NIGHTINGALE sings sweetly
In the verdant forest;
In the verdant forest,
On the slender branches.
Thither came three sportsmen,
Nightingale to shoot at.
She implored the sportsmen,
“Shoot me not, ye sportsmen!
“Shoot me not, ye sportsmen!
I will give you music,
In the verdant garden,
On the crimson rose-tree.”
But the sportsmen seize her;
They deceive the songster,
In a cage confine her,
Give her to their loved one.
Nightingale will sing not—
Hangs its head in silence:
Then the sportsmen bear her
To the verdant forests.
Soon her song is waken’d;
“Woe! woe! woe betides us,
Friend from friend divided,
Bird from forest banish’d!”