Lord knows whether it is worth anything! - some of it pleases me a
good deal, but I fear it is quite unfit for any possible magazine.
However, I wish you to see it, as you know the humour in which it
was conceived, walking alone and very happily about the Suffolk
highways and byeways on several splendid sunny afternoons. -
Believe me, ever your faithful friend,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

MONDAY. - I have looked over ROADS again, and I am aghast at its
feebleness. It is the trial of a very ''prentice hand' indeed.
Shall I ever learn to do anything well? However, it shall go to
you, for the reasons given above.



Letter: TO MRS. SITWELL



EDINBURGH, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1873.

. . . I MUST be very strong to have all this vexation and still to
be well. I was weighed the other day, and the gross weight of my
large person was eight stone six! Does it not seem surprising that
I can keep the lamp alight, through all this gusty weather, in so
frail a lantern? And yet it burns cheerily.

My mother is leaving for the country this morning, and my father
and I will be alone for the best part of the week in this house.