But his heart was not in the Law Courts, and already in that book-lined study at 17 Heriot Row, the window of which looked over the Forth to Fife, and the walls of which were so temptingly covered with books, his real life work had begun. No treat was greater, no honour more esteemed, than a visit to that study and a learned disquisition there on its owner's favourite books or methods of work.
Walking up and down with the hands thrown out in gesticulations, semi-foreign but eminently natural—for did not the child of three do it while repeating hymns on that walk to Broughton!—Mr Stevenson gave his opinions on matters grave and gay. Possibly he even produced his note-books, and with a slim finger between the leaves showed us the practice which he considered necessary for the creation of an author and the making of a style, breaking off in the middle of his disquisition to quote some master of the art or to take from the shelves a favourite book and read aloud a pertinent illustration of the subject in hand.
Boswell's Life of Johnson, Borrow's Bible in Spain, the Bible itself, Butler's Hudibras, George Meredith's novels, then less appreciated than now, were all books for a better knowledge of which some of us had to thank those visits to the study: on the shelves too were Bulwer Lytton, Sir Walter Scott, the old dramatists, ballads, and chapbooks, and innumerable favourites that had a place in his heart as well as in his bookcase.
Keen and clever were the criticisms he made on them—criticisms that come back to one with the pathos of 'a voice that is still' when one reads in his Gossip on Romance and A Humble Remonstrance his delight in Boswell, his pleasure in All Sorts and Conditions of Men, and his admiration for Scott as a Prince of Romance writers, for whose style he had not one good word to say!
He had early edited and written for amateur magazines, and when only sixteen he wrote a pamphlet on the Pentland Rising of 1666,[4] which is still in existence but a great rarity; the same subject inspired a romance, and another romance was composed about Hackston of Rathillet, that sombre and impressive witness of the murder of Archbishop Sharp, whose conscientious refusal either to take part for or against the victim had from childhood appealed to Mr Stevenson as pathetic and picturesque. He also wrote in those days a poetical play, some dramatic dialogues, and a pamphlet called An Appeal to the Church of Scotland, in which his father was keenly interested. The style in his early letters and notes of travel was excellent, but he destroyed most of his writings at that time as he worked for practice rather than for publication. He contributed frequently about 1871 to the University Magazine, in which, as he kindly lent it to us, some of us had the pleasure of reading An Old Gardener and A Pastoral, two papers of much promise, very full of outdoor life, the caller air of the Pentland hills and the scent of the old-fashioned flowers in the Swanston garden.
Edinburgh, as a picturesque, historic city, he loved with a life's devotion; Edinburgh, as a frivolous social centre, he despised; so some of the strictures he made on it in Picturesque Edinburgh, published in 1879, and beautifully illustrated by Mr Sam Bough and Mr Lockhart, gave dire offence at the time to the denizens of 'Auld Reekie,' and are in some quarters hardly pardoned even now when death and fame have made Scotland's capital value her gifted son at his true worth.
In 1873 Mr Stevenson made the acquaintance of Mr Sydney Colvin and a life-long friendship ensued. The older man was of great use in many ways to the younger, whose genius he early discovered, and whose leaning to literature he encouraged. In the interesting preface to The Vailima Letters Mr Colvin tells of his help in that time of trial, and that he used his influence to persuade the parents that Louis had found his real vocation in literature, and ought to follow it. No doubt when the large and full Life of Mr Stevenson, which Mr Colvin is preparing, appears, he will have much of interest to tell of that turning-point in the young man's life. He was of service also in introducing his friend to editors, and Mr Stevenson's first serious appearance in literature was an essay on Roads sent by Mr Colvin to Mr Hamerton, the editor of The Portfolio, in 1873. It appeared shortly, and was followed by more work there and elsewhere; Cornhill, Longmans, and Macmillan having all before long printed papers by the new writer. In Macmillan the paper Ordered South appeared in April 1874, and had a pathetic interest as it was an account of the first of its author's many pilgrimages in search of health, which, after he grew to manhood, were to make up so much of his life's experience.
In Fraser's, Scribner's, The New Amphion, The Magazine of Art, his early work also found acceptance, and he occasionally contributed to The Contemporary Review and The English Illustrated, a list of well-known magazines in the home country which makes the more remarkable the refusal of the American papers to use his contributions largely, during his stay in San Francisco and Monterey.
Of that charming dreamy sketch of those days, Will o' the Mill, which appeared in Cornhill, Mr Hamerton wrote in the highest terms of praise. Most of these early essays, sketches, and tales have been republished, and in the beautiful Edinburgh Edition of his works, presently being seen through the press by Mr Colvin and Mr Baxter, and all but completed, his many admirers will be able to read all that came from his busy and graceful pen.
In 1878 Mr Stevenson's first book, An Inland Voyage, was published by Messrs Chatto & Windus. It is a bright, fresh account of a trip in canoes, 'The Arethusa' and 'The Cigarette,' made by Mr Stevenson and his friend the late Sir Walter G. Simpson up the Oise and the Sambre. The travellers had unique opportunities of observing people and scenery, and of these the writer made the most, consequently the book is full of pretty pictures of scenery and quaint touches of human life which make it charming reading.