All in the merry month of May,
When green buds they were swelling,
Sweet William on his deathbed lay
For the love of Barbara Allen.

He sent his servant to the town,
Tot he place where she was dwelling,
Saying, "Hasten away and come with me,
If your name be Barbara Allen."

Then slowly, slowly she got up
And slowly she came nigh him,
And all the words she would speak to him,
"Young man, I think you're dying."

"O, yes, I'm sick and very sick
And death is on me dwelling.
No better, no better I never will be
If I can't have Barbara Allen."

As she was on her highway home
She spied his corpse a-coming;
"Set down, set down this corpse of clay
That I may look upon him."

The more she looked, the more she wept
Till she feel to the ground, a-crying,
"O, pick me up and carry me home,
For I am now a-dying."

"O, Father, O, Father, go dig my grave;
Go dig it long and narrow.
Sweet William died for me today,
I'll die for him tomorrow."

Upon her grave there grew a red rose.
On William's grave grew a briar.
They twined and they twined in a true-lover's knot,
And the rose grew around the briar.