Robert Louis Stevenson: a record, an estimate, and a memorial Part 4

And I direct the said Annie H. Ide to add to the said name of Annie H. Ide the name of Louisa-at least in private-and I charge her to use my said birthday with moderation and humanity, et tamquam bona filia familias, the said birthday not being so young as it once was and having carried me in a very satisfactory manner since I can remember;

And in case the said Annie H. Ide shall neglect or contravene either of the above conditions, I hereby revoke the donation and transfer my rights in the said birthday to the President of the United States of America for the time being.

In witness whereof I have hereto set my hand and seal this 19th day of June, in the year of grace eighteen hundred and ninety-one.

Robert Louis Stevenson. [Seal.]

Witness, Lloyd Osbourne.

Witness, Harold Watts.

He died in Samoa in December 1894-not from phthisis or anything directly connected with it, but from the bursting of a blood-vessel and suffusion of blood on the brain. He had up to the moment almost of his sudden and unexpected death been busy on Weir of Hermiston and St Ives, which he left unfinished-the latter having been brought to a conclusion by Mr Quiller-Couch.

CHAPTER IX-SOME CHARACTERISTICS

In Stevenson we lost one of the most powerful writers of our day, as well as the most varied in theme and style. When I use the word "powerful," I do not mean merely the producing of the most striking or sensational results, nor the facility of weaving a fascinating or blood-curdling plot; I mean the writer who seemed always to have most in reserve-a secret fund of power and fascination which always pointed beyond the printed page, and set before the attentive and careful reader a strange but fascinating personality. Other authors have done that in measure. There was Hawthorne, behind whose writings there is always the wistful, cold, far-withdrawn spectator of human nature-eerie, inquisitive, and, I had almost said, inquisitorial-a little bloodless, eerie, weird, and cobwebby. There was Dr Wendell Holmes, with his problems of heredity, of race-mixture and weird inoculation, as in Elsie Venner and The Guardian Angel, and there were Poe and Charles Whitehead. Stevenson, in a few of his writings-in one of the Merry Men chapters and in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and, to some extent, in The Master of Ballantrae-showed that he could enter on the obscure and, in a sense, weird and metaphysical elements in human life; though always there was, too, a touch at least of gloomy suggestion, from which, as it seemed, he could not there wholly escape. But always, too, there was a touch that suggests the universal.

Even in the stories that would be cla.s.sed as those of incident and adventure merely, Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and the rest, there is a sense as of some unaffected but fine symbolism that somehow touches something of possibility in yourself as you read. The simplest narrative from his hand proclaimed itself a deep study in human nature-its motives tendencies, and possibilities. In these stories there is promise at once of the most realistic imagination, the most fantastic romance, keen insights into some sides of human nature, and weird fancies, as well as the most delicate and dainty pictures of character. And this is precisely what we have-always with a vein of the finest autobiography-a kind of select and indirect self-revelation-often with a touch of quaintness, a subdued humour, and sweet-blooded vagary, if we may be allowed the word, which make you feel towards the writer as towards a friend. He was too much an artist to overdo this, and his strength lies there, that generally he suggests and turns away at the right point, with a smile, as you ask for more. Look how he sets, half slyly, these words into the mouth of David Balfour on his first meeting with Catriona in one of the steep wynds or closes off the High Street of Edinburgh:

"There is no greater wonder than the way the face of a young woman fits in a man's mind, and stays there, and he never could tell you why: it just seems it was the thing he wanted."

Take this alongside of his remark made to his mother while still a youth-"that he did not care to understand the strain on a bridge" (when he tried to study engineering); what he wanted was something with human nature in it. His style, in his essays, etc., where he writes in his own person, is most polished, full of phrases finely drawn; when he speaks through others, as in Kidnapped and David Balfour, it is still fine and effective, and generally it is fairly true to the character, with cunning glimpses, nevertheless, of his own temper and feeling too. He makes us feel his confidants and friends, as has been said. One could almost construct a biography from his essays and his novels-the one would give us the facts of his life suffused with fancy and ideal colour, humour and fine observation not wanting; the other would give us the history of his mental and moral being and development, and of the traits and determinations which he drew from along a lengthened line of progenitors. How characteristic it is of him-a man who for so many years suffered as an invalid-that he should lay it down that the two great virtues, including all others, were cheerfulness and delight in labour.

