Page:New poems and variant readings, Stevenson, 1918.djvu/94

74 Thoughts? No thought has yet unskilled attempted to flutter

Trammelled so vilely in verse;

He who writes but aims at fame and his bread and his butter,

Won with a groan and a curse.

LONG TIME I LAY IN LITTLE EASE

time I lay in little ease

Where, placed by the Turanian,

Marseilles, the many-masted, sees

The blue Mediterranean.

Now songful in the hour of sport,

Now riotous for wages,

She camps around her ancient port,

As ancient of the ages.

Algerian airs through all the place

Unconquerably sally;

Incomparable women pace

The shadows of the alley.

And high o'er dark and graving yard

And where the sky is paler,

The golden virgin of the guard

Shines, beckoning the sailor.