tOBI-RTLOVIS TEVENSON* . - LIBRARY UNlVEftSITY Of CAJJFOAMU SAN DIEGO Ex Libris Raymond A.Pcttcy d- A LAST MEMORY OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. A LAST MEMORY OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON BY CHARLOTTE EATON Scribere Jussit Amor NEW YORK THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY PUBLISHERS COPYBIGHT, 1916, BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY A LAST MEMORY OF ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON WHEN I came face to face with Robert Louis Stevenson it was the realization of one of my most cherished dreams. This was at Manasquan, a village on the New Jersey coast, where he had come to make a farewell visit to his old friend Will Low the artist. Mr. Low had taken a cottage there that Summer while working on his series of Lamia drawings for Lippincotts, and Steven- son, hearing that we were on the other 5 A Last Memory of side of the river, sent word that he would come to see us on the morrow. "Stevenson is coming," was announced at the breakfast-table as calmly as though it were a daily occurrence. Stevenson Coming to Manasquan! I was in my 'teens, was an enthusias- tic student of poetry and mythology, and Stevenson was my hero of romance. Was it any wonder the intelligence excited me? My husband, the late Wyatt Eaton, and Stevenson, were friends in their student days abroad, and it was in honor of those early days that I was to clasp the hand of my favorite author. 6 Robert Louis Stevenson It was in the mazes of a contra- dance at Barbizon, in the picturesque setting of a barn lighted by candles, that their first meeting took place, where Mr. Eaton, though still a student in the schools of Paris, had taken a studio to be near Jean Fra^ois Millet, and hither Stevenson had come, with his cousin, known as "Talking Bob," to take part in the harvest festivities among the peasants. These were the halcyon days at Bar- bizon. When Millet tramped the fields and the favorite haunts of Rousseau and Corot could be followed up through the Forest of Fontainebleau, before Barbizon had become a resort for holi- 7 A Last Memory of day makers, or the term "Barbizon School" had been thought of. Now, of all places in the world, the quaint little Sanborn Cottage on the river-bank, where we were stopping, seemed to me the spot best suited for a first meeting with Stevenson. The Sanborns were very little on the estate and the place had a neglected look. Indeed, more than that, one might easily have taken it for a haunted or abandoned place with its garden choked with weeds, and its window- shutters flaunting old spider-webs to the breeze. It was, of course, the fanciful, adven- ture-loving Stevenson that I looked 8 Robert Louis Stevenson forward to seeing, and I was not dis- appointed; and while others spoke of the flight of time with its inevitable changes, I felt sure that, to me, he would be just Stevenson who wrote the things over which I had burned the midnight oil. He came promptly at the hour fixed, appearing on the threshold as frail and distinguished looking as a portrait by Velasquez. He had walked across the mile-long bridge connecting Brielle and Manasquan, ahead of the others, for the bracer he always needed before joining even a small company. Shall I ever forget the sensation of delight that thrilled me, as he entered 9 A Last Memory of the room tall, emaciated, yet radiant, his straight, glossy hair so long that it lay upon the collar of his coat, throw- ing into bold relief his long neck and keenly sensitive face? His hands were of the psychic order, and were of marble whiteness, save the thumb and first finger of the right hand, that were stained from constant cigar- ette rolling for he was an inveterate smoker and had the longest fingers I have ever seen on a human being; they were, in fact, part of his general ap- pearance of lankiness, that would have been uncanny, but for the geniality and sense of bien etre that he gave off. His voice, low in tone, had an endear- 10 Robert Louis Stevenson ing quality in it, that was almost like a caress. He never made use of ver- nacularisms and was without the slight- est Scotch accent; on the contrary, he spoke his English like a world citizen, speaking a universal tongue, and al- ways looked directly at the person spoken to. I have since heard one who knew him (and they are becoming scarce now) call him the man of good manners, or "the Mannerly Stevenson," and this is the term needed to complete my first impression, for more than the traveller, the scholar or the author, it was the Mannerly Stevenson that appeared in our midst that day. He moved about 11 A Last Memory of the room to a ripple of repartee that was contagious, putting every one on his mettle in fact, his presence was a challenge to a jeu d'esprit on every hand. How self-possessed he was, how spiritual! his face glowing with memo- ries of other days. He had just come from Saranac, Saranac-in-the-Adirondacks, that had failed to yield him the elixir of life he was seeking, and where he had spent a winter of such solitude as even his courageous wife was unable