was a great favourite with Mr. Stevenson. He had a theory that the
not uncommon distaste among the people for that branch of literature
was largely the fault of the dull style adopted by many historians,
and saw no good reason why the thrilling story of the great events of
the world should not be presented in a manner that would hold the
interest of readers. Yet he had no patience with the sort of writing
that subordinates truth to the desire of presenting a striking
picture. As an instance, certainly of rare occurrence in Parkman, he
noticed a paragraph in _The Conspiracy of Pontiac_, in which the
author refers to the shining of the moon on a certain night when a
party was endeavouring to make a secret passage down the river through
hostile country. He thought it unlikely that Parkman could have known
that the moon shone on that particular night, though it is possible
that he did him an injustice, for it sometimes happens that just such
a trivial circumstance is mentioned in the documents of the early
explorers.

Sometimes he read aloud to us from some French writer, translating it
into English as he read for our benefit. _Les Etrangleurs_ was one of
the books that he read to us in this way, while we sat and sewed our
seams. He seemed to get a good deal of rest as well as amusement from
the reading of such books of mystery and adventure. His taste was
always for the decent in literature, and he was much offended by the
works of the writers of the materialistic school who were just then
gaining a vogue. Among these was Emile Zola, and he exacted a promise
from me never to read that writer--a promise that has been faithfully
kept to this day.

His stay at Monterey had given him a fancy to study the Spanish
language, so we obtained books and began it together. He had a theory
that a language could be best acquired by plunging directly into it,
but I have a suspicion that our choice of a drama of the sixteenth
century, one of Lope de Vega's, I think, was scarcely a wise one for
beginners. He refers to this venture of ours in a letter to Sidney
Colvin as "the play which the sister and I are just beating our way
through with two bad dictionaries and an insane grammar."
Nevertheless, we made some headway, and I remember that he marvelled
greatly at the far-fetched, high-flown similes and figures of speech
indulged in by the writers of the "Golden Age" of Spain. In spite of
his confessed dislike for the cold-blooded study of