Complete Works of Robert Louis Stevenson (Illustrated) (917 page)

To Sidney Colvin

The two following letters refer to the essay on the Spirit of Spring which I was careless enough to lose in the process of a change of rooms at Cambridge.
The Petits Poèmes en Prose
were attempts, not altogether successful, in the form though not in the spirit of Baudelaire.

Swanston
[
Autumn 1875
].

MY DEAR COLVIN, — Thanks. Only why don’t you tell me if I can get my
Spring
printed? I want to print it; because it’s nice, and genuine to boot, and has got less side on than my other game. Besides I want coin badly.

I am writing
Petits Poèmes en Prose
. Their principal resemblance to Baudelaire’s is that they are rather longer and not quite so good. They are ve-ry cle-ver (words of two syllables), O so aw-ful-ly cle-ver (words of three), O 196 so dam-na-bly cle-ver (words of a devil of a number of syllables). I have written fifteen in a fortnight. I have also written some beautiful poetry. I would like a cake and a cricket-bat; and a pass-key to Heaven if you please, and as much money as my friend the Baron Rothschild can spare. I used to look across to Rothschild of a morning when we were brushing our hair, and say — (this is quite true, only we were on the opposite side of the street, and though I used to look over I cannot say I ever detected the beggar, he feared to meet my eagle eye) — well, I used to say to him, “Rothschild, old man, lend us five hundred francs,” and it is characteristic of Rothy’s dry humour that he used never to reply when it was a question of money. He was a very humorous dog indeed, was Rothy. Heigh-ho! those happy old days. Funny, funny fellow, the dear old Baron.

How’s that for genuine American wit and humour? Take notice of this in your answer; say, for instance, “Even although the letter had been unsigned, I could have had no difficulty in guessing who was my dear,
lively
,
witty
correspondent. Yours, Letitia Languish.”

O! — my mind has given way. I have gone into a mild, babbling, sunny idiocy. I shall buy a Jew’s harp and sit by the roadside with a woman’s bonnet on my manly head begging my honest livelihood. Meantime, adieu.

I would send you some of these
PP. Poèmes
of mine, only I know you would never acknowledge receipt or return them. — Yours, and Rothschild’s,

R. L. Stevenson.

To Sidney Colvin

[
Edinburgh, Autumn 1875.
]

MY DEAR COLVIN, —
Fous ne me gombrennez pas.
Angry with you? No. Is the thing lost? Well, so be it. There is one masterpiece fewer in the world. The world can ill 197 spare it, but I, sir, I (and here I strike my hollow bosom so that it resounds) I am full of this sort of bauble; I am made of it; it comes to me, sir, as the desire to sneeze comes upon poor ordinary devils on cold days, when they should be getting out of bed and into their horrid cold tubs by the light of a seven o’clock candle, with the dismal seven o’clock frost-flowers all over the window.

Show Stephen what you please; if you could show him how to give me money, you would oblige, sincerely yours, R. L. S.

I have a scroll of
Springtime
somewhere, but I know that it is not in very good order, and do not feel myself up to very much grind over it. I am damped about
Springtime
, that’s the truth of it. It might have been four or five quid!

Sir, I shall shave my head, if this goes on. All men take a pleasure to gird at me. The laws of nature are in open war with me. The wheel of a dog-cart took the toes off my new boots. Gout has set in with extreme rigour, and cut me out of the cheap refreshment of beer. I leant my back against an oak, I thought it was a trusty tree, but first it bent, and syne — it lost the Spirit of Springtime, and so did Professor Sidney Colvin, Trinity College, to me. — Ever yours,

Robert Louis Stevenson.

