ye to ye, and joy be wi' ye! I hae nae time to say mair.
They say I'm gettin' _fat_--a fact!--Your laddie, with all love,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO JAMES PAYN

_Vailima, Samoa, Nov. 4, 1894._

MY DEAR JAMES PAYN,--I am asked to relate to you a little incident of
domestic life at Vailima. I had read your _Gleams of Memory_, No. 1; it
then went to my wife, to Osbourne, to the cousin that is within my
gates, and to my respected amanuensis, Mrs. Strong. Sunday approached.
In the course of the afternoon I was attracted to the great 'all--the
winders is by Vanderputty, which upon entering I beheld a memorable
scene. The floor was bestrewn with the forms of midshipmen from the
_Curacoa_--"boldly say a wilderness of gunroom"--and in the midst of
this sat Mrs. Strong throned on the sofa and reading aloud _Gleams of
Memory_. They had just come the length of your immortal definition of
boyhood in the concrete, and I had the pleasure to see the whole party
dissolve under its influence with inextinguishable laughter. I thought
this was not half bad for arthritic gout! Depend upon it, sir, when I go
into the arthritic gout business, I shall be done with literature, or at
least with the funny business. It is quite true I have my battlefields
behind me. I have done perhaps as much work as anybody else under the
most deplorable conditions. But two things fall to be noticed: In the
first place, I never was in actual pain; and in the second, I was never
funny. I'll tell you the worst day that I remember. I had a hemorrhage,
and was not allowed to speak; then, induced by the devil, or an errant
doctor, I was led to partake of that bowl which neither cheers nor
inebriates--the castor-oil bowl. Now, when castor-oil goes right, it is
one thing; but when it goes wrong, it is another. And it went wrong with
me that day. The waves of faintness and nausea succeeded each other for
twelve hours, and I do feel a legitimate pride in thinking that I stuck
to my work all through and wrote a good deal of _Admiral Guinea_ (which
I might just as well not have written for all the reward it ever brought
me) in spite of the barbarous bad conditions. I think that is my great
boast; and it seems a little thing alongside of your _Gleams of Memory_
illustrated by spasms of arthritic gout. We really should have an order
of merit in the trade of letters. For valour, Scott would have had it;
Pope too; myself on the strength of that castor-oi