October 1887._]

SIR,--I have to trouble you with the following _paroles bien senties_.
We are here at a first-rate place. "Baker's" is the name of our house,
but we don't address there; we prefer the tender care of the
Post-Office, as more aristocratic (it is no use to telegraph even to the
care of the Post-Office, who does not give a single damn[22]). Baker's
has a prophet's chamber, which the hypercritical might describe as a
garret with a hole in the floor: in that garret, sir, I have to trouble
you and your wife to come and slumber. Not now, however: with manly
hospitality, I choke off any sudden impulse. Because first, my wife and
my mother are gone (a note for the latter, strongly suspected to be in
the hand of your talented wife, now sits silent on the mantel shelf),
one to Niagara and t'other to Indianapolis. Because, second, we are not
yet installed. And because, third, I won't have you till I have a
buffalo robe and leggings, lest you should want to paint me as a plain
man, which I am not, but a rank Saranacker and wild man of the
woods.--Yours,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

TO CHARLES FAIRCHILD

_Post Office, Saranac Lake, Adirondacks, N.Y. [October 1887]._

MY DEAR FAIRCHILD,--I do not live in the Post Office; that is only my
address; I live at "Baker's," a house upon a hill, and very jolly in
every way. I believe this is going to do: we have a kind of a garret of
a spare room, where hardy visitors can sleep, and our table (if homely)
is not bad.

And here, appropriately enough, comes in the begging part. We cannot get
any fruit here: can you manage to send me some grapes? I told you I
would trouble you, and I will say that I do so with pleasure, which
means a great deal from yours very sincerely,

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

_P.S._--Remember us to all yours: my mother and my wife are away
skylarking; my mother to Niagara, my wife to Indianapolis; and I live
here to-day alone with Lloyd, Valentine, some cold meat, and four salmon
trout, one of which is being grilled at this moment of writing; so that,
after the immortal pattern of the Indian boys, my household will soon
only reckon three. As usual with me, the news comes in a P.S., and is
mostly folly.

R. L. S.

_P.P.S._--My cold is so much better that I took another yesterday. But
the new one is a puny child; I fear him not; and yet I fear to boast. If
the postscript business goes on, this establishment will run out of