The Beach of Falesá

Wiltshire gradually learns that Case's influence over the villagers stems from their belief that he has demonic powers, as a result of his simple conjuring tricks as well as strange noises and visions they have experienced at a "temple" he has built in the forest.

The story concludes with Wiltshire several years later living on another island, still happily married to Uma, worrying about what will happen to his mixed-race children.

Everybody else that has tried, that I have seen, got carried away by the romance, and ended in a kind of sugar candy sham epic, and the whole effect was lost - there was not etching, no human grin, consequently no conviction.

A comparison of earlier printed editions to Steven's original draft has been a source of fairly recent scholarly inquiry.

[3] In 1956, The Heritage Press of New York published a full version stating "the text (of the 1892 serialization) was bowdlerized, and the present printing represents the story exactly as R.L.S.

"[4] "The Beach of Falesá", along with his two other South Seas tales in Island Nights' Entertainments, were generally poorly received by his peers in London.

Stevenson was known and loved for his historical romances such as Treasure Island, Kidnapped and The Master of Ballantrae and so his shift to realism was not widely applauded.