A LETTER TO E. L. BURLINGAME
S.S. "JANET NICOLL," OFF PERU ISLAND,
KINGSMILLS GROUP, July 13th, '90
MY DEAR BURLINGAME, -- I am moved to write to
you in the matter of the end papers. I am
somewhat tempted to begin them again. Follow
the reasons pro and con:--
1st. I must say I feel as if something in
the nature of the end paper were a desirable
finish to the number, and that the substitutes
of occasional essays by occasional contributors
somehow fail to fill the bill. Should you
differ with me on this point, no more is to
be said. And what follows must be regarded
as lost words.
2nd. I am rather taken with the idea of
continuing the work. For instance, should
you have no distaste for papers of the class
called "Random Memories," I should enjoy
continuing them (of course at intervals),
and when they were done I have an idea they
might make a readable book. On the other
hand, I believe a greater freedom of choice
might be taken, the subjects more varied and
more briefly treated, in somewhat approaching
the manner of Andrew Lang in the "Sign of the
Ship"; it being well understood that the broken
sticks[1] method is one not very suitable (as
Colonel Burke would say) to my genius, and
not very likely to be pushed far in my practice.
Upon this point I wish you to condense your
massive brain. In the last lot I was promised,
and I fondly expected to receive, a vast
amount of assistance from intelligent and
genial correspondents. I assure you, I never
had a scratch of a pen from any one above the
level of a village idiot, except once, when
a lady sowed my head full of grey hairs by
announcing that she was going to direct her
life in future by my counsels. Will the
correspondents be more copious and less
irrelevant in the future? Suppose that to
be the case, will they be of any use to me
in my place of exile? Is it possible for a
man in Samoa to be in touch with the great
heart of the People? And is it not perhaps
a mere folly to attempt, from so hopeless a
distance, anything so delicate as a series
of papers? Upon these points, perpend, and
give me the results of your perpensions.
3rd. The emolument would be agreeable to your
humble servant.
I have now stated all the pros, and the most
of the cons are come in by the way. There
follows, however, one immense Con (with a
capital "C"), which I beg you to consider
particularly. I fear that, to be of any use
for your magazine, these papers should begin
with the beginning of a volume. Even supposing
my hands were free, this would be now impossible
for next year. You have to consider whether,
supposing you have no other objection, it would
be worth while to begin the series in the middle
of a volume, or desirable to delay the whole
matter until the beginning of another year.
Now supposing that the cons have it, and you
refuse my offer, let me make another proposal,
which you will be very inclined to refuse at
the first off-go, but which I really believe
might in time come to something. You know how
the penny papers have their answers to
correspondents. Why not do something of the
same kind for the "culchawed"? Why not get
men like Stimson, Brownell, Professor James,
Goldwin Smith, and others who will occur to
you more readily than to me, to put and to
answer a series of questions of intellectual
and general interest, until at last you should
have established a certain standard of matter
to be discussed in this part of the Magazine?
I want you to get me bound volumes of the
Magazine from its start. The Lord knows I
have had enough copies; where they are I
know not. A wandering author gathers no
magazines.
"The Wrecker" is in no forrader state than
in last reports. I have indeed got to a
period when I cannot well go on until I
can refresh myself on the proofs of the
beginning. My respected collaborator, who
handles the machine which is now addressing
you, has indeed carried his labours farther,
but not, I am led to understand, with what
we used to call a blessing; at least, I have
been refused a sight of his latest labours.
However, there is plenty of time ahead, and
I feel no anxiety about the tale, except
that it may meet with your approval.
All this voyage I have been busy over my
"Travels," which, given a very high temperature
and the saloon of a steamer usually going
before the wind, and with the cabins in
front of the engines, has come very near
to prostrating me altogether. You will
therefore understand that there are no more
poems. I wonder whether there are already
enough, and whether you think that such a
volume would be worth the publishing? I
shall hope to find in Sydney some expression
of your opinion on this point. Living as
I do among -- not the most cultured of
mankind ("splendidly educated and perfect
gentlemen when sober") -- I attach a growing
importance to friendly criticisms from
yourself.
