Rare Photograph of

Rls

THIS photograph of Robert Louis Stevenson appeared in the Sydney Mirror in October. It had the follow ing caption:— This* rare picture of Robert Louis Stevenson, wUh his sister (left), mother (right), and Samoan wife, was discovered in the files of a

Sydney photographic studio. The find fol lowed publication of a par in “Listen” that a Sydney tailoring firm was searching its re cords for the measure ments of Stevenson, as 3ata for a book being written by American author J. C. Furnas (Anatomy of Paradise).

Stevenson was in Syd ney with his family in 1891, and had the family ?roup taken at Free man’s, in George Street.

Mr. Val Waller, of Freeman’s, found the negative of the picture nn a sheet of glass in the studio records. A print will be sent to Mr.

Furnas.

This is the first time we have ever seen any reference to RLS having a Samoan wife, legal or de facto. From the writings of his step-daughter, Isobel Field, it appeared that Mrs. Stevenson,

formerly Field, a divorcee, whom he had met and married in America, was with him during the whole of his residence in Samoa. Perhaps some old resident of the Territory can clear the matter up.