Escape At Bedtime
The
lights
from
the
parlour
and
kitchen
shone
out
Through
the
blinds
and
the
windows
and
bars;
And
high
overhead
and
all
moving
about,
There
were
thousands
of
millions
of
stars.
There
ne'er
were
such
thousands
of
leaves
on
a
tree,
Nor
of
people
in
church
or
the
Park,
As
the
crowds
of
the
stars
that
looked
down
upon
me,
And
that
glittered
and
winked
in
the
dark.
The
Dog,
and
the
Plough,
and
the
Hunter,
and
all,
And
the
star
of
the
sailor,
and
Mars,
These
shown
in
the
sky,
and
the
pail
by
the
wall
Would
be
half
full
of
water
and
stars.
They
saw
me
at
last,
and
they
chased
me
with
cries,
And
they
soon
had
me
packed
into
bed;
But
the
glory
kept
shining
and
bright
in
my
eyes,
And
the
stars
going
round
in
my
head.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was born at Edinburgh, Scotland, on November 13, 1850. He was a sickly youth, and an only son, for whom his parents had high hopes. When at last Stevenson was able to attend school, he did extremely well and entered the university at sixteen. His family expected him to become a lighthouse engineer, a family profession, but Stevenson agreed, as a compromise, to study law instead. He was a young rebel; he thought that his parents' religion was an abomination, and he soon became known as a bohemian, ranting about bourgeois hypocrisy.