to Sidney Colvin

[Paris, January or February 1878.]

MY DEAR COLVIN,—Many thanks for your letter.  I was much interested by all the Edinburgh gossip.  Most likely I shall arrive in London next week.  I think you know all about the Crane sketch; but it should be a river, not a canal, you know, and the look should be ‘cruel, lewd, and kindly,’ all at once.  There is more sense in that Greek myth of Pan than in any other that I recollect except the luminous Hebrew one of the Fall: one of the biggest things done.  If people would remember that all religions are no more than representations of life, they would find them, as they are, the best representations, licking Shakespeare.

What an inconceivable cheese is Alfred de Musset!  His comedies are, to my view, the best work of France this century: a large order.  Did you ever read them?  They are real, clear, living work.—Ever yours,

R. L. S.