What sadness reigns over the plain (Thomas Arne)
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- (Posted 2025-10-09) CPDL #87084:
- Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2025-10-09). Score information: A4, 4 pages, 142 kB Copyright: CC BY SA
- Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download. This edition includes the original instrumental accompaniment.
- (Posted 2025-10-09) CPDL #87083:
- Editor: Christopher Shaw (submitted 2025-10-09). Score information: A4, 2 pages, 83 kB Copyright: CC BY SA
- Edition notes: Please click on the link for preview/playback/PDF download. This edition includes a keyboard reduction of the original instrumental accompaniment.
General Information
Title: What sadness reigns over the plain
Composer: Thomas Arne
Lyricist:
Number of voices: 1v Voicing: solo high
Genre: Secular, Aria
Language: English
Instruments: Basso continuo, violin
First published: 1760
Description: Probably written for performance at Vauxhall.
External websites:
Original text and translations
English text
What sadness reigns over the plain,
How droop the sweet flow'rets around;
How pensive each nymph and each swain,
How silent each musical sound.
No more the soft lute in the bow'rs
Beguiles the cool evenings away;
Sad sighs measure out the long hours,
Since Damon has wander'd away.
Oh! he was our village's pride,
This change from his absence is seen:
'Twas he that our music supplied
When gaily we danc'd on the green.
At shearing, at wake and at fair,
How jovial, how frolic were we;
But now ev'ry feast in the year
Is joyless as joyless can be.
Ah! why did he venture from home,
To mix among hostile alarms?
No justice obliged him to roam,
Or take up those terrible arms.
Let those who are cruel and rough
Be heedless of life and of limb;
The county had soldiers enough,
Nor needed one gentle like him.
Where e'er the adventurer goes
On land, or the dangerous main,
Kind heaven protect him from woes,
And give him to Celia again.
Oh! give him to Celia again;
My true love in safety restore;
I'll cease on his breast to complain;
From my arms he shall wander no more.