clergyman's life at the East-end by associating with the children of the district. Stevenson's boyishness was not only conspicuous, but was the very mainspring of his best work. That quality cannot be shown in a mathematical dissertation or an historical narrative, but it is invaluable for a writer of romances. The singular vivacity of Stevenson's early memories is shown by Mr. Balfour's account of his infancy as it was sufficiently revealed in the delightful Child's Garden. It is amusing to note that Stevenson could not even imagine that other men should be without this experience. You are indulging in 'wilful paradox,' he replied to Mr. Henry James. 'If a man have never been' (Mr. James alleged that he had not been) 'on a quest for hidden treasure, it can be demonstrated that he has never been a child.' His scheme of life, as he puts it in a charming letter to Mr. Monkhouse, was to be alternately a pirate and a leader of irregular cavalry 'devastating whole valleys.' Some of us, I fear, have never been pirates; and if we were anything, were perhaps already preaching infantile sermons. In any case, the castle-building propensity is often so weak as not even to leave a trace in memory. Stevenson's most obvious
