So We'll Go No More a-Roving
(as sung by Richard Dyer-Bennet)

Tune A
So we'll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.

Tune B
For the sword outwears the sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And love itself must rest.

Tune A
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day return too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.

So We'll Go No More a-Roving, the poem by Lord Byron, was set to music by Richard Dyer-Bennet. It has been recorded by Dyer-Bennet on Richard Dyer-Bennet No #1, Smithsonian-Folkways 40078, available HERE. The CD also contains his excellent English translation of The Joys of Love (plaisir d'amour) and the song, Three Fishers. If you want to get a clue as to where much of Joan Baez's early repertoire came from, check out the recordings of Richard Dyer-Bennet. Printed version in A New Treasury of Folk Songs compiled by Tom Glazer, Bantam Books, New York, 1961 (out of print, but a used book store may cough up a copy).

Don Firth