r
of criticisms and miscellaneous articles--a sort of new
Hazlitt. Others no sooner saw the _New Arabian Nights_ than
they recognised a tale-teller such as had not been seen for
a long time--such as, in respect of anything imitable, had
never been seen before. And he fortunately fell in with
these views and hopes. But all his tales are pure Romance,
and Romance has her eclipses with the vulgar. On the other
hand his letters are almost as good as his fiction, and not
in the least open to the charges of a certain
non-naturalness of style--even of thought--which could,
justly or not, be brought against his other writings. And it
is perhaps worth noting here that letters have held their
popularity with all fit judges almost better than any other
division of literature. Whether this is the effect of their
"touches of nature" (using the famous phrase without the
blunder so common in regard to it but not without reference
to its context) need not be discussed.

As, by the kindness of Mr. Lloyd Osbourne, I am enabled to
give here an unpublished letter of Stevenson's to myself, it
may require some explanation, not only of the commentatory
and commendatory kind but of fact. Stevenson, coming to dine
with me, had brought with him, and showed with much pride, a
new umbrella (a seven-and-sixpenny one) which, to my
surprise, he had bought. But when he went away that night he
forgot it; and when I met him next day at the Savile and
suggested that I should send it to him, there or somewhere,
he said he was going abroad almost immediately and begged me
to keep it for him. By this or that accident, but chiefly
owing to his constant expatriations, no opportunity of
restitution ever occurred: though I used to remind him of it
as a standing joke, and treasured it religiously, stored and
unused. This letter is partly in answer to a last reminder
in which I said that I was going to present it to the
nation, that it might be kept with King Koffee Kalcalli's,
but as a memory of a "victor in romance" not of a vanquished
enemy.

I of course told Mr. Kipling of the contents which concerned
him: and he, equally of course, demanded delivery of the
goods at once. But, half in joke, I demurred, saying that I
was a bailee, and the gift was not formal