sorrows and the burthen of life.' In a world so full of evil 'one dank and dispirited word' is harmful, and it is the business of art to present gay and bright pictures which may send the reader on his way rejoicing. Then, ingeniously turning the tables, he argues that Mr. Archer's acceptance of pessimism shows him to be a happy man, 'raging at the misery of others.' Had his critic tried for himself 'what unhappiness was like,' he would have found how much compensation it contains. He admits the correctness of one of Mr. Archer's remarks, that he has 'a voluntary aversion from the painful sides of life.' On the voyage to the leper settlement at Molokai he speaks of the Zola view of the human animal; and upon reaching the place sees 'sights that cannot be told and hears stories that cannot be repeated.' M. Zola would have managed perhaps to tell and repeat. Stevenson is sickened by the spectacle but 'touched to the heart by the sight of lovely and effective virtues in the helpless.' The background of the loathsome is there; but he would rather dwell upon the moral beauty relieved against it.
Stevenson might certainly claim that his optimism did not imply want of experience or want
