e been passed in the
stern-sheets of a boat with that romantic garment over my shoulders.
This, without prejudice to one glorious day when standing upon some
water stairs at Lerwick I signalled with my pocket-handkerchief for a
boat to come ashore for me. I was then aged fifteen or sixteen; conceive
my glory.

Several of the phrases you object to are proper nautical, or long-shore
phrases, and therefore, I think, not out of place in this long-shore
story. As for the two members which you thought at first so ill-united;
I confess they seem perfectly so to me. I have chosen to sacrifice a
long-projected story of adventure because the sentiment of that is
identical with the sentiment of "My uncle." My uncle himself is not the
story as I see it, only the leading episode of that story. It's really a
story of wrecks, as they appear to the dweller on the coast. It's a view
of the sea. Goodness knows when I shall be able to re-write; I must
first get over this copper-headed cold.

R. L. S.

TO SIDNEY COLVIN

The reference to Landor in the following is to a volume of mine in
Macmillan's series _English Men of Letters_. This and the next two or
three years were those of the Fenian dynamite outrages at the Tower
of London, the House of Lords, etc.

[_Kinnaird Cottage, Pitlochry, August 1881._]

MY DEAR COLVIN,--This is the first letter I have written this good
while. I have had a brutal cold, not perhaps very wisely treated; lots
of blood--for me, I mean. I was so well, however, before, that I seem to
be sailing through with it splendidly. My appetite never failed; indeed,
as I got worse, it sharpened--a sort of reparatory instinct. Now I feel
in a fair way to get round soon.

_Monday, August_ (_2nd_, is it?).--We set out for the Spital of
Glenshee, and reach Braemar on Tuesday. The Braemar address we cannot
learn; it looks as if "Braemar" were all that was necessary; if
particular, you can address 17 Heriot Row. We shall be delighted to see
you whenever, and as soon as ever, you can make it possible.

... I hope heartily you will survive me, and do not doubt it. There are
seven or eight people it is no part of my scheme in life to survive--yet
if I could but heal me of my bellowses, I could have a jolly life--have
it, even now, when I can work and stroll a little, as I have been doing
till this cold. I have so many things to make life sweet to me, it seems
a pity I cannot have that other on