The Pastor's Daughter

An ivy-mantled cottage smiled,
Deep-wooded near a streamlet’s side,
Where dwelt the village-pastor’s child,
In all her maiden bloom and pride.
Proud suitors paid their court and duty
To this romantic sylvan beauty:
Yet none of all the swains who sought her,
Was worthy of the pastor’s daughter.

The town-gallants crossed hill and plain,
To seek the groves of her retreat;
And many followed in her train,
To lay their riches at her feet.
But still, for all their arts so wary,
From home they could not lure the fairy.
A maid without a heart they thought her,
And so they left the pastor’s daughter.

One balmy eve in dewy spring
A bard became her father’s guest:
He struck his harp, and every string
To love vibrated in her breast.
With that true faith which can not falter,
Her hand was given at the alter,
And faithful was the heart he brought her
To wedlock and the pastor’s daughter.

How seldom learn the worldly gay
With all their sophistry and art,
The sweet and gentle primrose-way
To woman’s fond, devoted heart!
They seek, but never find, the treasure
Revealed in eyes of jet and azure.
To them, like truth in wells of water,
A fable is the pastor’s daughter.