Poems, by Robert Louis Stevenson, hitherto unpublished/My wife and I, in one romantic cot
MY WIFE AND I, IN ONE ROMANTIC COT—1880
The early months of Stevenson's married life were spent at Silverado, a deserted California mining camp; and it was there that he wrote this draft of a poem never brought to perfection. Its main interest lies in its revelation of the things that Stevenson and his wife were hoping someday to have—she, a horse and a garden, and he, a yacht and a cellar well stocked with wine. These wishes bring to mind Stevenson's sailing, among the islands of the South Sea, and Mrs. Stevenson's many hours of happy and arduous hoeing in the garden at Vailima. But the final wish, to have their friends share in the pleasures of their household, was not to be fulfilled in that far off island which was their only real home.
The well, knell, hell, dell, etc., in the margin of the manuscript, as shown in the accompanying facsmile, remind us of similar gatherings of ammunition by Stevenson for other poems.
MY WIFE AND I, IN ONE ROMANTIC COT
My wife and I, in one romantic cot,
The world forgetting, by the world forgot,
Or high as the gods upon Olympus dwell,
Pleased with what things we have, and pleased as well
To wait in hope for those which we have not.
She vows in ardour for a horse to trot;
I stake my votive prayers upon a yacht.
Which shall be first remembered, who can tell,—
My wife or I?
Harvests of flowers o'er all our garden plot,
She dreams; and I to enrich a darker spot,—
My unprovided cellar. Both to swell
Our narrow cottage huge as a hotel,
Where portly friends may come and share the lot
Of wife and I.
