The Book of Scottish Song/The Maid of Glenconnel

The Maid of Glenconnel.

[Munro.—Air by the Earl of Eglinton.]

The pearl of the fountain, the rose of the valley,
Are sparkling and lovely, are stainless and mild;
The pearl sheds its ray 'neath the dark water gaily,
The rose opes its blossoms to bloom on the wild.
The pearl and the rose are the emblems of Mary,
The maid of Glenconnel, once lovely and gay;
A false lover woo'd her—ye damsels be wary—
Now scathed is the blossom, now dimm'd is the ray.

You have seen her, when morn brightly dawn'd on the mountain,
Trip blythely along, singing sweet to the gale;
At noon, with her lambs, by the side of yon fountain;
Or wending, at eve, to her home in the vale.
With the flowers of the willow-tree blent is her tresses,
Now, woe-worn and pale, in the glen she is seen
Bewailing the cause of her rueful distresses,—
How fondly he vow'd—and how false he has been.

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