help me into quieter waters. The oversight
committed--and I do think it was not so bad as Mr. Scribner seems to
think it--and discovered, I was in a miserable position. I need not tell
you that my first impulse was to offer to share or to surrender the
price agreed upon when it should fall due; and it is almost to my credit
that I arranged to refrain. It is one of these positions from which
there is no escape; I cannot undo what I have done. And I wish to beg
you--should Mr. Scribner speak to you in the matter--to try to get him
to see this neglect of mine for no worse than it is: unpardonable
enough, because a breach of an agreement; but still pardonable, because
a piece of sheer carelessness and want of memory, done, God knows,
without design and since most sincerely regretted. I have no memory. You
have seen how I omitted to reserve the American rights in _Jekyll_: last
winter I wrote and demanded, as an increase, a less sum than had already
been agreed upon for a story that I gave to Cassell's. For once that my
forgetfulness has, by a cursed fortune, seemed to gain, instead of lose,
me money, it is painful indeed that I should produce so poor an
impression on the mind of Mr. Scribner. But I beg you to believe, and if
possible to make him believe, that I am in no degree or sense a
_faiseur_, and that in matters of business my design, at least, is
honest. Nor (bating bad memory and self-deception) am I untruthful in
such affairs.

If Mr. Scribner shall have said nothing to you in the matter, please
regard the above as unwritten, and believe me, yours very truly,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO E. L. BURLINGAME

[_Saranac Lake, November 1887._]

DEAR MR. BURLINGAME,--The revise seemed all right, so I did not trouble
you with it; indeed, my demand for one was theatrical, to impress that
obdurate dog, your reader. Herewith a third paper: it has been a cruel
long time upon the road, but here it is, and not bad at last, I fondly
hope. I was glad you liked the _Lantern Bearers_; I did, too. I thought
it was a good paper, really contained some excellent sense, and was
ingeniously put together. I have not often had more trouble than I have
with these papers; thirty or forty pages of foul copy, twenty is the
very least I have had. Well, you pay high; it is fit that I should have
to work hard, it somewhat quiets my conscience.--Yours very truly,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO JOHN ADDINGTON SYMO