Mt. Pleasant Pyramid | 1912-06-28 | Page 2 | Precocious Infant

Precocious Infant. William Lyon Phelps tells this story about Robert Louis Stevenson, as, illustrating il-lustrating the cosmopolitanism of Russian character, which Professor Phelps says is accountable, In a measure, for the international effect and Influence of Russian novels. Stevenson, writing from Mentone to his mother, 7 January, 1S74. said: "We have two little Russian girls, with the youngest of whom, a little polyglot button of a three-year-old. I had the most laughable scene at lunch, today. . . . She said something some-thing in Italian which made everybody laugh very much . . . after some examination, she announced emphatically emphat-ically to the whole table. In German, that I was a madchen. . . . This hasty conclusion as to my sex she was led afterward to revise . . . but her opinion . . . was announced In a language quite unknown to me. and probably Russian. To complete the scroll of her accomplishments . . . she said good-by to me In very commendable English." Three days later. Stevenson added, "The little Russian kid Is only two and a half; the speaks six languages."