ut to be child, boy, young man,
and old man all at once. There was never a time in his life when
Stevenson had to say with St. Augustine, "Behold! my childhood is dead,
but I am alive." The child lived on always in him, not in memory only,
but in real survival, with all its freshness of perception unimpaired,
and none of its play instincts in the least degree extinguished or made
ashamed. As for the perennial boy in Stevenson, that is too apparent to
need remark. It was as a boy for boys that he wrote the best known of
his books, _Treasure Island_, and with all boys that he met, provided
they were really boys and not prigs nor puppies, he was instantly and
delightedly at home. At the same time, even when I first knew him, he
showed already surprising occasional traits and glimpses of old
sagacity, of premature life-wisdom and experience.

Once more, it is said that in every poet there must be something of the
woman. If to be quick in sympathy and feeling, ardent in attachment, and
full of pity for the weak and suffering, is to be womanly, Stevenson was
certainly all those; he was even like a woman in being [Greek:
artidakrus], easily moved to tears at the touch of pity or affection, or
even at any specially poignant impression of art or beauty. But yet, if
any one word were to be chosen for the predominant quality of his
character and example, I suppose that word would be manly. In his gentle
and complying nature there were strains of iron tenacity and will:
occasionally even, let it be admitted, of perversity and Scottish
"thrawnness." He had both kinds of physical courage--the active,
delighting in danger, and the passive, unshaken in endurance. In the
moral courage of facing situations and consequences, of readiness to pay
for faults committed, of outspokenness, admitting no ambiguous relations
and clearing away the clouds from human intercourse, I have not known
his equal. The great Sir Walter himself, as this book will prove, was
not more manfully free from artistic jealousy or irritability under
criticism, or more unfeignedly inclined to exaggerate the qualities of
other people's work and to underrate those of his own. Of the humorous
and engaging parts of vanity and egoism, which led him to make infinite
talk and fun about himself, and use his own experiences as a key for
unlocking the confidences of others, Stevenson had plenty; but of the
morose and fretful parts never a shade. "A little Irish girl," he wrote
o