me; it is so solidly written. And that
again brings back (almost with the voice of despair) my unanswerable:
why is it false?

Here is a great deal about my works. I am in bed again; and my wife but
so-so; and we have no news recently from Lloyd; and the cat is well; and
we see, or I see, no one; so that other matters are all closed against
me.

Your vision is strange indeed; but I see not how to use it; I fear I am
earthy enough myself to regard it as a case of disease, but certainly it
is a thrilling case to hear of.--Ever affectionately yours,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO HENRY JAMES

This letter is written on the front page of a set of proofs of
_Memories and Portraits_. The "silly Xmas story" is _The
Misadventures of John Nicholson_; the "volume of verse" appeared
later in the year as _Underwoods_. The signature refers to the two
Scots poets of whom, "in his native speech," he considered himself
the follower.

_Skerryvore, Bournemouth, January 1887._

All the salutations!

MY DEAR JAMES,--I send you the first sheets of the new volume, all that
has yet reached me, the rest shall follow in course. I am really a very
fair sort of a fellow all things considered, have done some work; a
silly Xmas story (with some larks in it) which won't be out till I don't
know when. I am also considering a volume of verse, much of which will
be cast in my native speech, that very dark oracular medium: I suppose
this is a folly, but what then? As the nurse says in Marryat, "It was
only a little one."

My wife is peepy and dowie: two Scotch expressions with which I will
leave you to wrestle unaided, as a preparation for my poetical works.
She is a woman (as you know) not without art: the art of extracting the
gloom of the eclipse from sunshine; and she has recently laboured in
this field not without success or (as we used to say) not without a
blessing. It is strange: "we fell out my wife and I" the other night;
she tackled me savagely for being a canary-bird; I replied (bleatingly)
protesting that there was no use in turning life into King Lear;
presently it was discovered that there were two dead combatants upon the
field, each slain by an arrow of the truth, and we tenderly carried off
each other's corpses. Here is a little comedy for Henry James to write!
The beauty was each thought the other quite unscathed at first. But we
had dealt shrewd stabs.

You say nothing of yourself, wh