Sidney Colvin

“ That talented woman, who later became the wife of Sidney Colvin, one of the nearest and most loyal of all of Stevenson's friends, was long the recipient of Stevenson's confidences, and among the persons whom he most admired. ”

“ No rest but the grave for Sir Walter! O the words ring in a man’s head.)
R. L. S.
To Sidney Colvin [Vailima] August 1893.
MY DEAR COLVIN,—Quite impossible to write. Your letter is due to-day; a nasty, rainy-like morning with huge blue clouds, and a huge indigo shadow on the sea, and my lamp still burning at near 7. Let me humbly give you news. Fanny seems on the whole the most, or the only, powerful member of the family; for some days she has been the Flower of the Flock. Belle is begging for quinine. Lloyd and Graham have both been down with “belly belong him” (Black Boy speech) . ”

“ Hamerton had the pleasure of becoming personally acquainted with one of the most distinguished of the contributors to the "Portfolio,"—Mr. Sidney Colvin, who now came to pay a visit to the editor, after nursing his friend R. L. Stevenson through one of his dangerous attacks of illness. My husband esteemed highly Mr. Colvin's knowledge and acquirements. During his short stay this esteem expanded into personal regard, and in after years, whenever a meeting with him was possible, it invariably afforded gratification. ”

“ To Sidney Colvin
608 Bush Street, San Francisco [December 26, 1879] .
MY DEAR COLVIN,—I am now writing to you in a café waiting for some music to begin. For four days I have spoken to no one but to my landlady or landlord or to restaurant waiters. This is not a gay way to pass Christmas, is it? and I must own the guts are a little knocked 252 out of me. If I could work, I could worry through better. But I have no style at command for the moment, with the second part of the Emigrant, the last of the novel, the essay on Thoreau, and God knows all, waiting for me. ”

“ COLVIN, SIDNEY (1845–⁠) , English literary and art critic, was born at Norwood, London, on the 18th of June 1845. A scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge, he became a fellow of his college in 1868. In 1873 he was Slade professor of fine art, and was appointed in the next year to the directorship of the Fitzwilliam Museum. ”

“ He was privately educated at home by a private tutor, who made him a good classical scholar. He entered at Trinity College, in 1863; in 1865 he obtained the Chancellor' gold medal for an English poem on Florence. Colvin was third in the first-class of the Classical Tripos of 1867, when the Senior Classic was John Edwin Sandys, afterwards Public Orator, and the second was Sir Frederick Pollock. A scholarship (1867) and a fellowship (1868) at Trinity served to fix him at Cambridge. ”

“ Robert Louis Stevenson.
P.S.—Please order me the Evening Post for two months. My subscription is run out. The Mutiny and Edwardes to hand.
To Sidney Colvin
[Saranac Lake, March 1888.]
MY DEAR COLVIN,—Fanny has been very unwell. She is not long home, has been ill again since her return, but is now better again to a degree. You must not blame her for not writing, as she is not allowed to write at all, not even a letter. To add to our misfortunes, Valentine is quite ill and in bed. Lloyd and I get breakfast ”

“ I know not a finer image than the comparison of a poet unable to express his high feelings to a sick eagle looking at the sky, where he must have remembered his former towerings amid the blaze of dazzling sunbeams, in the pure expanse of glittering clouds ”

“ And when the future looks back on today, even on today, a death-day of empires in a sterner and vaster sense than any the world has known, will all the waste and hatred and horror, all the hope and heroism of the time, its tremendous issues and catastrophes, be really found to have eclipsed and superseded love as the thing fittest to fill the soul and inspire the songs of a poet? ”

“ Yet over such difficulties the true lover of poetry will find himself swiftly borne, until he pauses breathless and delighted at the threshold of the sanctuary prepared by the ‘gardener Fancy,’ his ear charmed by the glow and music of the verse, with its hurrying pace and artfully iterated vowels towards the close, his mind enthralled by the beauty of the invocation and the imagery. ”

“ For a moment he mistrusts her power, but the next moment finds himself where he would be, listening to the imagined song in the imagined woodland, and divining in the darkness all the secrets of the season and the night. ”

“ I wish for death every day and night to deliver me from these pains, and then I wish death away, for death would destroy even those pains which are better than nothing. Land and sea, weakness and decline, are great separators, but death is the great divorcer for ever. ”

