loveliness of
nature and the nobility of soul to which these strange deep eyes were
the index. She was indeed charming, and it was no wonder that such a
nature as Mr Stevenson's found in her that 'other half of the old
Platonic tradition, the fortunate finding of which can alone make a
marriage perfect.

The romantic and the unusual in the story comes in when, at the request
of his doctor, Mrs Osbourne gave willingly of her kindness and her
skill in nursing to the young man who was lying at point of death alone
in a far land. The child of the people with whom he was boarding had
been very ill, and when other folk left the house of sickness, Mr
Stevenson, who had liked his little playfellow, remained to help the
parents with the nursing, and wore himself out in their service as only
a man of his rare human sympathy and tenderness of heart would have
done. The child recovered, and long years afterwards when the monument
to his memory was erected at San Francisco, the mother laid a wreath at
its base in remembrance of that unforgotten kindness. Unfortunately,
already far from well and suffering much from the effects of the journey
by emigrant ship and train and the stern experience of 'roughing it'
which that had entailed, Mr Stevenson was quite unfit for the fatigue of
nursing and he became so ill that the doctor despaired of his life. This
doctor, who then and afterwards proved a very real friend, was greatly
distressed about his patient, especially as the danger of his illness
was greatly increased by the lack of that skilled nursing which was
there very difficult to obtain. In such a case the physician could do
much, but a good nurse could do far more, so the doctor, in his anxiety,
recollected that Mrs Osbourne was, like himself, interested in the
talented young Scotsman, and was also possessed of a rare and womanly
gift of nursing, and he begged her to do what she could for his patient.
She responded to his appeal, and with her sister showed the invalid a
kindness so great that it did more to help his recovery than the best of
drugs could have done. He was restored to a certain measure of health,
and it may thus be said that he owed his life to his future wife, but
he owed her much more for her unselfish devotion in his time of weakness
and loneliness, as a stranger in a strange land, glorified to him all
womanhood in her person, and the man who knew what it was to have an
ideal mother was so peculiarly fortunate as