CXXIX.
Reading edition
FAIR ELIZA.
A Gaelic Air.
[The name of the heroine of this song was at first Rabina: but Johnson, the publisher, alarmed at admitting something new into verse, caused Eliza to be substituted; which was a positive fraud; for Rabina was a real lady, and a lovely one, and Eliza one of air.]
I.
Turn again, thou fair Eliza, Ae kind blink before we part, Rue on thy despairing lover! Canst thou break his faithfu’ heart? Turn again, thou fair Eliza; If to love thy heart denies, For pity hide the cruel sentence Under friendship’s kind disguise!
II.
Thee, dear maid, hae I offended? The offence is loving thee: Canst thou wreck his peace for ever, Wha for time wad gladly die? While the life beats in my bosom, Thou shalt mix in ilka throe; Turn again, thou lovely maiden. Ae sweet smile on me bestow.
III.
Not the bee upon the blossom, In the pride o’ sunny noon; Not the little sporting fairy, All beneath the simmer moon; Not the poet, in the moment Fancy lightens in his e’e, Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture, That thy presence gies to me.