Behold me waiting--waiting for the knife. A little while, and at a leap I storm The thick sweet mystery of chloroform, The drunken dark, the little death-in-life. The gods are good to me: I have no wife, No innocent child, to think of as I near The fateful minute; nothing all-too dear Unmans me for my bout of passive strife. Yet I am tremulous and a trifle sick, And, face to face with chance, I shrink a little: My hopes are strong, my will is something weak. Here comes the basket? Thank you. I am ready But, gentlemen my porters, life is brittle: You carry Caesar and his fortunes--Steady! MARGARITAE SORORI A late lark twitters from the quiet skies; And from the west, Where the sun, his day's work ended, Lingers as in content, There falls on the old, grey city An influence luminous and serene, A shining peace. The smoke ascends In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires Shine, and are changed. In the valley Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun, Closing his benediction, Sinks, and the darkening air Thrills with a sense of the triumphing night-- Night with her train of stars And her great gift of sleep. So be my passing! My task accomplished and the long day done, My wages taken, and in my heart Some late lark singing, Let me be gathered to the quiet west, The sundown splendid and serene, Death. _Robert Louis Stevenson_ Robert Louis Stevenson was born at Edinburgh in 1850. He was at first trained to be a lighthouse engineer, following the profession of his family. However, he studied law instead; was admitted to the bar in 1875; and abandoned law for literature a few years later. Though primarily a novelist, Stevenson has left one immortal book of poetry which is equally at home in the nursery and the library: _A Child's Garden of Verses_ (first published in 1885) is second only to Mother Goose's own collection in its lyrical simplicity and universal appeal. _Underwoods_ (1887) and _Ballads_ (1890) comprise his entire poetic output. As a genial essayist, he is not unworthy to be ranked with Charles Lamb. As a romancer, his fame rests securely on _Kidnapped_, the unfinished masterpiece, _Weir of Hermiston_, and that eternal classic of youth, _Treasure Island_. Stevenson died after a long and dogged fight with his illness, in the Samoan Islands in 1894. SUMMER SUN Great is the sun, and wide he goes Through empty heaven without repose; And in the blue and glowing days More thick than rain he showers his rays. Though closer still the blinds we pull To keep the shady parlour cool, Yet he will find a chink or two To slip his golden fingers through. The dusty attic, spider-clad, He, through the keyhole, maketh glad; And through the broken edge of tiles Into the laddered hay-loft smiles.