Along with this, I send you some
P.P.P.
’s; if you lose them, you need not seek to look upon my face again. Do, for God’s sake, answer me about them also; it is a horrid thing for a fond architect to find his monuments received in silence. — Yours,

R. L. S.

To Mrs. Sitwell

[
Edinburgh, November 12, 1875.
]

MY DEAR FRIEND, — Since I got your letter I have been able to do a little more work, and I have been much better contented with myself; but I can’t get away, that is absolutely prevented by the state of my purse and my 198 debts, which, I may say, are red like crimson. I don’t know how I am to clear my hands of them, nor when, not before Christmas anyway. Yesterday I was twenty-five; so please wish me many happy returns — directly. This one was not unhappy anyway. I have got back a good deal into my old random, little-thought way of life, and do not care whether I read, write, speak, or walk, so long as I do something. I have a great delight in this wheel-skating; I have made great advance in it of late, can do a good many amusing things (I mean amusing in
my
sense — amusing to do). You know, I lose all my forenoons at Court! So it is, but the time passes; it is a great pleasure to sit and hear cases argued or advised. This is quite autobiographical, but I feel as if it was some time since we met, and I can tell you, I am glad to meet you again. In every way, you see, but that of work the world goes well with me. My health is better than ever it was before; I get on without any jar, nay, as if there never had been a jar, with my parents. If it weren’t about that work, I’d be happy. But the fact is, I don’t think — the fact is, I’m going to trust in Providence about work. If I could get one or two pieces I hate out of my way all would be well, I think; but these obstacles disgust me, and as I know I ought to do them first, I don’t do anything. I must finish this off, or I’ll just lose another day. I’ll try to write again soon. — Ever your faithful friend,

R. L. S.

To Mrs. Sitwell

The review of Robert Browning’s
Inn Album
here mentioned appears in Vanity Fair, Dec. 11, 1875. The matter of the poem is praised; the “slating” is only for the form and metres.

[
Edinburgh, December 1875.
]

Well, I am hardy! Here I am in the midst of this great snowstorm, sleeping with my window open and
smoking
in my cold tub in the morning so as it would do 199 your heart good to see. Moreover I am in pretty good form otherwise. Fontainebleau lags; it has turned out more difficult than I expected in some places, but there is a deal of it ready, and (I think) straight.

I was at a concert on Saturday and heard Hallé and Norman Neruda play that Sonata of Beethoven’s you remember, and I felt very funny. But I went and took a long spanking walk in the dark and got quite an appetite for dinner. I did; that’s not bragging.

As you say, a concert wants to be gone to
with
someone, and I know who. I have done rather an amusing paragraph or two for Vanity Fair on the
Inn Album
. I have slated R. B. pretty handsomely. I am in a desperate hurry; so good-bye. — Ever your faithful friend,

Robert Louis Stevenson.

To Mrs. de Mattos

The state of health and spirits mentioned in the last soon gave way to one of the fits of depression, frequent with him in Edinburgh winters. In the following letter he unbosoms himself to a favourite cousin (sister to R. A. M. Stevenson).

Edinburgh, January 1876.

MY DEAR KATHARINE, — The prisoner reserved his defence. He has been seedy, however; principally sick of the family evil, despondency; the sun is gone out utterly; and the breath of the people of this city lies about as a sort of damp, unwholesome fog, in which we go walking with bowed hearts. If I understand what is a contrite spirit, I have one; it is to feel that you are a small jar, or rather, as I feel myself, a very large jar, of pottery work rather
mal réussi
, and to make every allowance for the potter (I beg pardon; Potter with a capital P.) on his ill-success, and rather wish he would reduce you as soon as possible to potsherds. However, there are many things to do yet before we go

200

For instance, I have never been in a revolution yet. I pray God I may be in one at the end, if I am to make a mucker. The best way to make a mucker is to have your back set against a wall and a few lead pellets whiffed into you in a moment, while yet you are all in a heat and a fury of combat, with drums sounding on all sides, and people crying, and a general smash like the infernal orchestration at the end of the
Huguenots
....

Please pardon me for having been so long of writing, and show your pardon by writing soon to me; it will be a kindness, for I am sometimes very dull. Edinburgh is much changed for the worse by the absence of Bob; and this damned weather weighs on me like a curse. Yesterday, or the day before, there came so black a rain squall that I was frightened — what a child would call frightened, you know, for want of a better word — although in reality it has nothing to do with fright. I lit the gas and sat cowering in my chair until it went away again. — Ever yours,

R. L. S.

O, I am trying my hand at a novel just now; it may interest you to know, I am bound to say I do not think it will be a success. However, it’s an amusement for the moment, and work, work is your only ally against the “bearded people” that squat upon their hams in the dark places of life and embrace people horribly as they go by. God save us from the bearded people! to think that the sun is still shining in some happy places!

