CHAPTER XXX. THE LETTER FROM THE SHIP

DEDICATION.

To

CHARLES BAXTER, _Writer to the Signet_.

My Dear Charles,

It is the fate of sequels to disappoint those who have waited for them;

and my David, having been left to kick his heels for more than a lustre

in the British Linen Company’s office, must expect his late

re-appearance to be greeted with hoots, if not with missiles. Yet, when

I remember the days of our explorations, I am not without hope. There

should be left in our native city some seed of the elect; some

long-legged, hot-headed youth must repeat to-day our dreams and

wanderings of so many years ago; he will relish the pleasure, which

should have been ours, to follow among named streets and numbered

houses the country walks of David Balfour, to identify Dean, and

Silvermills, and Broughton, and Hope Park, and Pilrig, and poor old

Lochend—if it still be standing, and the Figgate Whins—if there be any

of them left; or to push (on a long holiday) so far afield as Gillane

or the Bass. So, perhaps, his eye shall be opened to behold the series

of the generations, and he shall weigh with surprise his momentous and

nugatory gift of life.

You are still—as when first I saw, as when I last addressed you—in the

venerable city which I must always think of as my home. And I have come

so far; and the sights and thoughts of my youth pursue me; and I see

like a vision the youth of my father, and of his father, and the whole

stream of lives flowing down there far in the north, with the sound of

laughter and tears, to cast me out in the end, as by a sudden freshet,

on these ultimate islands. And I admire and bow my head before the

romance of destiny.

R. L. S.

_Vailima_, _Upolu_,

_Samoa_, 1892.

CATRIONA