One writer has very well said on this feature in Stevenson:

"Other authors have struggled bravely against physical weakness, but their work has not usually been of a creative order, dependent for its success on high animal spirits. They have written histories, essays, contemplative or didactic poems, works which may more or less be regarded as 'dull narcotics numbing pain.' But who, in so fragile a frame as Robert Louis Stevenson's, has retained such indomitable elasticity, such fertility of invention, such unflagging energy, not merely to collect and arrange, but to project and body forth? Has any true 'maker' been such an incessant sufferer? From his childhood, as he himself said apropos of the Child's Garden, he could 'speak with less authority of gardens than of that other "land of counterpane."' There were, indeed, a few years of adolescence during which his health was tolerable, but they were years of apprentices.h.i.+p to life and art ('pioching,' as he called it), not of serious production. Though he was a precocious child, his genius ripened slowly, and it was just reaching maturity when the 'wolverine,' as he called his disease, fixed its fangs in his flesh. From that time forward not only did he live with death at his elbow in an almost literal sense (he used to carry his left arm in a sling lest a too sudden movement should bring on a haemorrhage), but he had ever-recurring intervals of weeks and months during which he was totally unfit for work; while even at the best of times he had to husband his strength most jealously. Add to all this that he was a slow and laborious writer, who would take more pains with a phrase than Scott with a chapter-then look at the stately shelf of his works, brimful of impulse, initiative, and the joy of life, and say whether it be an exaggeration to call his tenacity and fort.i.tude unique!"

Samoa, with its fine climate, prolonged his life-we had fain hoped that in that air he found so favourable he might have lived for many years, to add to the precious stock of innocent delight he has given to the world-to do yet more and greater. It was not to be. They buried him, with full native honours as to a chief, on the top of Vaea mountain, 1300 feet high-a road for the coffin to pa.s.s being cut through the woods on the slopes of the hill. There he has a resting-place not all unfit-for he sought the pure and clearer air on the heights from whence there are widest prospects; yet not in the spot he would have chosen-for his heart was at home, and not very long before his death he sang, surely with pathetic reference now:

"Spring shall come, come again, calling up the moorfowl, Spring shall bring the sun and rain, bring the bees and flowers, Red shall the heather bloom over hill and valley, Soft flow the stream thro' the even-flowing hours; Fair the day s.h.i.+ne, as it shone upon my childhood- Fair s.h.i.+ne the day on the house with open door; Birds come and cry there, and twitter in the chimney- But I go for ever and come again no more."

CHAPTER X-A SAMOAN MEMORIAL OF R. L. STEVENSON

A few weeks after his death, the mail from Samoa, brought to Stevenson's friends, myself among the number, a precious, if pathetic, memorial of the master. It is in the form of "A Letter to Mr Stevenson's Friends," by his stepson, Mr Lloyd Osbourne, and bears the motto from Walt Whitman, "I have been waiting for you these many years. Give me your hand and welcome." Mr Osbourne gives a full account of the last hours.

"He wrote hard all that morning of the last day; his half-finished book, Hermiston, he judged the best he had ever written, and the sense of successful effort made him buoyant and happy as nothing else could. In the afternoon the mail fell to be answered-not business correspondence, for this was left till later-but replies to the long, kindly letters of distant friends received but two days since, and still bright in memory. At sunset he came downstairs; rallied his wife about the forebodings she could not shake off; talked of a lecturing tour to America that he was eager to make, 'as he was now so well'; and played a game of cards with her to drive away her melancholy. He said he was hungry; begged her a.s.sistance to help him make a salad for the evening meal; and, to enhance the little feast he brought up a bottle of old Burgundy from the cellar. He was helping his wife on the verandah, and gaily talking, when suddenly he put both hands to his head and cried out, 'What's that?' Then he asked quickly, 'Do I look strange?' Even as he did so he fell on his knees beside her. He was helped into the great hall, between his wife and his body-servant, Sosimo, losing consciousness instantly as he lay back in the armchair that had once been his grandfather's. Little time was lost in bringing the doctors-Anderson of the man-of-war, and his friend, Dr Funk. They looked at him and shook their heads; they laboured strenuously, and left nothing undone. But he had pa.s.sed the bounds of human skill. He had grown so well and strong, that his wasted lungs were unable to bear the stress of returning health."

