ould like my literature; and I ask you
particularly to thank Mr. Bunner (have I the name right?) for his
notice, which was of that friendly, headlong sort that really pleases an
author like what the French call a "shake-hands." It pleased me the more
coming from the States, where I have met not much recognition, save from
the buccaneers, and above all from pirates who misspell my name. I saw
my book advertised in a number of the Critic as the work of one R. L.
Stephenson; and, I own, I boiled. It is so easy to know the name of the
man whose book you have stolen; for there it is, at full length, on the
title-page of your booty. But no, damn him, not he! He calls me
Stephenson. These woes I only refer to by the way, as they set a higher
value on the Century notice.

I am now a person with an established ill-health--a wife--a dog
possessed with an evil, a Gadarene spirit--a chalet on a hill, looking
out over the Mediterranean--a certain reputation--and very obscure
finances. Otherwise, very much the same, I guess; and were a bottle of
Fleury a thing to be obtained, capable of developing theories along with
a fit spirit even as of yore. Yet I now draw near to the Middle Ages;
nearly three years ago, that fatal Thirty struck; and yet the great work
is not yet done--not yet even conceived. But so, as one goes on, the
wood seems to thicken, the footpath to narrow, and the House Beautiful
on the hill's summit to draw further and further away. We learn, indeed,
to use our means; but only to learn, along with it, the paralysing
knowledge that these means are only applicable to two or three poor
commonplace motives. Eight years ago, if I could have slung ink as I can
now, I should have thought myself well on the road after Shakespeare;
and now--I find I have only got a pair of walking-shoes and not yet
begun to travel. And art is still away there on the mountain summit. But
I need not continue; for, of course, this is your story just as much as
it is mine; and, strange to think, it was Shakespeare's too, and
Beethoven's, and Phidias's. It is a blessed thing that, in this forest
of art, we can pursue our woodlice and sparrows, _and not catch them_,
with almost the same fervour of exhilaration as that with which
Sophocles hunted and brought down the Mastodon.

Tell me something of your work, and your wife.--My dear fellow, I am
yours ever,

R. L. STEVENSON.

My wife begs to be remembered to both of you; I cannot say as mu