to Charles Baxter

[Chalet am Stein, Davos], 22nd February ’82.

MY DEAR CHARLES,—Your most welcome letter has raised clouds of sulphur from my horizon. . . .

I am glad you have gone back to your music.  Life is a poor thing, I am more and more convinced, without an art, that always waits for us and is always new.  Art and marriage are two very good stand-by’s.

In an article which will appear sometime in the Cornhill, ‘Talk and Talkers,’ and where I have full-lengthened the conversation of Bob, Henley, Jenkin, Simpson, Symonds, and Gosse, I have at the end one single word about yourself.  It may amuse you to see it.

We are coming to Scotland after all, so we shall meet, which pleases me, and I do believe I am strong enough to stand it this time.  My knee is still quite lame.

My wife is better again. . . . But we take it by turns; it is the dog that is ill now.—Ever yours,

R. L. S.