to endure. His good spirits were doubtless the rebound after good work accomplished, for there, in "his hat-box on the hill,'* as he called his quarters at Baker's, 12 Robert Louis Stevenson were written his "Christmas Sermons," "The Lantern Bearer," and the open- ing chapters of "The Master of Ballan- trae." In this "very decent house" he would talk old Mr. Baker to sleep on stormy nights, and the good old farmer, never suspecting that Stevenson was "anybody in particular," snored his responses to those flights in fact and fancy for which there are those who would have given hundreds of dollars to have been in the old farmer's place. But it was the very carelessness of Mr. Baker that helped along the talking spell. This is often the case with authors; they will pour out their precious knowledges into the ears of 13 A Last Memory of some inconsequential person, a tramp as likely as not, picked up by the way ; the non-critical attitude of the illiterate seems to help the thinker in forming a sequence of ideas; this explains, too, why the artist values the lay criticism- it hits directly at any false note in a picture, thus saving the painter much unnecessary delay. Sometimes Dr. Trudeau, also an exile of the mountains, would drop in professionally on these stormy evenings and would stay until about midnight, having entirely forgotten the nature of his visit. Stevenson had this faculty of making friends of those who served him. To the restaurant keeper of 14 Robert Louis Stevenson Monterey, who trusted him when he was penniless and unknown, he pre- sented a set of his books, leather-bound, each volume autographed, and this worthy man has since refused a thou- sand dollars for the set. "Well," he ex- plained, "I do not need the money, and I value the gift for itself." I think this friend of Stevenson's must feel like Father Tabb in the library of his friend when he said: "To see, when he is dead, The many books he read, And then again, to note The many books he wrote; How some got in, and some got out. 'Tis very strange to think about." 15 But to return to our story. Stevenson's Isle-of-the-blest was call- ing to him, and hope lay that way, where life was elementary and where a man with but one lung to his account might live indefinitely. Not that he feared to die. Oh, no! It takes more courage sometimes to live, but it was hard to give up at forty, when one just begins to enter into the knowledge of one's own powers. A blind lady once said to me, in speaking of a mutual friend, "When Mr. B. comes, I feel as if there was a sprite in the room," and this is the way I felt about Stevenson, for during those moments of serious discussion when most people are tense, 16 Robert Louis Stevenson he moved actively about, and his philosophies were humanized by his warm, brown eyes ancl merry excla- mations. Another reason for the sprite feel- ing, was that he was consciously living in the past that day, and each face was like reseeing a milestone long passed, on some half-forgotten journey. It was this sense of detachment that, more than anything else, gave us the feeling that he was already beyond our mortal ken, that he was living at once in the visible and in the invisible, one to whom the passing of time had little significance. I think this is true, more 17 A Last Memory of or less, of all those who are marked for a brief earthly career. . By this time the other members of the family had arrived. His mother, Lloyd Osbourne, and Mrs. Strong, his step-children; "Fanny," his wife, was in California, looking after some prop- erty interests she had there, and pro- visioning the yacht chartered for the voyage to the South Seas. In all his enterprises she was his major-domo, and her devotion no doubt helped to prolong his life. Their mutual agree- ment on all financial matters reminded me of a remark made by mine host at a country inn, who, in speaking of his wife, said, "She is my very best invest- 18 Robert Louis Stevenson ment," and so was Mrs. Stevenson to her husband, Lewis, for so the family called him, and never Robert Louis. I am inclined to think that yoking of contrasts is an important part in Nature's economy of things. Ella Wheeler Wilcox said to me that she owed her success to Robert her hus- band because in all her undertakings he went before and smoothed the way; but Mr. Wilcox's version of the case is another story. "I keep an eye on Ella," said he, "to prevent her giving away too much money." Stevenson was now seated before the grate, the flickering light from the wood fire illuminating his pale face to trans- 19 A Last Memory of parency. Now and then he relapsed into silence, gazing into the fire with the rapt look of one who sees visions. "Are you seeing a Salamander," I asked, "or do the sparks flying upward make you think of the golden alchemy of Lescaris?"