Poems, by Robert Louis Stevenson, hitherto unpublished/Eh, man Henley, you're a Don
EH, MAN HENLEY, YOU'RE A DON!
1875
Discussion has been frequent upon Henley's attitude towards the Stevenson of later life, and the over-idealization of the Stevenson of posthumous fame. In the earlier days of their acquaintance, when both were struggling young poets, a very sympathetic friendship existed between them and their minds caught fire from the sparks of each other's conversations. Even their faults of temperament and character brought them closer together. It was only after the public began to set Stevenson on too high a pedestal of virtue that Henley's reaction found voice in expostulation and regret.
Here, in verses written several years before this friendship, from the point of view of literature, reached its consummation in various plays of collaboration, we have a witty and familiar little poem, full of all the tang of the vernacular, and of Stevenson's admiration for Henley; full, too, of encouragement. But in the retrospect, there is a touch of pathos in Stevenson's prophecy, never to be fulfilled, of the time when the whole world would cheer on his friend Henley. Henley was a born poet, and it is not to be wondered that he was able—to use Stevenson's term—to spit out admirable lines, lines whose wisdom entitled him to the appellation of "Don." But life was cruel to Henley; the world never "patted" his shoulders, as towards the end it patted the shoulders of Stevenson, and these verses, thus faulty in prophecy, have their value mainly as a bright jeu d' esprit dating from the younger days of the two men.
EH, MAN HENLEY, YOU'RE A DON!
Eh, man Henley, you're a Don!
Man, but you're a deevil at it!
This ye made an hour agone—
Tht!—like that—as tho ye'd spat it,—
Eh, man Henley.
Better days will come anon
When you'll have your shoulders pattit,
And the whole round world, odd rat it!
Will cry out to cheer you on;
Eh, man Henley, you're a Don!