Beautiful Barbara—Barbara bright,
As bright and as fresh as the dainty dawn,
What is it disturbeth her bosom white,
As the breeze into billows kisseth the corn?

Beautiful Barbara—silent and shy,
Shy as the dove, as the dove as fond,
What a dreaminess lives in her hazel eye,
As she looketh away through the valley beyond.

Through the valley beyond, where the daisies blush,
Where the woodbines bloom and the rivulets run;
Through the valley beyond, where, in evening's hush,
Beautiful Barbara's heart was won.

And the maiden Barbara, fair and forlorn,
The grass-green meadow looketh along;
The morrow was fixed for her wedding morn,
And she vieweth in vision the bridal throng.

She looketh, and weepeth, and looketh in vain:
Her heart was trustful; his heart was untrue;
And beautiful Barbara mingleth amain
Her tears with the daisies and the dew.

And the harvest moon sat silent and pale,
Silent and pale o'er the far-off hill:
And the sun in the morning flushing the vale
Saw beautiful Barbara stark and still.

Stark and still, with a forehead of white,
Round which the dew-drop coronal shone;
And the sunbeams came with their laughing light,
But beautiful Barbara sleepeth on.

'Twas a trying path for her dainty feet,
For such dainty feet as her's to tread.
So her trampled heart 'gainst its bars had beat,
Till it bravely broke and heavenward fled.