SONG, WRITTEN AT MR. THOMSON'S REQUEST, AS A KIND OF INTRODUCTION TO HIS IRISH MELODIES.

SONG, WRITTEN AT MR. THOMSON'S REQUEST, AS A KIND OF INTRODUCTION TO HIS IRISH MELODIES. Joanna Baillie Alexander Huber Editor Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford

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Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive

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Oxford This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Baillie, Joanna, 1762-1851. Fugitive Verses. By Joanna Baillie, author of “Dramas on the Passions,“ etc. London Edward Moxon, Dover Street. MDCCCXL. 1840 pp. 360-361.

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SONG , WRITTEN AT MR. THOMSON'S REQUEST , AS A KIND OF INTRODUCTION TO HIS IRISH MELODIES . SWEET power of song ! that canst impart To lowland swain or mountaineer A gladness thrilling through the heart , A joy so tender and so dear ! Sweet power ! that on a foreign strand Canst the rough soldier's bosom move With feelings of his native land , As gentle as an infant's love ! Sweet power ! that makest youthful heads , With thistle , leek or shamrock crowned , Nod proudly as the carol sheds Its spirit through the social round ! Sweet power ! that cheerest the daily toil Of cottage maid or beldame poor , The ploughman on the furrowed soil , Or herd-boy on the lonely moor : Or he by bards the Shepherd hight , Who mourns his maiden's broken tie , Till the sweet plaint , in woe's despite , Hath made a bliss of agony : Sweet power of song ! thanks flow to thee From every kind and gentle breast ! Let Erin's — Cambria's minstrels be With Burns's tuneful spirit blest !