I SEND to you, commissioners, <br />A paper that may please ye, sirs <br />(For troth they say it might be worse <br />An' I believe't) <br />And on your business lay my curse <br />Before I leav't. <br /> <br />I thocht I'd serve wi' you, sirs, yince, <br />But I've thocht better of it since; <br />The maitter I will nowise mince, <br />But tell ye true: <br />I'll service wi' some ither prince, <br />An' no wi' you. <br /> <br />I've no been very deep, ye'll think, <br />Cam' delicately to the brink <br />An' when the water gart me shrink <br />Straucht took the rue, <br />An' didna stoop my fill to drink - <br />I own it true. <br /> <br />I kent on cape and isle, a light <br />Burnt fair an' clearly ilka night; <br />But at the service I took fright, <br />As sune's I saw, <br />An' being still a neophite <br />Gaed straucht awa'. <br /> <br />Anither course I now begin, <br />The weeg I'll cairry for my sin, <br />The court my voice shall echo in, <br />An' - wha can tell? - <br />Some ither day I may be yin <br />O' you mysel'.<br /><br />Robert Louis Stevenson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-the-commissioners-of-northern-lights/