* "A Salamander," he replied, smiling. "Yes, a carnivorous fire-dweller that eats up man and his dreams forever." "Gracious! But you are going to worse things than Salamanders, the Paua,f they will get you, if you don't watch out." * Lescaris was a Greek shepherd who discov- ered the secret of transmuting the baser metals to fine gold. f Paua Native name for the Tridacna Gigus, a huge clam, that if it closes on any one, his only escape is by losing the limb. 20 Robert Louis Stevenson And then, suddenly becoming con- scious of my temerity in interrupting the thread of his reflections, to cover my embarrassment, I ran upstairs for my birthday-book. An autograph! Of course. And he wrote it, reading out the quotation that rilled in part of the space. It was one of Emerson's Kantisms, something about not going abroad, unless you can as readily stay at home ( I forget the exact words ) . It was decidedly malapropos and called out much merriment. "Oh, stay at home, dear heart, and rest ; Home-keeping hearts are happiest." 21 A Last Memory of Somebody quoted, to which another replied: "Home-keeping hearts have ever homely wits." The autograph has long since dis- appeared, but how often have I thought with regret of the amused expression in Stevenson's eyes at the Salamander fancy! What tales of witchery might have been spun from those themes worthy of the magic of his pen, the fire-dwelling man-eater, or the discov- ery of the Greek shepherd ! Stevenson was amused over our en- thusiasm, and the eagerness of some of the younger members of the company to lionize him. 22 Robert Louis Stevenson "And what do you consider your brightest failure?" inquired our host. " 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,' " he replied, without a moment's hesitation, adding, "that is the worst thing I ever wrote." "Yet you owe to it your dream- expedition," some one reminded him. "The dream-expedition?" he re- peated. "Yes, that was perhaps a com- pensation for the bad things." Benjamin Franklin has said that success ruins many a man. The success of "Trilby" killed Du Maurier, and many authors have had their heads turned for far less than the Jekyll and Hyde furore that swept the country at 23 A Last Memory of that time. But the Mannerly Steven- son carried his honors lightly. Smiling over the popularity of the "worst thing he ever wrote," he revealed that quality in his own nature that was finer than anything he had given to print, the soul whose indomitable courage could bear the brunt of adverse circumstance, and even contumely, and hold its own integrity, becoming a law unto itself. Here was the man who had passed himself off as one of a group of steerage passengers on that memorable trip across the Atlantic on his way to Monterey in quest of the woman he loved, the man whose life was more vital in its love-motif than any of his 24 Robert Louis Stevenson own romances, the man who, in spite of ill-health and uncertainty of means, yet paid the price for his heart's desire. "See here," said a lusty fellow, lurch- ing up to him one day on deck. "You are not one of us, you are a gentleman in hard luck." "But," added Stevenson triumphant- ly, in telling the story, "it was not until the end of the voyage that they found me out." This points the saying that it was the great washed that Stevenson fought shy of, and not the greater unwashed, with whom he was always on the friend- liest terms. 25 A Last Memory of He talked delightfully, too, on events connected with his journey across the plains, which he made in an emigrant train, associating with China- men, who cooked their meals on board, and slept on planks let down from the side of the cars. "The air was thick," said he, "and an Oriental thickness, at that." But this period of his life was a pain- ful subject for his mother, who was present, and some of his best stories were omitted on her account. He told us, however, about being nearly lynched for throwing away a lighted match on the prairie. "And all the fuss," said he, "before I was made 26 Robert Louis Stevenson aware of the nature of my crime." Both his mother and Sydney Colvin had done their best to make him accept enough money, as a loan, to make this trip comfortable. But he had refused. He was, he explained, "doing that which neither his family nor friends could approve," and he would therefore accept no financial aid. "Just before starting," said he, "be- ing in need of money, I called at the Century office, where I had left some manuscript, with the request for an early decision, but was politely shown the door." Consternation seized us at this an- 27 nouncement, for all present knew the Editor for a man of sympathy and heart. But Stevenson himself came to our relief with, "But Mr. Gilder was abroad that year." He laughed good- naturedly over the dilemmas that West- ern Editors threw him into by their tardiness in paying space rates for the stories and essays upon which, it is now conceded, his fame must rest. As he went from reminescence to reminescence, we felt that from this period of his vivid obscurity might have been drawn material for some of his most stirring romances, and we were rewarded as good listeners by the dis- covery of that which he thought his best 28 Robert Louis Stevenson work, namely, the little story called "Will o' the Mill." "Ah!" exclaimed Mr. Sanborn, his eyes beaming, "if you live to be as old as Methuselah, with all the world's