When voices of children are heard on the green,
And laughing is heard on the hill,
My heart is at rest within my breast
And everything else is still.
 
‘Then come home, my children, the sun is gone down,
And the dews of night arise;
Come, come leave off play, and let us away
Till the morning appears in the skies.’
 
‘No, no, let us play, for it is yet day,
And we cannot go to sleep;
Besides in the sky, the little birds fly,
And the hills are all covered with sheep.’