ay continents on which we fly our
colours; good luck to one and all, and may God continue to be
merciful.--Your old and warm friend,

R. L. S.

TO EDMUND GOSSE

Stevenson had been unable to finish for the Pall Mall Christmas
number the tale he had first intended; had tried the publishers with
_Markheim_ (afterwards printed in the collection called _Merry Men_),
which proved too short; had then furbished up as well as he could a
tale drafted in the Pitlochry days, _The Body Snatcher_, which was
advertised in the streets of London by sandwich-men carrying posters
so horrific that they were suppressed, if I remember right, by the
police. Stevenson rightly thought the tale not up to his best mark,
and would not take the full payment which had been bargained for. His
correspondent was just about to start on a tour to the United States.

_Bonallie Towers, Bournemouth, Nov. 15, 1884._

MY DEAR GOSSE,--This Mr. Morley[12] of yours is a most desperate fellow.
He has sent me (for my opinion) the most truculent advertisement I ever
saw, in which the white hairs of Gladstone are dragged round Troy behind
my chariot wheels. What can I say? I say nothing to him; and to you, I
content myself with remarking that he seems a desperate fellow.

All luck to you on your American adventure; may you find health, wealth,
and entertainment! If you see, as you likely will, Frank R. Stockton,
pray greet him from me in words to this effect:--

My Stockton if I failed to like,
It were a sheer depravity,
For I went down with the _Thomas Hyke_
And up with the _Negative Gravity_!

I adore these tales.

I hear flourishing accounts of your success at Cambridge, so you leave
with a good omen. Remember me to _green corn_ if it is in season; if
not, you had better hang yourself on a sour apple tree, for your voyage
has been lost.--Yours affectionately,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO AUSTIN DOBSON

Written in acknowledgment of the gift of a desk.

_Bonallie Towers, Bournemouth [December 1884 ?]._

DEAR DOBSON,--Set down my delay to your own fault; I wished to
acknowledge such a gift from you in some of my inapt and slovenly
rhymes; but you should have sent me your pen and not your desk. The
verses stand up to the axles in a miry cross-road, whence the coursers
of the sun shall never draw them; hence I am constrained to this
uncourtliness, that I must appear bef