The Short Stories Of Robert Louis Stevenson.

From the time he was a teen-ager until his death in 1894, Robert Louis Stevenson spent his life "casting off" for ports unknown in search of adventure and a place where he could find some relief from his chronic illness. Ironically, the man who longed for adventure and wrote so convincingly about it, was truly an invalid a good deal of his life, and faced death many times. In his writing, however, he exemplifies the severe self-discipline of a professional unremittingly engaged in a life-and-death struggle with style.