_Hotel Buol, Davos, Dec. 26, 1881._ MY DEAR GOSSE,--I have just brought my wife back, through such cold, in an open sleigh too, as I had never fancied to exist. I won't use the word torture, but go to your dentist's and in nine cases out of ten you will not suffer more pain than we suffered. This is merely in acknowledgment of your editorial: to say that I shall give my mind at once to the Murder. But I bethink me you can say so much and convey my sense of the liberality of our Cousins, without exhibiting this scrawl. So I may go on to tell you that I have at last found a publisher as eager to publish, as I am to write a Hazlitt. Bentley is the Boy; and very liberal, at least, as per last advices; certainly very friendly and eager, which makes work light, like whistling. I wish I was with the rest of--well, of us--in the red books. But I am glad to get a whack at Hazlitt, howsoe'er. How goes your Gray? I would not change with you; brother! Gray would never be suited to my temperament, while Hazlitt fits me like a glove. I hope in your studies in Young Folks you did not miss the delicious reticences, the artistic concealments, and general fine-shade graduation, through which the fact of the Xmas Nr. being 3d. was instilled--too strong--inspired into the mind of the readers. It was superb. I may add as a postscript: I wish to God I or anybody knew what was the matter with my wife.--Yours ever, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON. TO SIDNEY COLVIN [_Chalet am Stein, Davos-Platz, March 1882._] MY DEAR COLVIN,--Herewith _Moral Emblems_. The elephant by Fanny--the rest by me. I would have sent it long ago. But I must explain. I brought home with me from my bad times in America two strains of unsoundness of mind, the first, a perpetual fear that I can do no more work--the second, a perpetual fear that my friends have quarrelled with me.[43] This last long silence of yours drove me into really believing it, and I dared not write to you. Well, it's ancient history now, and here are the emblems. A second series is in the press. _Silverado_ is still unfinished; but I think I have done well on the whole, as you say. I shall be home, I hope, sometime in May, perhaps before; it depends on Fanny's health, which is still far from good and often alarms me. I shall then see your collectanea. I shall not put pen to paper till I settle somewhere else; Hazlitt had better simmer awhile. I have to see Ireland too, who has most kindly written to me and invited me to see his collections. Symonds grows much on me: in many ways, what you would least expect, a very sound man, and very wise in a wise way. It is curious how F. and I always turn to him for advice: we have learned that his advice is good.--Yours ever, R. L. S. TO ALISON CUNNINGHAM [_Chalet am Stein, Davos-Platz, February 1882._]