The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls

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the best thing in Edinburgh," he said enthusiastically.

Sir Walter Simpson, son of the famous doctor, Sir James Simpson, who
discovered chloroform, became another chum about this time, and for the
next ten years they were much together. He likewise was studying law and
was a near neighbor. The Simpsons kept open house, and it was the custom
for a group of cronies to drop in at all hours of day and night. Louis
was among those who came oftenest, and Sir Walter's sister writes: "He
would frequently drop in to dinner with us, and of an evening he had the
run of the smoking room. After ten p.m. the 'open sesame' to our door
was a rattle on the letter box and Louis' fancy for the mysterious was
whetted by this admittance by secret sign, and we liked his special
rat-a-tat for it was the forerunner of an hour or two of talk."

They teased him about his queer clothes and laughed at some of his wild
ideas, but he seldom was angry at them for it and never stayed away very
long.