Then 'tis told how the Rev. Mr Clarke came and prayed by him; and how, soon after, the chiefs were summoned, and came, bringing their fine mats, which, laid on the body, almost hid the Union jack in which it had been wrapped. One of the old Mataafa chiefs, who had been in prison, and who had been one of those who worked on the making of the "Road of the Loving Heart" (the road of grat.i.tude which the chiefs had made up to Mr Stevenson's house as a mark of their appreciation of his efforts on their behalf), came and crouched beside the body and said:

"I am only a poor Samoan, and ignorant. Others are rich, and can give Tusitala [6] the parting presents of rich, fine mats; I am poor, and can give nothing this last day he receives his friends. Yet I am not afraid to come and look the last time in my friend's face, never to see him more till we meet with G.o.d. Behold! Tusitala is dead; Mataafa is also dead. These two great friends have been taken by G.o.d. When Mataafa was taken, who was our support but Tusitala? We were in prison, and he cared for us. We were sick, and he made us well. We were hungry, and he fed us. The day was no longer than his kindness. You are great people, and full of love. Yet who among you is so great as Tusitala? What is your love to his love? Our clan was Mataafa's clan, for whom I speak this day; therein was Tusitala also. We mourn them both."

A select company of Samoans would not be deterred, and watched by the body all night, chanting songs, with bits of Catholic prayers; and in the morning the work began of clearing a path through the wood on the hill to the spot on the crown where Mr Stevenson had expressed a wish to be buried. The following prayer, which Mr Stevenson had written and read aloud to his family only the night before, was read by Mr Clarke in the service:

"We beseech thee, Lord, to behold us with favour, folk of many families and nations, gathered together in the peace of this roof; weak men and women, subsisting under the covert of Thy patience. Be patient still; suffer us yet a while longer-with our broken purposes of good, with our idle endeavours against evil-suffer us a while longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better. Bless to us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these must be taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our friends; be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest: if any awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when the day returns to us, our Sun and Comforter, call us up with morning faces and with morning hearts-eager to labour-eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our portion; and if the day be marked for sorrow, strong to endure it.

"We thank Thee and praise Thee, and in the words of Him to whom this day is sacred, close our oblations."

Mr Bazzet M. Haggard, H.B.M., Land-Commissioner, tells, by way of reminiscence, the story of "The Road of Good Heart," how it came to be built, and of the great feast Mr Stevenson gave at the close of the work, at which, in the course of his speech, he said:

"You are all aware in some degree of what has happened. You know those chiefs to have been prisoners; you perhaps know that during the term of their confinement I had it in my power to do them certain favours. One thing some of you cannot know, that they were immediately repaid by answering attentions. They were liberated by the new Administration... . As soon as they were free men-owing no man anything-instead of going home to their own places and families, they came to me. They offered to do this work (to make this road) for me as a free gift, without hire, without supplies, and I was tempted at first to refuse their offer. I knew the country to be poor; I knew famine threatening; I knew their families long disorganised for want of supervision. Yet I accepted, because I thought the lesson of that road might be more useful to Samoa than a thousand bread-fruit trees, and because to myself it was an exquisite pleasure to receive that which was so handsomely offered. It is now done; you have trod it to-day in coming hither. It has been made for me by chiefs; some of them old, some sick, all newly delivered from a hara.s.sing confinement, and in spite of weather unusually hot and insalubrious. I have seen these chiefs labour valiantly with their own hands upon the work, and I have set up over it, now that it is finished the name of 'The Road of Grat.i.tude' (the road of loving hearts), and the names of those that built it. 'In perpetuam memoriam,' we say, and speak idly. At least, as long as my own life shall be spared it shall be here perpetuated; partly for my pleasure and in my grat.i.tude; partly for others continually to publish the lesson of this road."

