The trees they grow high and the leaves they do grow green,

Many is time my true love I've seen,

Many an hour I have watched him all alone,

He's young but he's daily growing.

Father, dear father, you've done me great wrong,

You have married me to a boy who is too young,

I am twice twelve and he is about fourteen,

He's young but he's daily growing

Daughter, dear daughter, I've done you no wrong,

I have married you to a great lord's son,

He will be a man for you when I am dead and gone,

He's young but he's daily growing

Father, dear father, if you see fit,

We send him to college for another year yet,

I'll tie a blue ribbon all around his head,

To let the maidens know that he is married.

One day I was looking over my fathers castle wall,

I spied all the boys playing with a ball,

And my own true love he was the flower of them all,

He's young but he's daily growing

And so early in the morning at the dawning of the day,

They went into a hayfield to have some sport and play,

And what they did there she never would declare,

But she never more complained of his growing.

At the age of fourteen he was a married man,

At the age of fifteen the father of my son,

At the age of sixteen his grave it was green,

And death had put an end to his growing.

I'll buy my love some flannel, I'll make my love a shroud,

With every stitch I put in it, the tears they will pour down,

With every stitch I put in it, how the tears they will flow,

Cruel fate has put an end to his growing.