se first question was, 'Have you seen
Lou?'

And when we described that startling vision that was slowly creeping
along Princes Street in the open cab, she laughed till her tears fell.
In half an hour or so her son came in cool and unconcerned, and as
punctiliously polite as if his attire had been the orthodox apparel for
an afternoon tea-party.

The effects of his dressing and appearance on the foreign mind is most
humorously described by himself in his _Epilogue to an Inland Voyage_,
where the extraordinary nature of his garments so dismayed the French
police that while his friend, the late Sir Walter G. Simpson, 'The
Cigarette,' was allowed to go free, 'The Arethusa' was popped into
prison, kept there for an hour or two, and finally hustled off to Paris,
an adventure of the two friends, who were so systematically taken for
'bagmen,' on that charming expedition, which was always told with much
laughter by 'The Arethusa's' parents.

One of the last memories of Mr Stevenson in Edinburgh that distinctly
remains with me was finding him looking into the window of Messrs
Douglas & Foulis in Castle Street on a grey, east windy day that was
cold enough to make the thickest great-coat necessary. But he was
visibly shivering in one of his favourite short velvet coats. It was
palpably too short in the arms, and certainly the worse for wear; his
long hair fell almost to his shoulders, and he wore a Tyrolese hat of
soft felt. With a whimsical and appreciative glance at his garments, he
offered to accompany me along Princes Street; so we set off westwards
together, when, so charming was his conversation, that long before we
reached the doorsteps of his relative's house, which was my destination,
one had forgotten that the wind was in the east, and the sky greyer than
the pavements, and only longed for the walk to begin over again, that he
might talk all the way. These eccentricities of attire were merely a
part of the rather attractive vanity of a clever youth, whose exuberance
of spirits was, in spite of much bad health, at that time so great that
he was often merry with a gaiety that was as child-like as it was
amusing. In later life he gradually modified his ideas as to dress, and
in the _Vailima Letters_ he writes of himself in Samoa as going to Apia
to social amusements in most orthodox coats and ties.

At evening parties he always looked like a martyr in the dismal black
coat and white tie, which he described as a mixture