Transcribed from the 1912 Chatto and Windus edition by DavidPrice,
MEMORIES AND
PORTRAITS
by
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
fine-paperedition
london
CHATTO & WINDUS
1912
Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson &Co.
At the Ballantyne Press, Edinburgh
to
MY MOTHER
in the
name of past joy and present sorrow
I DEDICATE
these memories and portraits
S.S. “Ludgate Hill”
within sight of CapeRace
NOTE
This volume of papers, unconnected as they are, it will bebetter to read through from the beginning, rather than dip intoat random. A certain thread of meaning binds them. Memories of childhood and youth, portraits of those who have gonebefore us in the battle—taken together, they build up aface that “I have loved long since and lost awhile,”the face of what was once myself. This has come byaccident; I had no design at first to be autobiographical; I wasbut led away by the charm of beloved memories and by regret forthe irrevocable dead; and when my own young face (which is a faceof the dead also) began to appear in the well as by a kind ofmagic, I was the first to be surprised at the occurrence.
My grandfather the pious child, my father the idle eagersentimental youth, I have thus unconsciously exposed. Oftheir descendant, the person of to-day, I wish to keep thesecret: not because I love him better, but because, with him, Iam still in a business partnership, and cannot divideinterests.
Of the papers which make up the volume, some have appearedalready in The Cornhill, Longman’s,Scribner, The English Illustrated, The Magazineof Art, The Contemporary Review; three are here inprint for the first time; and two others have enjoyed only whatmay he regarded as a private circulation.
R. L S.
CONTENTS
I. | The foreigner at Home |
II. | Some College Memories |
III. | Old Morality |
IV. | A College Magazine |
V. | An Old Scotch Gardener |
VI. | Pastoral |
VII. | The Manse |
VIII. | Memories of an Islet |
IX. | Thomas Stevenson |
X. |