Near Banbridge Town in the County Down
One morning last July
Down a boreen green came a sweet colleen
And she smiled as she passed me by.
She looked so sweet from her two bare feet
To the sheen of her nut-brown hair
Sure the coaxing elf, I'd to shake myself
To be sure I was standing there


As she onward sped, sure I shook my head
And I gazed with a feeling quare
And I says, says I, to a passer-by
Who's the maid with the nut-brown hair
He smiled at me and he says, says he,
That's the gem of Ireland's crown,
Miss Rosie McCann
From the banks of the Bann,
She's the Star of the County Down.

From Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay
And from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I've seen like the brown colleen
That I met in the County Down
From Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay
And from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I've seen like the brown colleen
That I met in the County Down

She'd a soft brown eye and a look so sly
And a smile like a rose in June
And you hung on each note
from her lilly-white throat
As she lilted an Irish tune
At the pattern dance you were held in a trance
As she kicked through a reel or a jig
And when her eyes she'd roll,
She would lick your soul
A heart she would quickly steal

From Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay
And from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I've seen like the sweet Colleen
That I met in the County Down
From Bantry Bay up to Derry Quay
And from Galway to Dublin town
No maid I've seen like the sweet Colleen
That I met in the County Down