Our correspondent, "W. L.," who furnished the copy of the song as published recently in THE BOOK REVIEW says, however, that he copied the verses from a manuscript written into a book which bears this title: "Tales of the Ocean and Essays for the Forecastle, Containing Matters and Incidents Humorous, Pathetic, Romantic, and Sentimental, by Hawser Martingale, Boston, Printed and Published by S. W. Dickinson, 52 Washington St., 1843." This book belonged to his grandfather, who died in 1874, and the song was familiar to "W. L." in his youth as early as 1870. In a letter to W. E. Henley, dated at Braemar, Aug. 25, 1881, written when Stevenson had begun the writing of "Treasure Island," he writes: I am now on another lay for the moment, purely owing to Lloyd this one; but I believe there's more coin in it than in any amount of crawlers. Now see here "The Sea Cook or Treasure Island: A Story for Boys." [This was the first title selected for the book.] If this don't fetch the kids, why, they have gone rotten since my day. Will you be surprised to learn that it is about Buccaneers, that it begins in the Admiral Benbow public house on the Devon coast, that it's all about a map and a treasure and a mutiny and a derelict ship and a current and a fine old Squire Trelawney, (the real Tre. purged of literature and sin to suit the infant mind,) and a doctor and another doctor and a sea cook with one leg and and a sea song with a chorus, "Yo-ho-ho and a Bottle of Rum," (at the third "ho" you heave at the capstan bars,) which is a real buccaneer's song, only known to the crew of the late Capt. Flint, who died of rum at Key West much regretted? The first publication of "Treasure Island" was in 1883, and in a letter to Sidney Colvin in July, 1884, Stevenson writes: "'Treasure Island' came out of Kingsley's 'At Last,' where I got 'The Dead Man's Chest.'" * * * * * THE UNPUBLISHED LETTER _New York Times Review of Books_, It has been my great pleasure and satisfaction to sit with Young E. Allison of Louisville in business intimacy and friendship for many years, and to have seen the inception of his "Derelict" in three verses based on Billy Bones' song of "Fifteen Men on the Dead Man's Chest" from "Treasure Island." During this intimacy also I have observed those original three stanzas grow to six and viewed the adjustment and balance and polish he has given to what I now consider a masterpiece.