n predicted from the first. A genius so consciously artistic, so
quick in sympathy with other men's writings, however diverse, was
bound from the first to make many experiments. Before the public took
his career in hand and mapped it out for him, he made such an
experiment with _The Black Arrow_; and it was forgiven easily enough.
But because he now takes Mr. Osbourne into partnership for a new set
of experiments, the reviewers--not considering that these, whatever
their faults, are vast improvements on _The Black Arrow_--ascribe all
those faults to the new partner.

But that is rough criticism. Moreover it is almost demonstrably false.
For the weakness of _The Wrecker_, such as it was, lay in the Paris
and Barbizon business and the author's failure to make this of one
piece with the main theme, with the romantic histories of the
_Currency Lass_ and the _Flying Scud_. But which of the two partners
stands responsible for this Pais-Barbizon business? Mr. Stevenson
beyond a doubt. If you shut your eyes to Mr. Stevenson's confessed
familiarity with the Paris and the Barbizon of a certain era; if you
choose to deny that he wrote that chapter on Fontainebleau in _Across
the Plains_; if you go on to deny that he wrote the opening of Chapter
XXI. of _The Wrecker_; why then you are obliged to maintain that it
was Mr. Osbourne, and not Mr. Stevenson, who wrote that famous chapter
on the Roussillon Wine--which is absurd. And if, in spite of its
absurdity, you stick to this also, why, then you are only
demonstrating that Mr. Lloyd Osbourne is one of the greatest living
writers of fiction: and your conception of him as a mere imp of
mischief jogging the master's elbow is wider of the truth than ever.

No; the vital defect of _The Wrecker_ must be set down to Mr.
Stevenson's account. Fine story as that was, it failed to assimilate
the Paris-Barbizon business. _The Ebb-Tide_, on the other hand, is all
of one piece. It has at any rate one atmosphere, and one only. And who
can demand a finer atmosphere of romance than that of the South
Pacific?

_The Ebb-Tide_, so far as atmosphere goes, is all of one piece. And
the story, too, is all of one piece--until we come to Attwater: I own
Attwater beats me. As Mr. Osbourne might say, "I have no use for" that
monstrous person. I wish, indeed, Mr. Osbourne _had_ said so: for
again I cannot help feeling that the offence of Attwater lies at Mr.
Stevenson's door. He strikes me as a bad dream of M