{
 "id": "robert-louis-stevenson/to-mesdames-zassetsky-and-garschine",
 "title": "To Mesdames Zassetsky and Garschine",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Robert Louis Stevenson",
 "poet_slug": "robert-louis-stevenson",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "New Poems and Variant Readings",
 "book_slug": "new-poems-and-variant-readings",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1918,
  "venue": "New Poems and Variant Readings (1918)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1918 Chatto & Windus volume. That is not the first printing: this volume's own preface credits the Bibliophile Society of Boston with having first given these poems light in a privately printed edition. The year of that edition, and which poems it carried, are not established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/newpoemsandvaria00stevuoft"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/robert-louis-stevenson_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlvol28stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlou14stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/newpoemsandvaria00stevuoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemshithertounp00stevrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31291",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30659",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/441",
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Poems,_by_Robert_Louis_Stevenson,_hitherto_unpublished"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 30,
  "n_stanzas": 5,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 42,
  "max_indent": 2
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The wind may blaw the lee-gang way",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And aye the lift be mirk an’ gray,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "An deep the moss and steigh the brae",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where a’ maun gang⁠—",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "There’s still an hoor in ilka day",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For luve and sang.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And canty hearts are strangely steeled.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By some dikeside they’ll find a bield,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some couthy neuk by muir or field",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They’re sure to hit,",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Where, frae the blatherin’ wind concealed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They’ll rest a bit.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "An’ weel for them if kindly fate",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Send ower the hills to them a mate;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They’ll crack a while o’ kirk an’ State,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O’ yowes an’ rain:",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "An’ when it’s time to take the gate,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tak’ ilk his ain.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "—Sic neuk beside the southern sea",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I soucht⁠—sic place o’ quiet lee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Frae a’ the winds o’ life. To me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fate, rarely fair,",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Had set a freendly company",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To meet me there.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Kindly by them they gart me sit,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "An’ blythe was I to bide a bit.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Licht as o’ some hame fireside lit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My life for me.",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "—Ower early maun I rise an’ quit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This happy lee.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ]
 ]
}