Carus Rearn and Andrew Silex and the others were from a story you read me in Cassell's Family Paper, and which I have been reading again and found by no means a bad story. Mr. Galpin lent me all the old volumes, and I mean to re-read Custaloga also, but have not yet. It was strangely like old times to read the other; don't you remember the poisoning with mushrooms? That was Andrew Silex.--Yours most affectionately, R. L. S. TO MRS. THOMAS STEVENSON Having given up going to Scotland for a summer change, Stevenson had started on the "outing" which he mentions in the last letter. It took the shape of a ten days' visit to my house at the British Museum, followed by another made in the company of Mr. Henley to Paris, chiefly for the sake of seeing the W. H. Lows and the sculptor Rodin. _British Museum [August 10th, 1886]._ MY DEAR MOTHER,--We are having a capital holiday, and I am much better, and enjoying myself to the nines. Richmond is painting my portrait. To-day I lunch with him, and meet Burne-Jones; to-night Browning dines with us. That sounds rather lofty work, does it not? His path was paved with celebrities. To-morrow we leave for Paris, and next week, I suppose, or the week after, come home. Address here, as we may not reach Paris. I am really very well.--Ever your affectionate son, R. L. S. TO T. WATTS-DUNTON Written after his return from London and Paris. _Skerryvore, Bournemouth [September 1886]._ DEAR MR. WATTS,--The sight of the last Athenaeum reminds me of you, and of my debt, now too long due. I wish to thank you for your notice of _Kidnapped_; and that not because it was kind, though for that also I valued it, but in the same sense as I have thanked you before now for a hundred articles on a hundred different writers. A critic like you is one who fights the good fight, contending with stupidity, and I would fain hope not all in vain; in my own case, for instance, surely not in vain.