My query arises through recent reading of a newly published long lost biography of Stevenson by Arthur Ransome, whose own greatest claim to literary fame was the Swallows and Amazons series of children’s books.

Ransome wrote a life of Stevenson in his early days of journalistic struggle in London and the manuscript was only discovered, recently, 70 years after it was written.

My query arises from a brief reference in Ransome’s discussion of Stevenson’s early life. He had recently married a divorcee, a Mrs Osbourne, and the passage reads: “In April 1882, they (Stevenson, his wife, and stepson) were again in England, in Edinburgh in May, and at the end of June tried to live in the Manse of Stobo in Peeblesshire.” Stevenson fell ill - he suffered from poor health throughout his short life - and they moved back to London.

It would be interesting if anyone could throw any light on this cryptic reference.

I am, etc.

Geoffrey Whittaker Langside Drive Peebles