did not deserve it. I believe the
notice will be interesting and useful.
My father's last letter, owing to the use of a quill pen and the
neglect of blotting-paper, was hopelessly illegible. Every one
tried, and every one failed to decipher an important word on which
the interest of one whole clause (and the letter consisted of two)
depended.
I find I can make little more of this; but spare the blots. -
Dear people, ever your loving son,
R. L. S.
I will try again, being a giant refreshed by the house being empty.
The presence of people is the great obstacle to letter-writing. I
deny that letters should contain news (I mean mine; those of other
people should). But mine should contain appropriate sentiments and
humorous nonsense, or nonsense without the humour. When the house
is empty, the mind is seized with a desire - no, that is too strong
- a willingness to pour forth unmitigated rot, which constitutes
(in me) the true spirit of correspondence. When I have no remarks
to offer (and nobody to offer them to), my pen flies, and you see
the remarkable consequence of a page literally covered with words
and genuinely devoid of sense. I can always do that, if quite
alone, and I like doing it; but I have yet to learn that it is
beloved by correspondents. The deuce of it is, that there is no
end possible but the end of the paper; and as there is very little
left of that - if I cannot stop writing - suppose you give up
reading. It would all come to the same thing; and I think we
should all be happier...
Letter: TO W. H. LOW
[SKERRYVORE, BOURNEMOUTH], JAN. 2ND, 1886.
MY DEAR LOW, - LAMIA has come, and I do not know how to thank you,
not only for the beautiful art of the designs, but for the handsome
and apt words of the dedication. My favourite is 'Bathes unseen,which is a masterpiece; and the next, 'Into the green recessed
woods,is perhaps more remarkable, though it does not take my
fancy so imperiously. The night scene at Corinth pleases me also.
The second part offers fewer opportunities. I own I should like to
see both ISABELLA and the EVE thus illustrated; and then there's
HYPERION - O, yes, and ENDYMION! I should like to see the lot:
beautiful pictures dance before me by hundreds: I believe ENDYMION
would suit you best. It also is in faery-land; and I see a hundred
opportunities, cloudy and flowery glories, things as delicate as
the cobweb in the bush; actions, not in themselves of any mighty
purport, but made for the pencil: the feast of Pan, Peona's isle,
the 'slabbed margin of a well,the chase of the butterfly, the
nymph, Glaucus, Cybele, Sleep on his couch, a farrago of
unconnected beauties. But I divagate; and all this sits in the
bosom of the publisher.
What is more important, I accept the terms of the dedication with a
frank heart, and the terms of your Latin legend fairly. The sight
of your pictures has once more awakened me to my right mind;
something may come of it; yet one more bold push to get free of
this prisonyard of the abominably ugly, where I take my daily
exercise with my contemporaries. I do not know, I have a feeling
in my bones, a sentiment which may take on the forms of
imagination, or may not. If it does, I shall owe it to you; and
the thing will thus descend from Keats even if on the wrong side of
the blanket. If it can be done in prose - that is the puzzle - I
divagate again. Thank you again: you can draw and yet you do not
love the ugly: what are you doing in this age? Flee, while it is
yet time; they will have your four limbs pinned upon a stable door
to scare witches. The ugly, my unhappy friend, is DE RIGUEUR: it
is the only wear! What a chance you threw away with the serpent!
Why had Apollonius no pimples? Heavens, my dear Low, you do not
know your business....
I send you herewith a Gothic gnome for your Greek nymph; but the
gnome is interesting, I think, and he came out of a deep mine,
where he guards the fountain of tears. It is not always the time
to rejoice. - Yours ever,
R. L. S.
The gnome's name is JEKYLL & HYDE; I believe you will find he is
likewise quite willing to answer to the name of Low or Stevenson.
SAME DAY. - I have copied out on the other sheet some bad verses,
which somehow your picture suggested; as a kind of image of things
that I pursue and cannot reach, and that you seem - no, not to have
reached - but to have come a thought nearer to than I. This is the
life we have chosen: well, the choice was mad, but I should ...
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