lore at your finger-ends, you could never improve on that simple little story." We teased Stevenson a good deal on the enormity of his royalties on "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," which, besides having had what the publishers call a "run" that means something vastly different from the same term when applied to a bank, was bringing in a second goodly harvest from its drama- tization, by which his voyage to the South Seas had become a reality. A Last Memory of Remembering his remark that his idea of Purgatory was a perpetual high wind, I asked him: "Why have you chosen an island for your future habi- tat; or, if an island, why not Nevis in the West Indies, where one is in the perpetual doldrums, so to speak?" "There will be no more wind on Samoa than just enough to turn the page of the book one is reading," he replied; and windless Nevis was British, you see, and his first necessity was to get away where nobody reads. Like Jubal, son of Lamech, who felt himself hemmed in by hearing his songs repeated in a land where everybody sung, so he was shadowed by the Jekyll and Hyde 30 Robert Louis Stevenson mania in a land where everybody read. The very essence of his isolation is felt in a playful little fling at a Mr. Nerli, an artist, who went out there to paint his portrait, as well as the bore- dom every one experiences in sitting to a painter. "Did ever mortal man hear tell, of sae singu- lar a feriie, Of the coming to Apia here, of the painter, Mr. Nerli? He came; and O for a human found, of a* he was the pearlie, The pearl of a' the painter folk, was surely Mr. Nerli. He took a thraw to paint mysel* ; he painted late and early ; O now! the mony a yawn I've yawned in the beard of Mr. Nerli. 31 A Last Memory of Whiles I would sleep, an* whiles would wake, an' whiles was mair than surly, I wondered sair, as I sat there, forninst the eyes of Nerli. O will he paint me the way I want, as bonnie as a girlie? Or will he paint me an ugly type, and be damned to Mr. Nerli! But still and on, and whichever it is, he is a Canty Kerlie, The Lord proteck the back and neck of honest Mr. Nerli." Which shows that he was not alto- gether free from bothers even after reaching his "port o' dreams." In run- ning away from Purgatorial winds, only to be held up by a paint-brush! Also, as most of us when excited fall back upon our early idiom, so Steven- 82 Robert Louis Stevenson son, in jest or lyric mood, drifted into the dialect of his fathers. We found, much to our surprise, that Stevenson knew every nook and cranny of the Sanborn estate, and told us of his trespassings in their absence in search of fresh eggs for his breakfast, having observed that the hens had formed nomadic habits, laying in the wood-pile and in odd corners all over the grounds. This was during a former visit when he stayed at Wainwright's, a landmark that has recently been wiped out by fire. "One day, as I walked by," said he meaning the Sanborn place "I heard a hen cackling in that triumphant A Last Memory of way that left no doubt as to her having performed her duty to the species. I vaulted the fence for that particular egg and found it, still warm, with others, on its bed of soft chips. After that, I had an object in my long, soli- tary walks. New laid eggs for all occasions! And why not," he asked merrily, "seeing there was no other proprietor than Chanticleer Peter, who had been the victim of neglect so long that he would crow me a welcome, and in time became so tame that he would spring on my knee and eat crumbs from my fingers?" The Sanborns were in Europe that year and, all things considered, is it 14 Robert Louis Stevenson any wonder that he took the place for being abandoned? "Nothing but my instinct for the preservation of property kept me from smashing all the windows for exercise," said he. "I am glad thee was good to Peter," said Mrs. Sanborn. Her extinct brood was a pain still rankling in her bosom. She had found Peter frozen stiff on the bough on which he was roosting, after his hens had disappeared by methods too elemental to explain. They had left no servants in charge, and neighbors there were none to restrain the attacks of marauders, and 35 they were prize leghorns, too. She almost wailed. What a shame! Well might all bachelors who are threatened with a wintry solitude take warning by unhappy Peter. But he is not without the honor due to martyrdom is Peter, for Mrs. San- born had him stuffed, and presented him to "Fanny," who took him to California, where he survived the great San Francisco earthquake. "He must have been our mascot," said Lloyd Osbourne to me long after, "for the fire that followed the earth- quake came just as far as the gate and no farther." 