How sweet her drapery flowed, While the moor-cock oddly crowed; I took the kiss which love bestowed, Under the white-thorn tree. Soft winds the water curled, The trees their branches furled; Sweetest nook in all the world Is where she stood with me. Calm came the evening air, The sky was sweet and fair, In the river shadowed there, Close by the hawthorn tree. Round her neck I clasped my arms, And kissed her rosy charms; O'er the flood the hackle swarms, Where the maiden stood with me. O there's something falls so dear On the music of the ear, Where the river runs so clear, And my lover met with me. At the foot of Clifford Hill Still I hear the clacking mill, And the river's running still Under the trysting tree. TO MY WIFE--A VALENTINE O once I had a true love, As blest as I could be: Patty was my turtle dove, And Patty she loved me. We walked the fields together, By roses and woodbine, In Summer's sunshine weather, And Patty she was mine. We stopped to gather primroses, And violets white and blue, In pastures and green closes All glistening with the dew. We sat upon green mole-hills, Among the daisy flowers, To hear the small birds' merry trills, And share the sunny hours. The blackbird on her grassy nest We would not scare away, Who nuzzling sat with brooding breast On her eggs for half the day. The chaffinch chirruped on the thorn, And a pretty nest had she; The magpie chattered all the morn From her perch upon the tree. And I would go to Patty's cot, And Patty came to me; Each knew the other's very thought Under the hawthorn tree. And Patty had a kiss to give, And Patty had a smile, To bid me hope and bid me love, At every stopping stile. We loved one Summer quite away, And when another came, The cowslip close and sunny day, It found us much the same. We both looked on the selfsame thing, Till both became as one; The birds did in the hedges sing, And happy time went on. The brambles from the hedge advance, In love with Patty's eyes: On flowers, like ladies at a dance, Flew scores of butterflies. I claimed a kiss at every stile, And had her kind replies. The bees did round the woodbine toil, Where sweet the small wind sighs. Then Patty was a slight young thing; Now she's long past her teens; And we've been married many springs, And mixed in many scenes. And I'll be true for Patty's sake, And she'll be true for mine; And I this little ballad make, To be her valentine. MY TRUE LOVE IS A SAILOR 'T was somewhere in the April time, Not long before the May, A-sitting on a bank o' thyme I heard a maiden say, "My true love is a sailor, And ere he went away We spent a year together, And here my lover lay.