Page:The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Vailima Edition, Volume 8, 1922.djvu/495

NEW POEMS I should not ape the merely strange,

But aim besides at the divine;

And continuity and change

I still should labour to combine.

Here should I gallop down the race,

Here charge the sterling like a bull;

There, as a man might wipe his face,

Lie, pleased and panting, in a pool.

But what, my Dew, in idle mood,

What prate I, minding not my debt?

What do I talk of bad or good?

The best is still a cigarette.

Me whether evil fate assault,

Or smiling providences crown—

Whether on high the eternal vault

Be blue, or crash with thunder down—

I judge the best, whate'er befall,

Is still to sit on one's behind,

And, having duly moistened all,

Smoke with an unperturbèd mind.

CXII

F Schooners, Islands, and Maroons,

And Buccaneers and Buried Gold,

And Torches red and rising moons,

If all the old romance retold 481