Just come across this lovely song in a version by Richard Hayes Phillips (sung recently at the Bridge Folk Club -see YouTube)

Way down in the valley in some lonesome place
I wish no better pastime than to be with my love                                                                                     But she says she won’t have me so that I understand                                                                                    She wants a freeholder and I have no land

I cannot maintain her with silver nor gold
Nor buy her all the fine things that a big house can hold                                                                                  Farewell pretty Saro I will bid you adieu                                                                                                            And I’m going to ramble this whole world all through

Tis not the long journey that I’m dreading to go
Nor leaving the country for the debts that I owe
There’s nothing that grieves me nor troubles my mind
Like leaving pretty Saro, my darling, behind

If I were a poet and could write a fine hand
I’d write my love a letter so that she may understand
I will send it by the river where the waters do flow
And think on pretty Saro wherever I go

If I were a white dove and had wings and could fly
This night to my love’s window I know I would draw nigh
In her lily white arms all the night I would lay
And I’d watch them little windows till the dawn of the day