Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William McCarty, comp. The American National Song Book. 1842.

The Irish Emigrant

FAREWELL to my country, a lasting farewell!

Sweet scenes of my childhood, forever adieu!

Now hid from my sight is the flowery dell,

And now the dear cabin recedes from my view;

Thy murmuring streams no more breathe on mine ear;

Thy wild-waving woods, too, are lost to my sight:

Sweet gem of the world, I drop the sad tear,

And farewell to Erin, dear land of delight.

Sweet days that are past, how ye come o’er my soul!

Ye chill my warm blood, as the sad scenes I trace:

Though time shakes his sand, and the wide waters roll,

Nor distance, nor seasons, those scenes shall efface;

Brave, brave were thy sons, unshaken by fear;

And blooming thy maidens to my ravish’d sight.

Sweet gem of the world! I drop the sad tear

To Erin, dear Erin! the land of delight.

The tempest arose, and the ravager came;

Thy streams, stain’d with blood, reveal’d the sad tale!

Thy wild-waving woodlands were shrouded with flame,

And the hell-hounds of war descended the vale;

O! my mother, my sister, my Kathleen so dear!

Can I think without madness on that horrid night.

To your shades, ye beloved ones, I drop the sad tear,

And to Erin, dear Erin! the land of delight.