Cummie

Cummie

J. Patrick

c. 1855

Photograph

Source: Cruse, Robert Louis Stevenson

Stevenson's “true education he received at home, from his mother and his nurse 'Cummie.' They read to him and talked to him and encouraged him to make efforts for himself. . . . 'Cummie ' belonged to the strictest sect of the Presbyterians, and under her care Louis spent, as he tells us, "a Covenanting childhood." He was made to study diligently the Bible, the Shorter Catechism, and the writings of the chief Covenanting divines. "When I was a child," he wrote many years afterward to Mr J. M. Barrie, "and indeed until I was nearly a man, I consistently read Covenanting books” (Cruse 26-27).

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