to A. Conan Doyle

Vailima, August 23rd, 1893.

MY DEAR DR. CONAN DOYLE,—I am reposing after a somewhat severe experience upon which I think it my duty to report to you.  Immediately after dinner this evening it occurred to me to re-narrate to my native overseer Simelè your story of The Engineer’s Thumb.  And, sir, I have done it.  It was necessary, I need hardly say, to go somewhat farther afield than you have done.  To explain (for instance) what a railway is, what a steam hammer, what a coach and horse, what coining, what a criminal, and what the police.  I pass over other and no less necessary explanations.  But I did actually succeed; and if you could have seen the drawn, anxious features and the bright, feverish eyes of Simelè, you would have (for the moment at least) tasted glory.  You might perhaps think that, were you to come to Samoa, you might be introduced as the Author of The Engineer’s Thumb.  Disabuse yourself.  They do not know what it is to make up a story.  The Engineer’s Thumb (God forgive me) was narrated as a piece of actual and factual history.  Nay, and more, I who write to you have had the indiscretion to perpetrate a trifling piece of fiction entitled The Bottle Imp.  Parties who come up to visit my unpretentious mansion, after having admired the ceilings by Vanderputty and the tapestry by Gobbling, manifest towards the end a certain uneasiness which proves them to be fellows of an infinite delicacy.  They may be seen to shrug a brown shoulder, to roll up a speaking eye, and at last secret bursts from them: ‘Where is the bottle?’  Alas, my friends (I feel tempted to say), you will find it by the Engineer’s Thumb!  Talofa-soifuia.

Oa’u, O lau no moni, O Tusitala.

More commonly known as,

R. L. Stevenson.

Have read the Refugees; Condé and old P. Murat very good; Louis XIV. and Louvois with the letter bag very rich.  You have reached a trifle wide perhaps; too many celebrities?  Though I was delighted to re-encounter my old friend Du Chaylu.  Old Murat is perhaps your high water mark; ’tis excellently human, cheerful and real.  Do it again.  Madame de Maintenon struck me as quite good.  Have you any document for the decapitation?  It sounds steepish.  The devil of all that first part is that you see old Dumas; yet your Louis XIV. is distinctly good.  I am much interested with this book, which fulfils a good deal, and promises more.  Question: How far a Historical Novel should be wholly episodic?  I incline to that view, with trembling.  I shake hands with you on old Murat.

R. L. S.