Love In A Cottage

They may talk of love in a cottage     And bowers of trellised vine,     Of nature bewitchingly simple,     And milkmaids half divine;     They may talk of the pleasure of sleeping     In the shade of a spreading tree,     And a walk in the fields at morning,     By the side of a footstep free!     But give me a sly flirtation     By the light of a chandelier,     With music to play in the pauses,     And nobody very near;     Or a seat on a silken sofa,     With a glass of pure old wine,     And mamma too blind to discover     The small white hand in mine.     Your love in a cottage is hungry,     Your vine is a nest for flies,     Your milkmaid shocks the Graces,     And simplicity talks of pies!     You lie down to your shady slumber     And wake with a bug in your ear,     And your damsel that walks in the morning     Is shod like a mountaineer.     True love is at home on a carpet,     And mightily likes his ease,     And true love has an eye for a dinner,     And starves beneath shady trees.     His wing is the fan of a lady,     His foots an invisible thing,     And his arrow is tipped with a jewel,     And shot from a silver string.