rk. The essay _Pan's Pipes_, reprinted in _Virginibus
Puerisque_, was written about this time.

_Hotel des Etrangers, Dieppe, January 1, 1878._

MY DEAR COLVIN,--I am at the _Inland Voyage_ again: have finished
another section, and have only two more to execute. But one at least of
these will be very long--the longest in the book--being a great
digression on French artistic tramps. I only hope Paul may take the
thing; I want coin so badly, and besides it would be something
done--something put outside of me and off my conscience; and I should
not feel such a muff as I do, if once I saw the thing in boards with a
ticket on its back. I think I shall frequent circulating libraries a
good deal. The Preface shall stand over, as you suggest, until the last,
and then, sir, we shall see. This to be read with a big voice.

This is New Year's Day: let me, my dear Colvin, wish you a very good
year, free of all misunderstanding and bereavement, and full of good
weather and good work. You know best what you have done for me, and so
you will know best how heartily I mean this.--Ever yours,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

I had had business in Edinburgh, and had stayed with Stevenson's
parents in his absence.

[_Paris, January or February 1878._]

MY DEAR COLVIN,--Many thanks for your letter. I was much interested by
all the Edinburgh gossip. Most likely I shall arrive in London next
week. I think you know all about the Crane sketch; but it should be a
river, not a canal, you know, and the look should be "cruel, lewd, and
kindly," all at once. There is more sense in that Greek myth of Pan than
in any other that I recollect except the luminous Hebrew one of the
Fall: one of the biggest things done. If people would remember that all
religions are no more than representations of life, they would find
them, as they are, the best representations, licking Shakespeare.

What an inconceivable cheese is Alfred de Musset! His comedies are, to
my view, the best work of France this century: a large order. Did you
ever read them? They are real, clear, living work.--Ever yours,

R. L. S.

TO THOMAS STEVENSON

_Cafe de la Source, Bd. St. Michel, Paris, 15th Feb. 1878._

MY DEAR FATHER,--A thought has come into my head which I think would
interest you. Christianity is among other things, a very wise, noble,
and strange doctrine of life. Nothing is so difficult to specify as t