Stevenson's Shrine Part 3

Herr Conrade, the manager for Herr Kunz, the present owner, was kind enough to show us everything, but naturally Stevenson's suite of rooms were the only ones that possessed any special interest. First his bedroom, then his library, and lastly his Temple of Peace, the innermost shrine where he wrote, and which, opening as it did on to the upper verandah, commanded a magnificent view of sea and mountain. From the verandah could be seen the gleam of the sunlight on the breaking surf around the far distant bay. On the left, fronting seaward, were the heights where he was laid to rest.

Between two of the upper rooms (the bedroom and the library), there used to be a square hole, just large enough for a man to crawl through on hands and knees.[9] This was formerly the only entrance, but the present owner has had a door put up on which the outline of the hole is still indicated.

With the exception of these rooms, Vailima might have belonged to any other European of wealth and taste.

The question has been raised, Was Stevenson contented in Samoa? Did those three years bring him pleasure? May we not answer, Yes! and not only pleasure but profit. For the profit, note the books written during this period, _The Master of Ballantrae_, and the unfinished _Weir of Hermiston_!

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For the pleasure he shall speak for himself, and mark the subtle distinction he draws between happiness and pleasure. "I was only happy once--that was at Hyeres, it came to an end from a variety of reasons, decline of health, change of place, increase of money, age with his stealing steps; since then, as before then, I know not what it means. But I know pleasure still, pleasure with a thousand faces and none perfect, a thousand tongues all broken, a thousand hands and all of them with scratching nails. High among these I place this delight of weeding out here, alone by the garrulous water, under the silence of the high wood, broken by incongruous sounds of birds."

"Intense in all he did, Tusitala could do nothing by halves," said a man who knew him well. "Whether it was at clearing land or writing books he always worked at the top of his power, and enjoying as he did the life of the gay house party in the evening, he would rise at daylight to make up his loss of time." His was the old, old story of the sword that wore out the scabbard--flesh and spirit at issue, and the flesh so frail, so unequal to the conflict. There was an Austrian Count in Upolu whom the captain took us one day to see, and who, to use the colonial word, "batched" in a little bungalow in the midst of a huge coconut plantation.

The bungalow contained but one room--the bedroom, and the broad encircling verandah served for sitting room. Here we sat and talked about Tusitala, and drank to his memory. The conversation turned on Vailima, and our host took us within and showed us the only two adornments that his room possessed. Over his camp bed hung a framed photograph bearing the inscription "My friend Tusitala," and fronting the bed was another of the house and Mount Veea.

"So," he said, "I keep him there, for he was my saviour, and I wish 'good night' and 'good morning,' every day, both to himself and to his old home." The count then told us that when he was stopping at Vailima he used to have his bath daily on the verandah below his room. One lovely morning he got up very early, got into the bath, and splashed and sang, feeling very well and very happy, and at last beginning to sing very loudly, he forgot Mr. Stevenson altogether. All at once there was Stevenson himself, his hair all ruffled up, his eyes full of anger. "Man," he said, "you and your infernal row have cost me more than two hundred pounds in ideas," and with that he was gone, but he did not address the count again the whole of that day. Next morning he had forgotten the count's offence and was just as friendly as ever, but--the noise was never repeated! Another of the count's stories amused me much. "An English lord came all the way to Samoa in his yacht to see Mr. Stevenson, and found him in his cool Kimino sitting with the ladies and drinking tea on his verandah; the whole party had their feet bare. The English lord thought that he must have called at the wrong time, and offered to go away, but Mr. Stevenson called out to him, and brought him back, and made him stay to dinner. They all went away to dress, and the guest was left sitting alone in the verandah. Soon they came back, Mr. Osborne and Mr. Stevenson wearing the form of dress most usual in that hot climate, a white mess jacket, and white trousers, but their feet were still bare. The guest put up his eyegla.s.s and stared for a bit, then he looked down upon his own beautifully shod feet and sighed.

They all talked and laughed until the ladies came in, the ladies in silk dresses, befrilled with lace, but still with bare feet, and the guest took a covert look through his eyegla.s.s and gasped, but when he noticed that there were gold bangles on Mrs. Strong's ankles and rings upon her toes, he could bear no more and dropped his eyegla.s.s on the ground of the verandah breaking it all to bits." Such was my informant's story, which I give for what it is worth.

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On our way back to the steamer we visited the lovely waterfall referred to in _Vailima Letters_, also the Girls' School for the daughters of Native Chiefs. The latter affords most interesting testimony to the value of mission work. The princ.i.p.al of the school--a German lady--told us that both Stevenson and his mother took the deepest interest in this school, and subscribed liberally towards its support.

We had, I regret to say, very little time in Apia, and no time for Papasea, or The Sliding Rock, which lies some miles inland. The natives love to shoot this fall, and many of the white folk of both s.e.xes follow their example.

Next morning we were off again, steaming for the other side of the island, where we stayed two days shipping copra. Here I met many of Stevenson's friends, and can recall a chat I had with the photographer to whom I am indebted for several of the photographs in this book. He was a thin spare man, about six-and-twenty years of age, and not so very unlike the pictures of Stevenson himself.

"I had but recently come to Samoa," he said, "and was standing one day in my shop when Mr. Stevenson came in and spoke. "Mon," he said, "I tak ye to be a Scotsman like mysel."

