Classic Poem

Little Nellie Cassidy has got a place in town,
She wears a fine white apron,
She wears a new black gown,
An' the quarest little cap at all with straymers hanging down.

I met her one fine evening stravagin' down the street,
A feathered hat upon her head,
And boots upon her feet.
“Och, Mick,” says she, “may God be praised that you and I should meet.

“It's lonesome in the city with such a crowd,” says she;
“I'm lost without the bog-land,
I'm lost without the sea,
An' the harbor an' the fishing-boats that sail out fine and free.

“I'd give a golden guinea to stand upon the shore,
To see the big waves lepping,
To hear them splash and roar,
To smell the tar and the drying nets, I'd not be asking more.

“To see the small white houses, their faces to the sea,
The childher in the doorway,
Or round my mother's knee;
For I'm strange and lonesome missing them, God keep them all,” says she.

Little Nellie Cassidy earns fourteen pounds and more,
Waiting on the quality,
And answering the door—
But her heart is some place far away upon the Wexford shore.