Je voudrais pouvoir vous ecrire; mais ce n'est pas moi qui tiens la plume--c'est l'autre, le bete, celui qui ne connait pas le Francais, celui qui n'aime pas mes amis comme je les aime, qui ne goute pas aux choses de l'art comme j'y goute; celui que je renie, mais auquel je commande toujours assez pour le faire prendre la plume en main et ecrire des tristes bavardages. Celui-la, mon cher Rodin, vous ne l'aimez pas; vous ne devez jamais le connaitre. Votre ami, qui dort a present, comme un ours, au plus profond de mon etre, se reveillera sous peu. Alors, il vous ecrira de sa propre main. Attendez lui. L'autre ne compte pas; ce n'est qu'un secretaire infidele et triste, a l'ame gelee, a la tete de bois. Celui qui dort est toujours, mon cher ami, bien a vous; celui qui ecrit est charge de vous en faire part et de signer de la raison sociale, ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON ET TRIPLE-BRUTE. TO SIDNEY COLVIN The following refers first, if I remember right, to some steps that were being taken to obtain recognition in the form of a knighthood for the elder Stevenson's public services; next, to the writer's own work at the time in hand; and lastly, to my volume on Keats then in preparation for the _English Men of Letters_ series. _Skerryvore, Dec. 14, 1886._ MY DEAR COLVIN,--This is first-rate of you, the Lord love you for it! I am truly much obliged. He--my father--is very changeable; at times, he seems only a slow quiet edition of himself; again, he will be very heavy and blank; but never so violent as last spring; and therefore, to my mind, better on the whole. Fanny is pretty peepy; I am splendid. I have been writing much verse--quite the bard, in fact; and also a dam tale to order, which will be what it will be: I don't love it, but some of it is passable in its mouldy way, _The Misadventures of John Nicholson_. All my bardly exercises are in Scotch; I have struck my somewhat ponderous guitar in that tongue to no small extent: with what success, I know not, but I think it's better than my English verse; more marrow and fatness, and more ruggedness. How goes _Keats_? Pray remark, if he (Keats) hung back from Shelley, it was not to be wondered at, _when so many of his friends were Shelley's pensioners_. I forget if you have made this point; it has been borne in upon me reading Dowden and the _Shelley Papers_; and it will do no harm if you have made it. I finished a poem to-day, and writ 3000 words of a story, _tant bien que mal_; and have a right to be sleepy, and (what is far nobler and rarer) am so.--My dear Colvin, ever yours, THE REAL MACKAY. TO LADY TAYLOR