d in MS.

[78] I may be allowed to quote the following sentence from a letter
of this gentleman written when the news of our friend's death
reached England:--"So great was his power of winning love that
though I knew him for less than a week I could have borne the loss
of many a more intimate friend with less sorrow than Stevenson's.
When I saw him, last Easter, there was no suggestion of failure of
strength. After all I had heard of his delicacy I was astonished at
his vigour. He was up at five, and at work soon after, and at eleven
o'clock at night he was dancing on the floor of the big room while I
played Scotch and Irish reels on the rickety piano. He would talk to
me for hours of home and old friends, but with a wonderful
cheerfulness, knowing himself banished from them for life and yet
brought close to them by love. I confidently counted on his living;
he took keen interest in my own poor work, and it was one of my
ambitions to send him a book some day which would better deserve his
attention."

[79] _Sentimental Tommy_: whose chief likeness to R. L. S. was meant
to be in the literary temperament and passion for the _mot propre_.

[80] A proposed frontispiece for one of the volumes of the Edinburgh
Edition.

[81] _Sic_: query "least"?

[82] Of _The Wrecker_.

[83] _Trieb_, impulse.

[84] It seemed an obvious duty to publish the speech in question
through the English press, as the best proof both of Stevenson's
wise and understanding methods of dealing with his native friends,
and of the affection and authority which he enjoyed among them. I
have reprinted it, as a necessary supplement to this letter, in
Appendix II. at end of the present volume.

[85] Whitrett or Whitrack is Scots for a weasel: why applied to Mr.
Meiklejohn I know not.

APPENDIX I

ACCOUNT OF THE DEATH AND BURIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON, BY LLOYD OSBOURNE

He wrote hard all that morning of the last day; his half-finished book,
_Hermiston_, he judged the best he had ever written, and the sense of
successful effort made him buoyant and happy as nothing else could. In
the afternoon the mail fell to be answered; not business
correspondence--for this was left till later--but replies to the long,
kindly letters of distant friends, received but two days since, and
still bright in memory.

At sunset he came downstairs; rallied his