Okay, have checked Database for both "O Mary Dear" and "Mary Dear" (which gives a quite different song), and can't find the McCormack words there or in the numerous threads all related to "Danny Boy" and/or "The Air from County Derry"; so, here are the words John McCormack put to the air sometime in the 1930s:

"Oh, Mary Dear, a cruel fate has parted us,
I'll hide my grief, e'en though my heart should break;
Farewell my love, may God be always with you,
I love you so, I'd die for your dear sake.
But you'll come back to me my sad heart whispers,
You'll come with Summer's flowers or Winter's snow,
And I'll be there to wait if God will spare me,
And with the years my love will deeper, greater grow.

Oh, Mary Dear, the years are lone and dreary,
And yet you come not back my heart to cheer;
My eyes grow dim, my path of life's near ended,
When death shall come, in spirit, Love, be near;
Remember then my soul's great adoration,
Shed one sad tear, that all the world may see;
Breathe one short prayer, that I may know you love me,
And still be waiting, Mary, when you come to me."


Unlike F Weatherley, McCormack took care to set words to the highest note which are rather easier for the tenor voice than "here" and "bend"; on his two recordings of the piece, too, he sings a simpler version of the melody to the fourth line than on his much earler recording of "Would God I were the tender apple-blossom" (which is by Kathleen Tynam; I'm now not so sure about "As chimes that sound o'er silent seas", above, and will see can I confirm the author of that one).