e picturesque can be imagined than the ledge that forms the
summit to Vaea, a place no wider than a room, and flat as a table. On
either side the land descends precipitously; in front lies the vast
ocean and surf-swept reefs; to the right and left green mountains
rise....

"All the morning Samoans were arriving with flowers, few of these were
white, for they have not learned our foreign custom, and the room glowed
with the many colors. There were no strangers on that day, no
acquaintances; those only were called who would deeply feel the loss. At
one o'clock a body of powerful Samoans bore away the coffin, hid beneath
a tattered red ensign that had flown above his vessel in many a remote
corner of the South Seas. A path so steep and rugged taxed their
strength to the utmost, for not only was the journey difficult in
itself, but extreme care was requisite to carry the coffin shoulder
high....

"No stranger hand touched him.... Those who loved him carried him to his
last home; even the coffin was the work of an old friend. The grave was
dug by his own men."

Tusitala had left them, and his friends in the South Seas had lost a
faithful friend and companion, a wise and just master.

His family and friends the world over had lost not only these but far
more. His life had been a chivalrous one with all the best that chivalry
stands for, "loyalty, honesty, generosity, courage, courtesy, and
self-devotion; to impute no unworthy motives and to bear no grudges; to
bear misfortune with cheerfulness and without a murmur; to strike hard
for the right and to take no mean advantage; to be gentle to women and
kind to all that are weak; to be rigorous with oneself and very lenient
to others--these ... were the traits that distinguished Stevenson."

"They do not make life easy as he frequently found."

His resting-place on the crest of Vaea Mountain is covered by a tomb of
gray stone. On one side is inscribed in English the verses he had
written for his own requiem:

A ROBERT LOUIS [Symbol: Omega]
1850 STEVENSON 1894

"Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie,
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.

"This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill."

[Illustration: The tomb of Stevenson on Vaea Mountain]