36 Robert Louis Stevenson Since the cup that cheers is not cus- tomary in Quaker homes, our hostess proposed an egg-nog by way of after- noon collation, and all entered with zest into the mixing of the decoction. One brought the eggs, another the sugar- bowl, while our host went to the cellar for that brand of John Barleycorn that transmutes every beverage to a toast. Now, while Stevenson came to re- gard new-laid eggs as the natural manna of the desert, he had his doubts as to the feasibility of egg-nog, see- ing that milk is a necessary constituent. He did not know, you see, that a little white Alderney cow was chewing the cud of salt-meadow grasses in the woods 37 A Last Memory of nearby, and, even as he doubted, Mrs. Sanborn and her Ganymedes had brought in a jug of the white fluid, topped with a froth like sea-foam. "It's nectar for the gods on Olym- pus," said I meaning the milk. "True Ambrosia of the meadows," agreed Mrs. Sanborn. "Well, this is Elysium, and we are the gods to-day." Elysium-on-Manasquan. "To be more exact," said Stevenson, "it should be Argos; it was there they celebrated the cow, as we are now celebrating " "Tidy," said Mrs. Sanborn. "lo," corrected Stevenson, waving 38 Robert Louis Stevenson his fork, for he, too, was helping to beat the eggs : "Argos-on-Manasquan." He lingered over the name Manas- quan, as though he enjoyed saying it. "The first thing that impressed me in travelling in America," said he, "was your Indian names for towns and rivers. Tamiscami, Cognawaga, Ti- conderoga, the very sound of them thrills one with romantic fancies. Why do you not revive more of these charm- ing Indian names?" "We are too young yet to appreciate our legendry wealth," said Mr. San- born, with an emphasis on the "leg- endry." 39 "Qui s'excuse, s'accuse" reminded Mrs. Low, who was a French woman. "Quite right," assented Mr. Sanborn, "it is not precedent we lack, but valua- tions." "To return to Argos," said Mrs. Sanborn the peace-maker "I always feel in the presence of a divine mystery when I milk Tidy. No one could be guilty of a frivolous thing before the calm eye of that little cow." Mrs. Sanborn possessed the reverent spirit of the pre-Raphaelites, which burned modestly in its Quaker shrine or flared up like lightning as occasion required, and she delighted in the deification of her little cow. And why 40 Robert Louis Stevenson not? Had not Tidy's worshipped an- cestors nourished kings of antiquity, and given idols to their temples, and stood she not to-day as perfect a sym- bol of maternity? I do not now remember whether it was referring to Samoa as Stevenson's "port o' dreams" that brought up the discussion of dreams. To some one who asked him if he believed that dreams came true, he replied, "Certainly, they are just as real as anything else." "Well, it's what one believes that counts, isn't it, and one can form any theory in a world where dreams are as real as other things, and is it the same with ideals?" somebody ventured. 41 A Last Memory of "Ideals," said Stevenson, "are apt to stay by you when material things have taken the proverbial wings, and are assets quite as enduring as stone fences." "And was it from a want of faith in the durability of stone fences, or ignor- ance of their dream-assets that accounts for the way that Cato and Demosthenes solved their problems?" was the next question, but as this high strain was interrupted by more frivolity, my thoughts again reverted to the solid- ity of Stevenson's dreams, that now furnished his inquiring soul with new fields for exploration, as well as a 42 Robert Louis Stevenson dominant interest to fill up the measure of his earthly span. He regretted leaving the haunts of man, he told us, particularly the sep- aration from his friends, which was satisfactory, coming, as it did, from the man who coined the truism that the way to have a friend is to be one. But this was his fighting chance, "and a fellow had to die fighting, you know." What was civilization anyway to one who needed only sunshine and negligee? Thus in no other than a tone of pleas- antry did he refer to his condition, and never have I seen a face or heard a voice so exempt from bitterness. He told me, in fact, that he was unable to 43 A Last Memory of breathe in a room with more than four people in it at a time. This sounds like an exaggeration, or one of the vagaries of the sick, yet things that seem trifles to the well, can be tragic to the nervous sufferer. Mrs. Low has told me that at a dinner of only five or six covers Stevenson would frequently get up and throw open a window to breathe in enough ozone to enable him to get through the evening. He was embarking to the lure of soft airs and long, subliminal solitudes, ac- cepting gracefully the one hope held out, when the crowded habitations of cities had become a torture. We felt the pity of the enforced exile of so com- 44 Robert Louis Stevenson panionable a spirit, but we did not voice it, feeling constrained to live up to the standard of cheerfulness he had so valiantly set for us. Mr. Eaton, who boasted that, in him, a good sea captain had been spoiled to make a bad painter, encouraged Steven- son to talk freely of his plans, and he dwelt at some length on the beauty and seaworthiness of the yacht Casco, that had been chartered for the voyage. This sea theme led, of course, to the inevitable fish stories, and after some mythological whale had been swallowed by some non-Biblical Jonah, I re- marked, in the lull that followed, "May- 45 A Last Memory of be the