penumbra of death. Yet Stevenson spoke always as gallantly as his
great predecessor. Their "cheerful stoicism," which allies his books
with the best British breeding, will keep them classical as long as
our nation shall value breeding. It shines to our dim eyes now, as we
turn over the familiar pages of _Virginibus Puerisque_, and from page
after page--in sentences and fragments of sentences--"It is not
altogether ill with the invalid after all" ... "Who would project a
serial novel after Thackeray and Dickens had each fallen in
mid-course." [_He_ had two books at least in hand and uncompleted, the
papers say.] "Who would find heart enough to begin to live, if he
dallied with the consideration of death?" ... "What sorry and pitiful
quibbling all this is!" ... "It is better to live and be done with it,
than to die daily in the sick-room. By all means begin your folio;
even if the doctor does not give you a year, even if he hesitates over
a month, make one brave push and see what can be accomplished in a
week.... For surely, at whatever age it overtake the man, this is to
die young.... The noise of the mallet and chisel is scarcely quenched,
the trumpets are hardly done blowing, when, trailing with him clouds
of glory, this happy-starred, full-blooded spirit shoots into the
spiritual land."

As it was in _Virginibus Puerisque_, so is it in the last essay in his
last book of essays:--

"And the Kingdom of Heaven is of the childlike, of those who are
easy to please, who love and who give pleasure. Mighty men of
their hands, the smiters, and the builders, and the judges, have
lived long and done sternly, and yet preserved this lovely
character; and among our carpet interests and two-penny concerns,
the shame were indelible if _we_ should lose it. _Gentleness and