Near to Bainbridge town, in the County Down, one morning in July
Down a boreen green came a sweet colleen, and she smiled as she passed me by.
Oh, she looked so sweet from her two white feet to the sheen of her nut-brown hair
Sure, the coaxing elf, I’d to shake myself to be sure I was standing there.

Cho.: Oh, from Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay, and from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I’ve seen like the sweet colleen, who I met in the County Down.


As she onward sped I shook my head, and I gazed with a feeling quare
“And I say,” says I to a passer-by, “who’s the maid with the nut-brown hair?”
Oh, he smiled at me, and with pride says he, “She’s the gem in Ireland’s crown,
She’s young Rosie McCann from the banks of the Bann, she’s the Star of the County Down.”


She’d a soft brown eye and a look so sly, and a smile like a rose in June.
And I hung on each note from her lily-white throat as she lilted an Irish tune.
At the pattern dance I was held in trance as she skipped through a reel and a jig,
And when her eye’s she’d roll she’d coax, upon my soul, a spud from a hungry pig.


I’ve travelled a bit, but I never was hit since my roving career began.
But fair and square I surrendered there to the charm of young Rosie McCann.
With a heart to let and no tennent yet who I’d met with a shawl or a gown
But in she went, and I asked no rent from the Star of the County Down.


At the crossroads fair I’ll surely be there, and I’ll dress in my Sunday clothes,
And I’ll try sheep’s eyes and deludhering lies on the heart of the nut-brown Rose.
No pipe I’’l smoke, no horse I’ll yoke, though with rust my plow turns brown.
Till a smiling bride by my own fireside sits the Star of the County Down.

Dark Hollow Dulcimers  256 Durham Road,  Ottsville,  Pennsylvania  18942