Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) verged on–indeed, occasionally fell
into–sentimentality in his work (Kidnapped, Treasure Island, The
Master of Ballantrae. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde), but without
him my experience of reading, as a boy, would have been much poorer, and his
verse always sang to me.
My House
My house, I say. But
hark to the sunny doves
That make my roof the arena of their loves,
That gyre about the gable all day long
And fill the chimneys with their murmurous song:
Our house, they say;
and mine, the cat declares
And spreads his golden fleece upon the chairs;
And mine the dog, and
rises stiff with wrath
If any alien foot profane the path.
So, too, the buck that trimmed my terraces,
Our whilom gardener, called the garden his;
Who now, deposed, surveys my plain abode
And his late kingdom, only
from the road.