I believe that this is the most of our
business. As for my health, I got over
my cold in a fine style, but have not been
very well of late. To my unaffected annoyance,
the blood-spitting has started again. I
find the heat of a steamer decidedly wearing
and trying in these latitudes, and I am
inclined to think the superior expedition
rather dearly paid for. Still, the fact
that one does not even remark the coming
of a squall, nor feel relief on its departure,
is a mercy not to be acknowledged without
gratitude. The rest of the family seem
to be doing fairly well; both seem less run
down than they were on the Equator, and
Mrs. Stevenson very much less so. We have
now been three months away, have visited
about thirty-five islands, many of which
were novel to us, and some extremely
entertaining; some also were old acquaintances,
and pleasant to revisit. In the meantime,
we have really a capital time aboard ship,
in the most pleasant and interesting society,
and with (considering the length and nature
of the voyage) an excellent table. Please
remember us all to Mr. Scribner, the young
chieftain of the house, and the lady, whose
health I trust is better. To Mrs. Burlingame
we all desire to be remembered, and I hope
you will give our news to Low, St. Gaudens,
Faxon, and others of the faithful in the
city. I shall probably return to Samoa
direct, having given up all idea of returning
to civilisation in the meanwhile. There,
on my ancestral acres, which I purchased six
months ago from a blind Scots blacksmith,
you will please address me until further
notice. The name of the ancestral acres is
going to be Vailima; but as at the present
moment nobody else knows the name, except
myself and the co-patentees, it will be
safer, if less ambitious, to address R. L. S.,
Apia, Samoa. The ancestral acres run to
upwards of three hundred; they enjoy the
ministrations of five streams, whence the
name. They are all at the present moment
under a trackless covering of magnificent
forest, which would be worth a great deal
if it grew beside a railway terminus. To
me, as it stands, it represents a handsome
deficit. Obliging natives from the Cannibal
Islands are now cutting it down at my expense.
You would be able to run your magazine to
much greater advantage if the terms of
authors were on the same scale with those
of my cannibals. We have also a house about
the size of a manufacturer's lodge. 'Tis
but the egg of the future palace, over the
details of which on paper Mrs. Stevenson and
I have already shed real tears; what it will
be when it comes to paying for it, I leave
you to imagine. But if it can only be built
as now intended, it will be with genuine
satisfaction and a growunded pride that I
shall welcome you at the steps of my Old
Colonial Home, when you land from the steamer
on a long-merited holiday. I speak much at
my ease; yet I do not know, I may be now
an outlaw, a bankrupt, the abhorred of all
good men. I do not know, you probably do.
Has Hyde[2] turned upon me? Have I fallen,
like Danvers Carew?
It is suggested to me that you might like
to know what will be my future society.
Three consuls, all at loggerheads with one
another, or at the best in a clique of two
against one; three different sets of
missionaries, not upon the best of terms;
and the Catholics and Protestants in a
condition of unhealable ill-feeling as to
whether a wooden drum ought or ought not
to be beaten to announce the time of school --
the pertinacity of this dispute and the
importance attached to it by the Catholics
is something not to be conceived. The
native population, very genteel, very
songful, very agreeable, very good-looking,
chronically spoiling for a fight (a
circumstance not to be entirely neglected
in the design of the palace). As for the
white population of (technically, "The
Beach"), I don't suppose it is possible
for any person not thoroughly conversant
with the South Seas to form the smallest
conception of such a society, with its
grog-shops, its apparently unemployed
hangers-on, its merchants of all degrees
of respectability and the reverse. The
paper, of which I must really send you a
copy -- if yours were really a live magazine,
you would have an exchange with the editor:
I assure you, it has of late contained a
great deal of matter about one of your
contributors -- rejoices in the name of
Samoa Times and South Sea Advertiser.
The advertisements in the Advertiser are
permanent, being simply subsidies for its
existence. A dashing warfare of newspaper
correspondence goes on between the various
residents, who are rather fond of recurring
to one another's antecedents. But when
all is said, there are a lot of very nice,
pleasant people, and I don't know that Apia
is very much worse than half a hundred
towns that I could name.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
[1] French batons rompus: disconnected thoughts or studies.
[2] The Rev. Dr. Hyde, of Honolulu:
in reference to Stevenson's letter on Father Damien.
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