Siffler sur la colline [English translation]

I saw her near a laurel bush, she was herding her white ewes.

When I asked how she had got such a fresh skin, she said

it is the tumbling in the dew that makes shepherdesses pretty.

But when I said I'd like to tumble in it with her too,

she said

She said I should go and whistle high upon the hill,

wait for her there with a small bunch of eglantine.

I picked the flowers and whistled my lungs out.

I waited and waited but she never came.

One day during the village fair I whispered to her

that I would like to be an apple hanging from a tree

so that she could take a bite each time she came by.

But she walked on by and her nice teeth showed

as she said

She said I should go and whistle high upon the hill,

wait for her there with a small bunch of eglantine.

I picked the flowers and whistled my lungs out.

I waited and waited but she never came.