And turning to the chiefs, Mr Stevenson said:

"I will tell you, chiefs, that when I saw you working on that road, my heart grew warm; not with grat.i.tude only, but with hope. It seemed to me that I read the promise of something good for Samoa; it seemed to me as I looked at you that you were a company of warriors in a battle, fighting for the defence of our common country against all aggression. For there is a time to fight and a time to dig. You Samoans may fight, you may conquer twenty times, and thirty times, and all will be in vain. There is but one way to defend Samoa. Hear it, before it is too late. It is to make roads and gardens, and care for your trees, and sell their produce wisely; and, in one word, to occupy and use your country. If you do not, others will... .

"I love Samoa and her people. I love the land. I have chosen it to be my home while I live, and my grave after I am dead, and I love the people, and have chosen them to be my people, to live and die with. And I see that the day is come now of the great battle; of the great and the last opportunity by which it shall be decided whether you are to pa.s.s away like those other races of which I have been speaking, or to stand fast and have your children living on and honouring your memory in the land you received of your fathers."

Mr James H. Mulligan, U.S. Consul, told of the feast of Thanksgiving Day on the 29th November prior to Mr Stevenson's death, and how at great pains he had procured for it the necessary turkey, and how Mrs Stevenson had found a fair subst.i.tute for the pudding. In the course of his speech in reply to an unexpected proposal of "The Host," Mr Stevenson said:

"There on my right sits she who has but lately from our own loved native land come back to me-she to whom, with no lessening of affection to those others to whom I cling, I love better than all the world besides-my mother. From the opposite end of the table, my wife, who has been all in all to me, when the days were very dark, looks to-night into my eyes-while we have both grown a bit older-with undiminished and undiminis.h.i.+ng affection.

"Childless, yet on either side of me sits that good woman, my daughter, and the stalwart man, my son, and both have been and are more than son and daughter to me, and have brought into my life mirth and beauty. Nor is this all. There sits the bright boy dear to my heart, full of the flow and the spirits of boyhood, so that I can even know that for a time at least we have still the voice of a child in the house."

Mr A. W. Mackay gives an account of the funeral and a description of the burial-place, ending:

"Tofa Tusitala! Sleep peacefully! on thy mountain-top, alone in Nature's sanct.i.ty, where the wooddove's note, the moaning of the waves as they break unceasingly on the distant reef, and the sighing of the winds in the distant tavai trees chant their requiem."

The Rev. Mr Clarke tells of the constant and active interest Mr Stevenson took in the missionaries and their work, often aiding them by his advice and fine insight into the character of the natives; and a translation follows of a dirge by one of the chiefs, so fine that we must give it:

I.

"Listen, O this world, as I tell of the disaster That befell in the late afternoon; That broke like a wave of the sea Suddenly and swiftly, blinding our eyes.

Alas for Loia who speaks tears in his voice!

Refrain-Groan and weep, O my heart, in its sorrow.

Alas for Tusitala, who rests in the forest!

Aimlessly we wait, and sorrowing. Will he again return?

Lament, O Vailima, waiting and ever waiting!

Let us search and inquire of the captain of s.h.i.+ps, 'Be not angry, but has not Tusitala come?'

II.

"Teuila, sorrowing one, come thou hither!

Prepare me a letter, and I will carry it.

Let her Majesty Victoria be told That Tusitala, the loving one, has been taken hence.

Refrain-Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc.

III.

"Alas! my heart weeps with anxious grief As I think of the days before us: Of the white men gathering for the Christmas a.s.sembly!

Alas for Aolele! left in her loneliness, And the men of Vailima, who weep together Their leader-their leader being taken.

Refrain-Groan and weep, O my heart, etc., etc.

IV.

"Alas! O my heart! it weeps unceasingly When I think of his illness Coming upon him with fatal swiftness.

Would that it waited a glance or a word from him, Or some token, some token from us of our love.