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The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson – Swanston Edition. Volume 14

Год написания книги
2017
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3

Since I am sworn to live my life
And not to keep an easy heart,
Some men may sit and drink apart,
I bear a banner in the strife.

Some can take quiet thought to wife,
I am all day at tierce and carte,
Since I am sworn to live my life
And not to keep an easy heart.

I follow gaily to the fife,
Leave Wisdom bowed above a chart,
And Prudence brawing in the mart,
And dare Misfortune to the knife,
Since I am sworn to live my life.

4

OF HIS PITIABLE TRANSFORMATION

I who was young so long,
Young and alert and gay,
Now that my hair is grey,
Begin to change my song.

Now I know right from wrong,
Now I know pay and pray,
I who was young so long,
Young and alert and gay.

Now I follow the throng,
Walk in the beaten way,
Hear what the elders say,
And own that I was wrong —
I who was young so long.

    1876.

III

EPISTLE TO CHARLES BAXTER

Noo lyart leaves blaw ower the green,
Red are the bonny woods o’ Dean,
An’ here we’re back in Embro, freen’,
To pass the winter.
Whilk noo, wi’ frosts afore, draws in,
An’ snaws ahint her.

I’ve seen ’s hae days to fricht us a’,
The Pentlands poothered weel wi’ snaw,
The ways half-smoored wi’ liquid thaw,
An’ half-congealin’,
The snell an’ scowtherin’ norther blaw
Frae blae Brunteelan’.

I’ve seen ’s been unco sweir to sally,
And at the door-cheeks daff an’ dally,
Seen ’s daidle thus an’ shilly-shally
For near a minute —
Sae cauld the wind blew up the valley,
The deil was in it! —

Syne spread the silk an’ tak the gate,
In blast an’ blaudin’, rain, deil hae ’t!
The hale toon glintin’, stane an’ slate,
Wi’ cauld an’ weet,
An’ to the Court, gin we ’se be late,
Bicker oor feet.

And at the Court, tae, aft I saw
Whaur Advocates by twa an’ twa
Gang gesterin’ end to end the ha’
In weeg an’ goon,
To crack o’ what ye wull but Law
The hale forenoon.

That muckle ha’, maist like a kirk,
I’ve kent at braid mid-day sae mirk
Ye’d seen white weegs an’ faces lurk
Like ghaists frae Hell,
But whether Christian ghaists or Turk,
Deil ane could tell.

The three fires lunted in the gloom,
The wind blew like the blast o’ doom,
The rain upo’ the roof abune
Played Peter Dick —
Ye wad nae’d licht enough i’ the room
Your teeth to pick!

But, freend, ye ken how me an’ you,
The ling-lang lanely winter through,
Keep’d a guid speerit up, an’ true
To lore Horatian,
We aye the ither bottle drew
To inclination.
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