The version Mairead sings is substantially that given in Sam Henry's "Songs of the People" but omits the opening verse. According to Sam Henry's note (of 1928) - "It tells of a draper's assistant named MacDonald who soughht in vain the hand of his employer's daughter, Miss Ramsay, of Strabane. The song is about 80 years old. It was first published in a Derry newspaper by Dan McAnaw in 1909 but the air is now published for the first time."

That dates it approx 1846. The paper mentioned is probably the Derry Journal but a search I made some time past did not reveal it.