R. L. S.

To Mrs. Sitwell

[
Edinburgh, January 1876.
]

... Our weather continues as it was, bitterly cold, and raining often. There is not much pleasure in life certainly as it stands at present.
Nous n’irons plus au bois, hélas!

I meant to write some more last night, but my father was ill and it put it out of my way. He is better this morning.

If I had written last night, I should have written a lot. But this morning I am so dreadfully tired and stupid that I can say nothing. I was down at Leith in the afternoon. God bless me, what horrid women I saw; I never knew what a plain-looking race it was before. I was sick at heart with the looks of them. And the children, filthy and ragged! And the smells! And the fat black mud!

My soul was full of disgust ere I got back. And yet the ships were beautiful to see, as they are always; and on the pier there was a clean cold wind that smelt a little of the sea, though it came down the Firth, and the sunset had a certain
éclat
and warmth. Perhaps if I could get more work done, I should be in a better trim to enjoy filthy streets and people and cold grim weather; but I don’t much feel as if it was what I would have chosen. I am tempted every day of my life to go off on another walking tour. I like that better than anything else that I know. — Ever your faithful friend,

Robert Louis Stevenson.

To Sidney Colvin

Fontainebleau
is the paper called
Forest Notes
which appeared in the Cornhill Magazine in May of this year (reprinted in
Essays of Travel
). The
Winter’s Walk
, as far as it goes one of the most charming of his essays of the Road, was for some reason never finished; reprinted
ibidem
.

[
Edinburgh, February 1876.
]

MY DEAR COLVIN, —
1st
. I have sent
Fontainebleau
long ago, long ago. And Leslie Stephen is worse than tepid about it — liked “some parts” of it “very well,” the son of Belial. Moreover, he proposes to shorten it; and I, who want
money
, and money soon, and not glory and 202 the illustration of the English language, I feel as if my poverty were going to consent.

2nd.
I’m as fit as a fiddle after my walk. I am four inches bigger about the waist than last July! There, that’s your prophecy did that. I am on
Charles of Orleans
now, but I don’t know where to send him. Stephen obviously spews me out of his mouth, and I spew him out of mine, so help me! A man who doesn’t like my
Fontainebleau
! His head must be turned.

3rd.
If ever you do come across my
Spring
(I beg your pardon for referring to it again, but I don’t want you to forget) send it off at once.

4th.
I went to Ayr, Maybole, Girvan, Ballantrae, Stranraer, Glenluce, and Wigton. I shall make an article of it some day soon,
A Winter’s Walk in Carrick and Galloway
. I had a good time. — Yours,

R. L. S.

To Sidney Colvin

“Baynes” in the following is Stevenson’s good friend and mine, the late Professor Spencer Baynes, who was just relinquishing the editorship of the Encyclopædia Britannica by reason of ill-health.

[
Swanston, July 1876.
]

Here I am, here, and very well too. I am glad you liked
Walking Tours
; I like it, too; I think it’s prose; and I own with contrition that I have not always written prose. However, I am “endeavouring after new obedience” (Scot. Shorter Catechism). You don’t say aught of
Forest Notes
, which is kind. There is one, if you will, that was too sweet to be wholesome.

I am at Charles d’Orléans. About fifteen Cornhill pages have already coulé’d from under my facile plume — no, I mean eleven, fifteen of MS. — and we are not much more than half-way through, Charles and I; but he’s a pleasant companion. My health is very well; I am in a fine exercisy state. Baynes is gone to London; 203 if you see him, inquire about my
Burns
. They have sent me £5, 5s. for it, which has mollified me horrid. £5, 5s. is a good deal to pay for a read of it in MS.; I can’t complain. — Yours,

R. L. S.

To Mrs. Sitwell

This dates from just before the canoeing trip recounted in the
Inland Voyage
.