Stevenson, Robert Louis (1850–1894). A Child’s Garden of Verses and Underwoods. 1913.
XVI. Its an owercome sooth for age an youth
I
And it brooks wi’ nae denial,
That the dearest friends are the auldest friends
And the young are just on trial.
And it’s him that has bereft me;
For the surest friends are the auldest friends
And the maist o’ mines hae left me.
And fools to take and break them;
But the nearest friends are the auldest friends
And the grave’s the place to seek them.