Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson, the son of a man of some means, was born in Edinburgh, November 30, 1850. The Louis form of his second name was merely a caprice in spelling adopted by the boy, and never altered the pronunciation of the original by his family. An only child, afflicted with poor health, he was an object of solicitude, notably to his nurse, Alison Cunningham, to whose loving devotion the world owes an unpayable debt. Stevenson's appreciation of her faithful ministrations is beautifully voiced in the dedication of his "A Child's Garden of Verses" (1885). After some schooling, made more or less desultory by ill-health, he attended Edinburgh University. The family profession was lighthouse engineering, and though he gave it enough attention to receive a medal for a suggested improvement on a lighthouse lamp, his heart was not in engineering, so he compromised with his father on law. He was called to the Scottish bar and rode on circuit with the court, but, becoming master of his destiny, he abandoned law for literature.
Literature was the serious purpose of his life and to it he gave an ardor of industry which is amazing. He worked at the mastery of its technique for years, till he gained that felicity of expression which has made his writings classical. His earliest publications were essays, often inspired by his trips abroad in search of health. On one of these in France in 1876 he met his future wife, Mrs. Osbourne, an American. Other such trips are recorded in "An Inland Voyage" (1878) and in "Travels with a Donkey" (1879). In 1879 he came to America, travelling in a rough way to California, an experience made use of in his book "An Amateur Emigrant." As a consequence of this trip, he fell desperately ill in San Francisco, where he was nursed by Mrs. Osbourne, whom he married in 1880. His convalescence in an abandoned mining camp is recorded in "The Silverado Squatters" (1883). Returning to Scotland, they found the climate impossible for his weak lungs, consequently they tried various places on the Continent. Throughout his ill-health he heroically kept at work, publishing from time to time books of essays and short-stories, such as "Virginibus Puerisque" (1881) and "New Arabian Nights" (1882), parts of which had already appeared in magazines, and in 1883 his first popular success, "Treasure Island."
In 1887 his father died and in the next year he came again to America, sojourning at various places, among them Saranac Lake, and then voyaging in a sailing vessel, The Casco, in the Pacific. It was not his ill-health alone that kept him on the move, but an adventurous spirit as well. Finally the family settled at Apia, Samoa, the climate of which he found remarkably salubrious. There he could work even physically without the long spells of illness to which he had been accustomed all his life. He was able to take an intense interest in the unhappy politics of the islands, endeavoring to alleviate the unfortunate condition of the natives, who passionately returned his interest. They built for him to his house a road to which they gave the significant name of "The Road of the Loving Heart," and they celebrated his story-telling gift by the name "Tusitala," the teller of tales. His efforts for Samoa resulted in a book entitled "A Foot Note to History" (1893), which showed the troubled condition of the islands. In this place, ruling over a large retinue of servants like a Scottish chieftain over his clan, he lived for three years, turning out much work and producing half of that most wonderful novel, "Weir of Hermiston," which bid fair to be his greatest achievement. Death came suddenly in 1894 from the bursting of a blood vessel in the brain, thus cheating his lifelong enemy, tuberculosis. Besides "Weir," he left almost completed another novel, "St. Ives," which was concluded by Quiller-Couch and published in 1898.
On a high peak of Vaea he lies beneath a stone bearing the epitaph written by himself:
"Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill."
REFERENCES
Biography:
Balfour: Life of Robert Louis Stevenson.
Raleigh: R. L. Stevenson.
Criticism:
Genung: Stevenson's Attitude toward Life.
Phelps: Modern Novelists.
NOTES ON "THE SIRE DE MALÉTROIT'S DOOR"
This story of dramatic interest, which contains, moreover, much psychologic interest, was first published in Temple Bar, January, 1878, and reprinted in the volume "New Arabian Nights" in 1882.
Page [148]. Sire: obsolete French for sir. Burgundy: a section of eastern France bordering on the river Rhone. The Count of Burgundy by a treaty with the English recognized the claim of the English king, Henry VI, to the throne of France. Their troops at the time of the story were endeavoring to establish this claim by force of arms. Joan of Arc figures in this war. safe-conduct: a passport. As Denis had one, he must have come from the French forces and consequently was among enemies.