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"I would I could have claimed a kinship," deplored the photographer, "but alas! I am English to the back-bone, with never a drop of Scotch blood in my veins, and I told him this, regretting the absence of the blood tie.

"I could have sworn your back was the back of a Scotchman," was his comment, "but," and he held out his hand, "you look sick, and there is a fellowship in sickness not to be denied." I said I was not strong, and had come to the Island on account of my health. "Well then," replied Mr.

Stevenson, "it shall be my business to help you to get well; come to Vailima whenever you like, and if I am out, ask for refreshment, and wait until I come in, you will always find a welcome there."

At this point my informant turned away, and there was a break in his voice as he exclaimed, "Ah, the years go on, and I don't miss him less, but more; next to my mother he was the best friend I ever had: a man with a heart of gold; his house was a second home to me."

"You like his books, of course."

"Yes!" (this very dubiously), "I like them, but he was worth all his books put together. People who don't know him, like him for his books. I like him for himself, and I often wish I liked his books better. It strikes me that we in the Colonies don't think so much of them as you do in England, perhaps we are not educated up to his style." And this is the cla.s.s of comment I heard over and over again in the Colonies, from men who liked the man, but had no especial liking for his books. Is it that Robert Louis Stevenson appeals first and foremost to a cultured audience? Surely not.

Putting the essays out of court, his books are one and all tales of adventure, stories of romance. The interest may be heightened by style--by the use of words that fit the subject, as a tailor-made gown fits its wearer--but the subject is never sacrificed to the style. It seems to me that one of my friends on the _Manipouri_ (himself a great reader and no mean critic) came very near solving the problem when he said, "Frankly, much as I like the man, I don't care one straw about his writings. I've got on board this boat _The Master of Ballantrae_, _The Black Arrow_, _Kidnapped_, and _The Ebb Tide_. They all read like so many boys' books, and when I became a man I put away childish things. I've plenty of adventure and excitement in my life, and I want a book that tells me about the home life in the old country, or else an historical novel. Give me Thomas Hardy, or Mrs. Humphry Ward, or Marion Crawford, or Antony Hope.

My bad taste, I daresay, but it is so, and I am not alone in my verdict, although I reckon the majority of the folk, this side of the world, would prefer Marie Corelli or Mrs. L. T. Meade."

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I cannot leave Samoa without saying a few words about the natives, in whom Tusitala took so deep an interest.

As I write there rises before my mental vision a crowd of brown-skinned men, women, and children, their bodies glistening with coconut oil, and looking as sleek as a shoal of porpoises. Supple of limb, handsome of feature, the men are mostly possessed of reddish or yellow-tinted hair, which stands straight out from their heads in a stiff mop. The colour is due to the rubbing in of a much prized description of red clay, and the stiffness to their constant use of coral lime, for purposes of cleanliness.

All the men wear the kilt of the South Seas, the _sulu_, _ridi_, or _lava-lava_, and as often as not a tunic besides. Nearly all the women are clothed in "pinafore" dresses, infinitely graceful and becoming. Men and women alike adorn themselves with flowers, wreaths of flowers in their hair, flowers interwoven in their _sulu's_, garlands of flowers around the neck, in addition to countless strings of sh.e.l.ls and beads.

That they loved Tusitala with a deep and lasting affection is undoubted, and if proof were needed this touching little story may be taken as but one of many evidences. Sosimo, one of his servants, went out of his way to do Tusitala an act of personal kindness. In expressing his grat.i.tude Stevenson said, "Oh! Sosimo, great is the service." "Nay, Tusitala,"

replied the Samoan, "greater is the love." The following is the Native Lament composed by one of the Chiefs at the time of Stevenson's death. The translation is by Mr. Lloyd Osborne, Stevenson's step-son and able collaborator. I was allowed to copy the poems from the little pamphlet kindly lent me by the Captain.[10]

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NATIVE LAMENT FOR TUSITALA.

Listen oh! this world as I tell of the disaster, That befell in the late afternoon, That broke like a wave of the sea, Suddenly and swiftly blinding our eyes.

Alas! for Lois who speaks, tears in his voice, Refrain, groan, and weep, oh, my heart in its sorrow!

Alas! for Tusitala who rests in the forest.

Aimlessly we wait and wonder, Will he come again?

Lament, oh Vailima, waiting and ever waiting; Let us search and inquire of the Captains of Ships, "Be not angry, but has not Tusitala come?"

Tuila, sorrowing one, come hither, Prepare me a letter, I will carry it.

Let her Majesty, Queen Victoria, be told, That Tusitala, the loving one, has been taken home.

Refrain, groan, and weep, oh, my heart in its sorrow!

Alas! for Tusitala, who rests in the forest.

Alas! my heart weeps with anxious pity, As I think of the days before us, Of the white men gathering for the Christmas a.s.sembly; Alas! for Alola,[11] left in her loneliness, And the men of Vailima, who weep together, Their leader being taken; Refrain, groan, and weep, oh, my heart in its sorrow!

Alas! for Tusitala, who sleeps in the forest.

Alas! oh, my heart, it weeps unceasingly, When I think of his illness, Coming upon him with so fatal a swiftness, Would that it had waited a word or a glance from him, Or some token from us of our love.

Refrain, groan, and weep, oh, my heart in its sorrow!

Alas! for Tusitala who sleeps in the forest.