My father had many oxen

Yet all are gone;

My father had many servants;

I sit alone.

He followed the Southern women,

He drank of the Southern wines,

Hefought in the Southern quarrels—

My star declines.

I will go to the Southern houses, I will sit ’mid the maids at hire;

I will bear their meat to the tables and carry wood to their fire;

Where the cheep of the rat and mouse is all night long will I lie,

Awake in the byres and the stables. When the white moon looks from the sky,

And over the Southern waters, and the wind blows warm from the South,

With the bitter tears in my eyelids and the heavy sighs in my mouth,

I shall hear through the gaping gables how the Southern night bird sings

Of hirelings once Queen’s daughters and slaves the seed of Kings.