Fainne Geal an Lae (The Bright Ring of the Day)

We had a week on Geometrization last week: 18 lectures on Ricci flow, the proof of the Poincaré conjecture and the Thurston geometrization conjecture. These were organised by Constantin Vernicos, and delivered by Silvain Maillot and Laurent Bessière. Beautiful stuff. Turned out that SM plays tin whistle and is a fan of Irish traditional music, so Michael Clancy brought his fiddle on Friday and they had a session. I sang a couple of songs, and that reminded me that I don't know (any more?) the words of Fáinne Geal an Lae. This was the first tune I ever learned to play on the tin whistle, and nowadays it is better known as the tune that suits Patrick Kavanagh's Raglan Road. So I dug out my school song-book: Amhránleabhar Ógra Éireann (Songbook of Irish Youth), 3rd ed. 1954. (Ógra É. was a kind of club we had at school.)
Here is the text, p.34 (It's printed in the sean-chló, and I've rendered it into cló rómhánach, roman print):

Ar maidin moch do ghabhas amach
Ar bhruach Locha Léin;
An Samhradh 'theacht 'san chraobh len ais,
'Gus lonradh te ón ngréin.
Ag taistil dom tré bhailte poirt
'Gus bánta míne réidhe;
Cia gheobhainn lem ais ach an chúilfhionn deas
Le Fáinne Geal an Lae.

Ní raibh bróg ná stoca cadhp ná clóch'
Ar mo stóirín óg ón spéir;
Ach folt folt fionn órtha síos go troigh,
Ag fás go barr an fhéir.
Bhí calán crúite 'ci 'na glaic,
'Sar dhrúcht ba dheas a scéimh,
Do thug barr-ghean ó Bhénus deas
Le Fáinne Geal an Lae.

(Singer went out for a walk by the Lough Lane
at dawn, and met a heavenly blonde, wearing
just her long golden hair, and carrying a
milking-pail. He was impressed.)