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I'd wed you without herds, without money, or rich array,
And I'd wed you on a dewy morning at day-dawn grey;
My bitter woe it is, love, that we are not far away
In Cashel town, though the bare deal board were our marriage-bed this day;
Oh, fair maid, remember the green hill side,
Remember how I hunted about the valleys wide;
Time now, has worn me; my locks are turn'd to grey,
The year is scarce and I am poor, but send me not, love, away!
Oh, deem not my blood is of base strain, my girl,
Oh, deem not my birth was as the birth of the churl;
Marry me, and prove me, and say soon you will,
That noble blood is written on my right side still!
My purse holds no red gold, no coin of the silver white,
No herds are mine to drive through the long twilight!
But the pretty girl that would take me, all bare though I be and lone
Oh, I'd take her with me kindly to the county Tyrone.
Oh, my girl, I can see 'tis in trouble you are,
And, oh, my girl. I see 'tis your people's reproach you bear:
'I am a girl in trouble for his sake with whom I fly,
And, oh, may no other maiden know such reproach as I!'
Sir Samuel Ferguson
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