n life: _la carriere
humaine_. I will enclose, if I remember, the required autograph.

I will do better, put it on the back of this page. Love to all, and
mostly, my very dear Colvin, to yourself. For whatever I say or do, or
don't say or do, you may be very sure I am--Yours always affectionately,

R. L. S.

TO MISS ADELAIDE BOODLE

_Saranac Lake, Christmas 1887._

MY DEAR MISS BOODLE,---And a very good Christmas to you all; and better
fortune; and if worse, the more courage to support it--which I think is
the kinder wish in all human affairs. Somewhile--I fear a good
while--after this, you should receive our Christmas gift; we have no
tact and no taste, only a welcome and (often) tonic brutality; and I
dare say the present, even after my friend Baxter has acted on and
reviewed my hints, may prove a White Elephant. That is why I dread
presents. And therefore pray understand if any element of that hamper
prove unwelcome, _it is to be exchanged_. I will not sit down under the
name of a giver of White Elephants. I never had any elephant but one,
and his initials were R. L. S.; and he trod on my foot at a very early
age. But this is a fable, and not in the least to the point: which is
that if, for once in my life, I have wished to make things nicer for
anybody but the Elephant (see fable), do not suffer me to have made them
ineffably more embarrassing, and exchange--ruthlessly exchange!

For my part, I am the most cockered up of any mortal being; and one of
the healthiest, or thereabout, at some modest distance from the bull's
eye. I am condemned to write twelve articles in Scribner's Magazine for
the love of gain; I think I had better send you them; what is far more
to the purpose, I am on the jump with a new story which has bewitched
me--I doubt it may bewitch no one else. It is called _The Master of
Ballantrae_--pronounce B[=a]ll[)a]n-tray. If it is not good, well, mine
will be the fault; for I believe it is a good tale.

The greetings of the season to you, and your mother, and your sisters.
My wife heartily joins.--And I am, yours very sincerely,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

_P.S._--You will think me an illiterate dog: I am, for the first time,
reading Robertson's sermons. I do not know how to express how much I
think of them. If by any chance you should be as illiterate as I, and
not know them, it is worth while curing the defect.

R. L. S.

TO CHARLES BAXTER

The fo