waters of the South Seas will yield you up a heroine." A laugh went around at this, for some present thought I had said a "herring." But Stevenson had no doubt as to my meaning. "I am always helpless," said he, "when I try to de- scribe a woman; but then," he added, brightly, "how should I hope to under- stand a woman, when God, who made her, cannot?" As straws show how the wind blows, so this little pun throws light on Stevenson's state of mind to- ward womankind in general. During this heroine discussion, he remarked that he was always "unconscionably bored" by the conversation of young 46 Robert Louis Stevenson girls. He had no desire, it seems, to mould the young idea to his taste, as Horace, when he said: "Place me where the world is not habitable, Where the Day-God's Chariot too near approaches, Yet will I love Lalage, see her sweet smile, Hear her sweet prattle." Even as a school-boy he was unable to mingle with lads of his own age. This, doubtless, is another of the pre- cocities of the early-doomed, who feel that every moment of life they have must be lived to the full. A well- known artist, who was suffering with tuberculosis, once said to me, in de- scribing his working hours at the studio, 47 A Last Memory of "I must make every touch tell, and every moment count." So to Stevenson the rounded out sympathies of maturity were more attractive than the sweet prattle of girlhood, because, like the painter, with his paint, he, with his life, had to make every moment count, and this, of course, explains his having chosen a woman so much older than himself as a life-companion; a woman in whom he could find a response on his own mental plane. In a little poem which I copied from an old scrap-book in a garret out in Duluth, Stevenson not only draws a good portrait of his wife, but pays her a beautiful tribute as well, which was 48 Robert Louis Stevenson something of a test even to his skill, for I knew Mrs. Stevenson, and she was certainly no beauty: "Trusty, dusky, vivid true, With eyes of gold and bramble-clew, Steel-true and blade-straight, The Great Artist Made my mate. Honor, anger, valor, fire, A love that life could never tire ; Death quench or evil stir The Mighty Maker Gave to her. Teacher, tender, comrade, wife, A fellow-farer, staunch through life, Heart-whole and soul-free, The August Father Gave to me." 49 A Last Memory of Some of "Fanny's" stories of New York City were as amusing as Steven- son's prairie experiences. She always engaged a messenger-boy to pioneer her through the great stone jungle, and sights to which New Yorkers are inured to her were emotionalizing events. On first arriving, she went directly to the old Albert Hotel on University Place and Eleventh Street, registering thus: "Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson (wife of the author of 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde')." To those of the friends who smiled over it, she explained that, not being very well, she was afraid that 50 Robert Louis Stevenson if they did not know who she was, that she would have been neglected. I have never seen a portrait of Stevenson that equalled his appear- ance that day. The bas-relief by Saint Gaudens approximates it somewhat in ethereal thinness, but the verve, the glow, the vital spark, are lacking even in that. I felt the poetry of the day more poignantly as the hour for parting approached, and when the sun began to wane, I went out on the lawn to see the place under the spell of the lengthened shadows and the mellow sun-rays that turn the tree-trunks to burnished gold. This has always been my favorite hour, this charmed hour before sunset, when 51 A Last Memory of we can almost feel the earth's move- ment under our feet an hour that transcends in poetry anything that can be imagined by the finite mind. I walked up and down under the cedars bordering the river, to quiet my emotion. It was there, too, under the cedars, that a remark of Mr. Eaton's, in describing to me his first meeting with Stevenson, flashed across my mem- ory: "He combined the face of a boy with the distinguished bearing of a man of the world." And I thought, as I saw him then, merrily recalling the scenes and escapades of student life, "How well the distinguished man of 52 Robert Louis Stevenson the world had succeeded in keeping the heart of a boy!" A passage in Mr. Low's book, "A Chronicle of Friendships," that recalls that day most vividly, is this : "Steven- son never once excused himself from our company on the plea of having work to do." For so it was with us ; he seemed to have no cares of preoccu- pations, but to be content to be there, enjoying the conversation and the pleasantness of the passing hour. I had a cosy quarter of an hour with his mother after my walk, and off by ourselves, in a corner, away from inter- ruption, she spoke of her son's child- hood. In her eyes, he was still the 53 A Last Memory of "bonnie wee laddie" who scouted about in his make-believe worlds among the chairs and tables in the drawing-room while she entertained her friends, and we repeated bits from "A Child's Garden of Verses." I think that if