Wytze Oostenbrug : The water is wide (No. 5 from 5 Folk Songs)

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"The Water Is Wide" (also known as "O Waly, Waly" or simply "Waly, Waly") is a folk song of Scottish origin. It remains popular in the 21st century. Cecil Sharp published the song in Folk Songs From Somerset (1906).
The imagery of the song's lyrics describes the challenges of love: "Love is fair, love is kind" during the romantic honeymoon phase of any relationship. But over time, "love grows old and grows cold". Even true love, the lyrics say, can "fade like morning dew".
The modern text for "The Water Is Wide" was consolidated and named by Cecil Sharp in 1906 from several older sources in southern England, following English texts with very different stories and styles but the same meter. Earlier sources were often published as pamphlets without notes. Performers or publishers inserted, removed and adapted verses from one piece to another: Floating verses are also characteristic of hymns and blues verses. Hymn texts from different sources could be used with different melodies of the same meter. Accordingly, each verse of the modern hymn may not have been originally composed in the context of the verses surrounding it, nor is it thematically consistent.