The kindly eyes, that looked me
through and through, sparkled when we compared notes of adventure. I
marveled at some of her experiences and escapes. She told me that,
along with her husband, she had voyaged in all manner of rickety craft
among the islands of the Pacific, reflectively adding, "Our tastes
were similar."
Following the subject of voyages, she gave me the four beautiful
volumes of sailing directories for the Mediterranean, writing on the
fly-leaf of the first:
To CAPTAIN SLOCUM. These volumes have been read and re-read many times
by my husband, and I am very sure that he would be pleased that they
should be passed on to the sort of seafaring man that he liked above
all others. FANNY V. DE G. STEVENSON.
Mrs. Stevenson also gave me a great directory of the Indian Ocean. It
was not without a feeling of reverential awe that I received the books
so nearly direct from the hand of Tusitala, "who sleeps in the
forest." Aolele, the _Spray_ will cherish your gift.
[Illustration: Vailima, the home of Robert Louis Stevenson.]
The novelist's stepson, Mr. Lloyd Osbourne, walked through the Vailima
mansion with me and bade me write my letters at the old desk. I
thought it would be presumptuous to do that; it was sufficient for me
to enter the hall on the floor of which the "Writer of Tales,"
according to the Samoan custom, was wont to sit.
Coming through the main street of Apia one day, with my hosts, all
bound for the _Spray_, Mrs.
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