"STEEL TRUE AND BLADE STRAIGHT
THE GREAT ARTIFICER
MADE MY MATE"

LANCE CORPORAL GUY MELVILLE FARNDEN

ROYAL INNISKILLING FUSILIERS

23RD AUGUST 1918 AGE 34

BURIED: MONT NOIR MILITARY CEMETERY, FRANCE


This is a quote from Robert Louis Stevenson's beautful poem 'My Wife':

Trusty, dusky, vivid, true,
With eyes of gold and bramble-dew,
Steel-true and blade-straight,
The great artificer
Made my mate.

Honour, anger, valour, fire;
A love that life could never tire,
Death quench or evil stir,
The mighty master
Gave to her.

Teacher, tender, comrade, wife,
A fellow-farer true through life,
Heart-whole and soul free
The august father
Gave to me.

Guy Farnden's wife, Edith, chose his incription, transferring the qualities Stevenson had bestowed on his beloved and greatly valued wife onto her own husband to whom she had been married for ten years.