there is any clue to the character of a great man we must look to his mother. Mrs. Stevenson em- bodied the idea of her son's peculiar charm; there was the same triumphal youthfulness, and her cheeks were round and rosy like a ripe apple. I think of the mother now, after so many years, as the crowning influence of the day, quiet and reticent, but always felt, and honored by all as 54 Robert Louis Stevenson became the mother of our welcome guest. In her letters, written in the Mar- quesas to her sister in Scotland, she carries out this impression of habitual freshness of spirit, and her humor is subtle and optimistic: "Nothing gives me more pleasure or a better appetite than an obstacle overcome." She shows herself the life of "The Silver Ship," as the people of Fakarava dubbed the Casco, and never a word of criticism or complaint is penned at any inconve- nience or annoyance endured by the way. Indeed, one marvels at her tran- quillity in the midst of so many com- plications just as one wondered at 55 A Last Memory of the simplicity of Queen Victoria in her diary. One of the chief delights in the perusal of these letters is the questions they project into the mind of the reader. Is it a style, a native virtue, a mannerism, a fad, or what? For example, she never suspects that the French man-o'-war in one of the bays may account for some of the good behavior of the natives, or that their bounty in cocoanuts and bread-fruit may be tendered with an eye to the novelties to be had in exchange, but accepts all in good faith, as part of their native generosity. And what a joy it is to see her tak- ing holy communion with these people, 56 Robert Louis Stevenson so lately reclaimed from cannabalism, and taking the ceremony "au grand serieux"! Thus, a missionary within, a warship without, the amenities of religion and society are enjoyed to the full. One lays down these letters and laughs, many a time, where no laughter was intended. Certainly, she was a good mixer as well as the born mother of a genius. Stevenson's death is an anomaly no less pathetic than his life, for in elud- ing extinction by consumption, he probably achieved a still earlier end by apoplexy. I had the account from Mrs. Low, who received it directly 57 A Last Memory of from "Fanny" by letter. Mrs. Steven- son was mixing a salad of native ingre- dients of which Stevenson was very fond, when he joined her in the kitchen, complaining that he was not very well, and sitting down, laid his head on her shoulder, where in about twenty min- utes he expired. I said at the beginning that I was not disappointed in the personality of Stevenson, but it would be nearer the mark to say that my anticipations fell far short of the reality. It is often the case in meeting literary celebrities that one has the feeling that they are first authors, and after that men. Rodin, the French 58 Robert Louis Stevenson sculptor, focuses this idea by saying that "many are artists at the expense of some qualities of manhood." With Stevenson one was clearly in the pres- ence of a man, and after that the scholar and the gentleman. Was it not this fine distinction that, in spite of woollen shirt and a third- class transportation, awoke the sus- picions of his companions of the steerage, that prompted the already quoted remark, "You are not one of us"? And on that memorable journey across the plains, seeking the woman of his choice, resolved, though penni- less and unknown, to make her his 59 A Last Memory of wife in spite of every obstacle, the truth that the frailty of the body is no criterion for the strength of the spirit is well brought out. It was, in fact, this quality of initiative that con- stituted his chief charm the quality that, above all others, made us so spontaneous in his presence and so proud of his achievement. We knew that we were seeing him at his best, surrounded by his old friends, and with the light of the mem- ory of his youthful ambitions on his face. We knew, too, that the parting would be a life-long one, and that we would never look upon his like again. This regret each knew to be uppermost 60 Robert Louis Stevenson in the mind of the others, but when the good-byes began, we made no sign that it was to be more than the absence of a day. Nevertheless, the tensity of the last moments of parting was keenly felt. Stevenson had planned to spend his last night at Wainwright's, and Lloyd Osbourne was to row him across the river. Mr. Eaton and I went down to the river-bank to see them off and to wave our last adieux. The rumble of carriage-wheels in the distance, and the reverberations of footsteps and voices on the old wooden bridge grew fainter and died away, before the little boat was pushed off; 61 Robert Louis Stevenson and then, these two friends, Robert Louis Stevenson and Wyatt Eaton, both at the zenith of their life and powers, and both hovering so closely on the brink of eternity, sent their last messages to each other, across the dis- tance, until the little boat had glided away, on the ebb-tide, a mere speck in the gray transparency of the twilight. 62 UC SOUTHBW REGIONAL U8RARY FAOUTY A 000 674 308 2