How did my young heart fondly yearn
To greet thy treach'rous shore!
And deem'd the while, for home-return
To husband up a store.

Why did I leave my native glen
And tune my mountain-lay,
To colder maids and sterner men
Than o'er our glaciers stray?

There pity dews the manly cheek
And heaves the bosom coy,
That quail'd not at the giddy peak
Which foils the fleet chamois.

Here--where the torrents voice would thrill
Each craven breast with fear;
For dumb distress or human ill
There drops no kindred tear.

The rushing Arc, the cold blue Rhone,
That in their channels freeze;
And snow-clad Cenis' heart of stone
Might melt ere one of these.

Why did I loathe my lowly cot
Where late I caroll'd free,
Nor felt, contrasted with my lot,
The pomp of high degree?