| |
| BEHOLD her, single in the field, | |
| Yon solitary Highland Lass! | |
| Reaping and singing by herself; | |
| Stop here, or gently pass! | |
| Alone she cuts and binds the grain, | 5 |
| And sings a melancholy strain; | |
| O listen! for the vale profound | |
| Is overflowing with the sound. | |
| |
| No nightingale did ever chaunt | |
| More welcome notes to weary bands | 10 |
| Of travellers in some shady haunt, | |
| Among Arabian sands: | |
| No sweeter voice was ever heard | |
| In spring-time from the cuckoo-bird, | |
| Breaking the silence of the seas | 15 |
| Among the farthest Hebrides. | |
| |
| Will no one tell me what she sings? | |
| Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow | |
| For old, unhappy, far-off things, | |
| And battles long ago: | 20 |
| Or is it some more humble lay, | |
| Familiar matter of to-day? | |
| Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, | |
| That has been, and may be again! | |
| |
| Whate’er the theme, the maiden sang | 25 |
| As if her song could have no ending; | |
| I saw her singing at her work, | |
| And o’er the sickle bending; | |
| I listen’d, till I had my fill; | |
| And, as I mounted up the hill, | 30 |
| The music in my heart I bore | |
| Long after it was heard no more. | |
| |