“ As if that mythology could ever die: as if the ancient fables, in passing out of the transitory state of things believed, into the state of things remembered and cherished in imagination, had not put on a second life more enduring and more fruitful than the first. Faiths, as faiths, perish one after another: but each in passing away bequeaths for the enrichment of the after-world whatever elements it has contained of imaginative or moral truth or beauty. ”

“ I never felt my Mind repose upon anything with complete and undistracted enjoyment—upon no person but you. When you are in the room my thoughts never fly out of window: you always concentrate my whole senses. ”

“ Believe me, my dear Jane, it is a great happiness to see that you are, in this finest part of the year, winning a little enjoyment from the hard world. In truth, the great Elements we know of, are no means comforters: the open sky sits upon our senses like a sapphire crown—the Air is our robe of state—the Earth is our throne and the Sea a mighty minstrel playing before it—able, like David’s harp, to make such a one as you forget almost the tempest cares of life. ”

“ I was much comforted when he looked up from the letter and grinned.
“Ben Sidney’s boy! Well, your father was the only critter on two legs in Levant, in the old days, who could stand in a barrel, like I could, and jump out without touching the sides. You look as if you have some of his spryness and grit!”
“I hope so, sir. I have always worked at what has come to my hands to do.”
“Dod says business is a mite slow in Levant and that you want a job.” ”

“ Then she whirled around and stared with all her might, "If there isn't Mamsie coming!"
"As true as you live it is!" cried Jasper, with a good look, and springing down the rocks to help her up. Tom Selwyn plunged after him, getting there first. So in the bustle, nobody answered Mr. King. And he, supposing from the merry chatter that Phronsie was in the midst of it, concluded it best not to interrupt their fun, even if he could make them hear.
"Your father made me come, Polly," said Mrs. Fisher, coming up between the two boys. ”

“ And so they all flew around till they looked like five statues set up to grace the sidewalk.
“Suppose a big dog should come,” suggested Van, pleasantly, “and snap at our backs!”
At this little Dick gave a small howl, and turned around in a fright.
“There isn't any dog coming,” said Polly. “What does make you say such awful things, Van?”
“I hear a noise,” said Phronsie; and so they all whirled around in expectation. But it proved to be only a market wagon coming at a furious pace down the road, with somebody's belated dinner. So they all had to whirl back again as before. ”

“ King said, "And you mean to say, Mrs.
Selwyn, that you really must move on to-morrow?"
"Yes; we really must," she said decidedly. "But oh," and her plain, quiet face changed swiftly, "you cannot know how sorry we shall be to leave your party."
"In that case, Mrs. Fisher,"—old Mr. King looked down the table-length to Mamsie,—"we must go too; for I don't intend to lose sight of these nice travelling companions until I am obliged to." Tom's face was one big smile. "Oh, goody!" exclaimed Polly, as if she were no older than Phronsie.
Jasper clapped Tom's back, instead of wasting words. ”

“ Then, with a very proud air, he said in a grand way, “At any rate, we aren't going to be, long, for something's coming!”
“What do you mean, Joey?” asked Ben, while the rest looked equally amazed.
“Our ships,” said Joel confidently, as if they were right before their eyes; at which they all screamed!
“See Polly's stove!” cried Phronsie, wishing to entertain in her turn. “Here 'tis,” running up to it, and pointing with her fat little finger.
“Yes, I see,” cried Jasper, pretending to be greatly surprised; “it's new, isn't it?”
“Yes,” said the child; “it's very all new; four yesterdays ago!” ”

“ Oh, won't we, children! for it will please Jasper." Her eyes glowed as she looked around at them all. At this little Dick deserted his lace. "Oh, I will, Mamma," he promised, "and he shall have my rocking-horse, and that'll please Jasper, I guess," and he began to march up and down the hall in great importance.
"And now, Polly," said Mrs. Whitney, "and, boys, we must think up what we are to do for the real Christmas, when Jasper and father and Ben get home; oh, and Pip—we mustn't forget Pip." ”

