BARGAINING
Reading edition
There are many, many forests lying north, south, east, and west, There are many, many rivers moving slowly to the sea, But there's a wood of budding beech that claims the heart of me, And there's a little singing beck that falls from heathered crest.
O! I would give the universe to own that singing stream, And watch the stars a-hiding from the rosy-fingered morn, While cuckoos wake the fellside, and daffodils are born— O! any one can have the world, so I may keep my stream—
Yet would I barter beechen wood and little singing beck If I could fold my arms once more around my sweetheart's neck.
NIDDERDALE.