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A Sweet Country Life
Bob Lewis: On Autumn Harvest ah09: Bob Lewis: Drive Sorrows Away. Recorded at the Fife Traditional Singing Festival May 2009.
The song was printed on broadsides and has been collected throughout the south of England and is one of the songs Bob got from his mother. The song is also in E. Lyle: Andrew Crawfurd's Collection of Ballads and Songs as sung in the Lochwinnoch in the 1820s where it was known as Lord Eglinton's Song (Roud 2406).
1: A sweet country life is to me both dear and charming,
For to walk abroad on a fine summer’s morning;
Your houses, your cities, your lofty gay towers,
In nothing can compare with the sweet shady bowers.
 Your houses, your cities, your lofty gay towers,
In nothing can compare with the sweet shady bowers.
2: Nor do I admire your robes and fine dresses,
Your silks and your scarlets and other excesses;
For my own country clothing is to me more endearing,
Than your sweet pretty mantle, for ’tis my homespun wearing.
For my own country clothing is to me more endearing,
Than your sweet pretty mantle for ’tis my homespun wearing.
3: No fiddle, no flute, no hautboy or spinet,
In ought can compare with the lark or the linnet;
Adown as I lay all among the green bushes,
I was charmed by the notes of the blackbirds and thrushes.
Adown as I lay all among the green bushes,
I was charmed by the notes of the blackbirds and thrushes.
4: As Johnny the ploughboy was a-walking alone,
To fetch home his cattle so early at morn;
There he spied pretty Nancy all among the green bushes,
She was singing much more sweetlye than the blackbirds and thrushes.
There he spied pretty Nancy all among the green bushes,
She was singing much more sweetlye than the blackbirds and thrushes.
5: ’Twas down in the meadow, beneath a lofty mountain,
There she sat a-milking by the side of a fountain;
The flocks they did graze in the dew of the morning,
Bright Phoebe did shine, the hills all adorning.
The flocks they did graze in the dew of the morning,
Bright Phoebe did shine, the hills all adorning.
6: So now to conclude and to end my ditty,
Come all you country lasses that are so neat and pretty;
Oh never do forsake your own country employment,
No cities can afford half so sweet an enjoyment.
Oh never do forsake your own country employment,
No cities can afford half so sweet an enjoyment.
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c p 2010 Autumn Harvest : www.springthyme.co.uk
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