“ So it was all settled—“really and truly settled,” as Phronsie said. To-morrow Polly and Ben should take her to the town to be fitted, if Mr. Brown would let them have his wagon.
“Oh, mayn’t we go, too?” cried Joel; “we can sit in behind. Say, now, Mammy, mayn’t we?”
“Do, Mammy!” said David.
“Well, I don’t see why not, I’m sure,” said Mrs. Pepper; “’Twon’t cost anything; the wagon’s going anyway, and the horse is strong—if you’ll be good, Joey.”
“Oh, won’t I, though!” said Joel, giving his mother a hearty kiss, while little David beamed his satisfaction. ”

“ Then she bobbed up her head to look at him the closer. "We surely are, Grandpapa; and Polly is going to tell about it, she is."
"Well, then we must listen, you and I," said old Mr. King. "So we'll be still as mice, Phronsie," he whispered.
"Well, now," Polly was saying, drawing a long breath and smoothing down her gown; "O dear me! How shall we begin, we've so very much to tell? Ben—"
"Why, just begin," said Joel, impatiently, burrowing deeper in the rug, where he lay nearest to the fire.
"Do be still, Joe," said Alexia, with a little pinch. ”

“ Then the farmer leaned forward and stared ahead down the road.
“Ef you ain’t goin’ to git out an’ pick up that child, I am, John Brown. Sech a mortal slow man I never see,” snorted his wife scornfully.
“An’ sech a flutter-budget as you be, no man ever saw,” Mr. Brown found time to say as he got slowly down over the wheel.
“Somebody’s got to flutter-budget in this world,” said his wife after him, as he walked slowly over to the small pink heap, “or everybody’d go to sleep. Bring her to me, John.— Oh, do hurry! Bring her to me!”
“I want Mamsie,” said Phronsie, as Mr. Brown leaned over her. ”

“ It might be said of Coleridge, as Cowper has so happily said of Sir Philip Sidney, that he was 'the warbler of poetic prose.' There was always this characteristic feature in his multifarious conversation,—it was always delicate, reverend, and courteous. The chastest ear could drink in no startling sound; the most serious believer never had his bosom ruffled by one sceptical or reckless assertion. ”

“ Pepper, who was almost stunned.
“To come here and live!” cried Jasper, unable to keep still any longer—and springing to the children. “Don't you want to, Joe?”
“To live!” screamed Joel. “Oh whickety, yes! Do ma, do come here and live—do!”
“To live?” echoed Phronsie, over in the old gentleman's lap. “In this be-yew-ti-ful place? Oh, oh!”
“Oh, mamsie!” that was all Polly could say.
And even Ben had his arms around his mother's neck, whispering “Do” into her ear, while little Davie got into her lap and teased her with all his might. ”

“ Judge Kingsley rushed out with a horsewhip and lashed us apart just as I was finishing Ben up.
“Young Sidney, you’re a cheeky, tough, brazen character,” said the judge. I did not answer him.
It is my nature to take a big lot from all women, considerable from some men, and devilish little from most men. I had nothing at all to say to Celene Kingsley’s father, even though I was rubbing half a dozen swelling welts where his whip had connected with the back of my neck.
“You come of a tough family,” stated the judge.
Right then my uncle Deck arrived at the party ”

“ Alexia Rhys, you are a great one to send after her,” cried Sally Moore. “Not even to tell her where we are going, or what we want her for!”
“Well, I got her here, and that is half of the battle,” said Alexia, in an injured way; “and my goodness me! Polly won't hardly speak to me now; and you may go yourself after her next time, Sally Moore.”
“There, girls, don't fight,” said Clem sweetly. “Polly, we are going out to Silvia Horne's. Mrs. Horne has just telephoned to see if we'll come out to supper. Come, hurry up; we want to catch the next car. She says she'll send somebody home with us.” ”

“ He threw his arm around her.
"Where are you going?" cried Alexia, raising her head, where she had been luxuriously awaiting their return to the rug. "Polly Pepper, where are you going?"
"To Madam Van Ruypen's," said Polly, dancing off, her cheeks as red as two roses. "Come on, Alexia."
"Come on, yes. You lead the way and we'll follow," said Ben, bundling out of the room, Pip at his heels, followed closely by Pickering Dodge.
"Dear me!" exclaimed Alexia, getting up to her feet. "Percy—Van—what is it, do you know?" as they hopped up, and raced after the others. ”