Page:The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Vailima Edition, Volume 8, 1922.djvu/493

NEW POEMS CXI

EPISTLE TO ALBERT DEW-SMITH

IGURE me to yourself, I pray—

A man of my peculiar cut—

Apart from dancing and deray,

Into an Alpine valley shut;

Shut in a kind of damned Hotel,

Discountenanced by God and man;

The food?—Sir, you would do as well

To cram your belly full of bran.

The company? Alas, the day

That I should dwell with such a crew,

With devil anything to say,

Nor any one to say it to!

The place? Although they call it Platz,

I will be bold and state my view;

It's not a place at all—and that's

The bottom verity, my Dew.

There are, as I will not deny,

Innumerable inns; a road;

Several Alps indifferent high;

The snow's inviolable abode;

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