Robert Louis Stevenson | Page 6

13th November 1850,
Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson was born. In 1853 they moved to a

house in Inverleith Terrace, and in 1857, when Louis was about seven
years old, they took possession of 17 Heriot Row, the house so long
and so intimately associated with them in the minds of their many
friends.
The little Louis was from his earliest babyhood a very delicate child,
and only the most constant and tender care of his devoted mother and
nurse enabled him to survive those first years which must have been so
full of anxiety to his parents. In The Child's Garden of Verses there are
some lines called 'The Land of Counterpane,' the picture heading of
which is a tiny child propped up against his bed pillows, and with all
his toys scattered on the coverlet. Beneath it are four verses that give a
wonderfully graphic description of the life the little boy too often led.
In the last verse he was a giant who saw before him all 'the pleasant
land of counterpane,' and in the very word 'pleasant' the temperament
of the child shows itself. How many children would have found
anything 'pleasant' in the enforced days of lie-a-bed quietness, and
would have made no murmurs over the hard fate which forbade to them
the active joys of other boys and girls?
But this small lad had a sweet temper and an unselfish, contented
disposition, and so he bore the burden of his bad health as bravely in
those days as he did in after years, and made for himself plays and
pleasures with his nimble brain while his weary body was often tired
and restless in that bed whereof he had so much. His mother used to
describe, with the same graphic touch that gives life to all her son wrote,
the bright games the little fellow invented for himself when he was well
enough to be up and about, and tell how, in a corner of the room, he
made for himself a wonder-world all his own, in which heroes and
heroines of romance loved and fought and walked and talked at the
bidding of the wizard in frock and pinafore.
It was not all indoor life happily, and if there were many bad days there
were some good and glad ones also, when he was well and allowed to
be out and at play in the world of outdoor life he always loved so
dearly.

Two quaint pictures of the child as he was in those days have been
supplied by his aunt, Miss Balfour. One of them is from a note-book of
his mother's, in which she had jotted down a few things that had been
said or written of him. The first interesting description is that given by
a very dear old friend of the family, and is an exceedingly early one, for
it was written in October 1853, when Louis was barely three, and the
family had just settled in Inverleith Terrace.
'One day,' she says, 'I called and missed you, and found Cummie' (the
valued nurse) 'and Louis just starting for town, so we walked up
together by Canonmills, keeping the middle of the road all the way.'
Louis, she continues, was dressed in a navy blue pelisse trimmed with
fur, a beaver hat, a fur ruff, and white gloves. A very quaint little figure
he must have been with the thin delicate face and the wonderfully
bright eyes, so luminous and far-seeing even then!
The tiny mite repeated hymns all the way, 'emphasising so prettily,' the
friend goes on to say, 'with the dear little baby hands. All of a sudden,
when near St Mary's Church he stood still, and looking in my face,
said:
'"But by-the-bye did I ever give you my likeness?"
'"No," was the reply, "have you got your likeness?"
'"Oh! yes, I will give it you; I will send it by the real post to-morrow."'
'It seemed,' the lady adds, 'as if the wonderful little mind had been
considering what other kind thing he could do besides repeating the
hymns.'
The whole incident is an excellent example of his sweetness of
disposition, and his innate thoughtfulness for others. It is pleasant to
know that the pretty promise was fulfilled, Mrs Stevenson herself
acting 'postman,' and taking the likeness to her friend next day.
The second picture is from the memory of Miss Balfour herself. She

too describes the blue pelisse trimmed with grey astrakhan, which he
wore in the winter of 1853 and '54. In the spring of 1854 she went to
the Stevensons' house to tell her sister that their father had been given
the degree of Doctor of Divinity. The small Louis, on hearing his
grandfather spoken of as 'Doctor,' immediately said:
'Now that grandpapa is a