The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1901-03-05
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GiFA 4 BAlLLlA M LECTURE.
Large Audience Heard DR.. Vau Dyke on
Robert louis Stevenson.

Robert LoUiS Stevenson.
The Hyperion last night was crowded
to overlooking with people who awaited
themselves of their privilege in the
course of Yale Public lectures to heal
Henry Van Dyke, the brilliant preacher
and Princeton professor of literature
who delivered his lecture on the life OF
Robert Louis Stevenson,
Dr. Van Dyke was introduced by Pro-
fessor Bernadotte Perrin, of Yale, who
prefaced his introduction by announc-
ing a change in date of the Yale Public
lectures for this week and next, owing
to the production at the Hyperion to-
morrow night of ''Minna Won Barnhelm''
under the auspices of the German de-
partment The lecture by Professor
Perrin set for tomorrow night will be
deferred until Wednesday evening of
next week, and his next lecture will
come on the following (Thursday)
/ night.
In opening DR.. Van Dyke rapidly
summed up the main points in Steven
sons life Born in Edinburgh in 1850,
he died in the South Seas in 1894, leav-
ing his work unfinished, but having at
tanned the goal of honor and the haven
of happy rest. The speaker said: ste
venson was long and lanls, queer, del
icate boy, and from his youth was des-
perately fond of writing. He was pre-
destined maker of books One thing
more than writing he cared for, and
that was living. With his frail consti-
tuition, which seemingly doomed him to
early death, he battled against the
al DO nd Al 70 60 IN i,
a grim courage.
Stevenson had q strain of adventure
in his blood from the beginning. I'M
der any conditions he would have been
a wide. traveller, and through all his
wandering, adventurous life he lived
widely and gladly and thoroughly, and
kept his spirit unbroken. AS with
Browning, life for him was the stuff to
try the souls strength on and in spite
of his frailty he travelled widely and
never gave up"
In discussing Stevenson as an au-
thor the lecturer enumerated the early
works which led to his popularity,
among them the Travels With a Don
key" This he declared one of the most
instructive and entertaining of books,
and that the donkey was zone of the
best drawn female characters of her
race" Treasure Island" he denomi-
mated boys book for men. Prince
Otto" a romance, and Stevenson's own
favorite, is the parent of that class in
current fiction of which the Prisoner
of Zenda" is the type, but is much bet
ter The collections entitled THE Mer-
ry Men" are models Of what short tales
ought to be. The Island Nights Enter
tainments" are strong with the flavor
of the Pacific. The two splendid vol
umes of Letters" are the richest since
those of Lamb and Thackeray. In the
comparatively short time from 1878 he
produced marvellous amount of work,
which the lecturer compared with the
productions of Thaekeray. both in fine
ness of execution and In versatility.
Stevenson did not exhaust his happy
veins, but worked with equal felicity
in essay and song and story.
AS a writer of English, we have Ste
venson's own testimony for the way in
which he got his training, "All through
my boyhood and youth" he says, II
was known and pointed out for pat
tern of an idler, but / was always busy
in learning to write" He describes the
road he took in learning to write, with |
a list of his authors-Hazlitt, Sir Thorn
as Brown, Montaigne and others-to all |
of whom, as he tells us, he played the |
sedulous ape. But more than this, he
observed the forms in the street and
picked up its characteristic phrases.
He was a laborious writer. He mod
eled and remodeled. and the end of his
toll was to bring his language closer to
life. Instead of copying the real Ian