William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Georgian Verse. 1909.
The Braes of YarrowJohn Logan (17481788)
T
When first on them I met my lover:
Thy braes how dreary, Yarrow stream,
When now thy waves his body cover!
For ever now, O Yarrow stream!
Thou art to me a stream of sorrow:
For never on thy banks shall I
Behold my love, the flower of Yarrow.
To bear me to his father’s bowers;
He promised me a little page,
To squire me to his father’s towers;
He promised me a wedding-ring—
The wedding-day was fixed to-morrow:
Now he is wedded to his grave,
Alas! his watery grave in Yarrow.
My passion I as freely told him:
Clasped in his arms, I little thought
That I should never more behold him!
Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost:
It vanished with a shriek of sorrow:
Thrice did the water-wraith ascend,
And gave a doleful groan through Yarrow.
With all the longing of a mother;
His little sister weeping walked
The greenwood path to meet her brother.
They sought him east, they sought him west,
They sought him all the forest thorough;
They only saw the cloud of night,
They only heard the roar of Yarrow.
Thou hast no son, thou tender mother!
No longer walk, thou little maid;
Alas! thou hast no more a brother.
No longer seek him east or west,
And search no more the forest thorough;
For, wandering in the night so dark,
He fell a lifeless corpse in Yarrow.
No other youth shall be my marrow:
I’ll seek thy body in the stream,
And then with thee I’ll sleep in Yarrow.
The tear did never leave her cheek,
No other youth became her marrow;
She found his body in the stream,
And now with him she sleeps in Yarrow.