o speak, as
Richardson and Fielding, Dickens and Thackeray, Mr. Hardy and Mr.
Meredith; and their field, the great living world of their time, is what
the general reader wants the novelist to deal with as he best may.

Shakespeare, to be sure, wrote no drama on Elizabethan times in England;
we must go to Heywood and Ben Jonson for the drama of his contemporary
world. Many circumstances caused Stevenson, when at his best, to be a
historical novelist, and he is, since Scott and Thackeray, the best
historical novelist whom we have.

Add to all this his notable eminence in tales of shorter scope; in
essays, whether on life or on literature, so various and original, so
graceful and so strong; add the fantasies of his fables, and remember
that almost all he did is good--and we must, I think, give to Stevenson
a very high place in the literature of his century.

Of his verse I have hitherto said nothing, and I do not think that if he
had written verse alone, his place would have been highly distinguished.
His "Child's Garden of Verse" is a little masterpiece in a _genre_ of
his own invention. His verses in Scots are full of humour, and he had a
complete mastery of the old Northern English of the Lowlands. His more
serious poems often contain ideas and the expression of moods which he
handled better, I think, in his prose. Even the story of "Ticonderoga" I
would rather have received from him in prose than in his ballad measure.
Possibly I am prejudiced a little by his willfulness in giving to a
Cameron the part of the generous hero; true to his word, in spite of the
desire to avenge a brother, and of the thrice-repeated monition of the
dead. It is not that I grudge any glory to the children of Lochiel, a
clan, in General Wolfe's opinion, the bravest where all were brave, a
clan of constant and boundless loyalty. But in Stevenson's own note to
his poem, the Cameron "swears by his sword and Ben Cruachan," and
"Cruachan" is a slogan of the Campbells. The hero, as a matter of fact,
was a Campbell of Inverawe. "Between the name of _Cameron_ and that of
_Campbell_ the Muse will never hesitate," says Stevenson. One name means
"Wry mouth," the other "Crooked nose"; so far, the Muse has a poor
choice! But the tale is a tale of the Campbells, of Clan Diarmaid, and
the Muse must adhere to the historic truth.

This essay must not close on a difference of opinion concerning
historical events--a jarring note.

There are points enough in