Am  F/A  D/A  G/A  A  D/A  C  B  
 
Am                        F  
The poacher and his daughter throw soft  
D                  G              A5  D5  E  C B  
shadows on the water in the night.  
 Am                     F  
A thin moon slips behind them as they  
D                   G              A5  D5  E5  C B  
pull the net with no betraying light.  
 
D                   F  
And later on the coast road,  
  C                   Bb     F/A        G5  
I meet them and the old man winks a smile.  
Am                     F  
And who am I to fast deny the right  
D            G              A5  D5  E5  C5 B5  
to take a fish once in a while?  
 
Am                     F  
I walk with them, they wish me luck  
       D                  G              A5  D5  E5  C B  
when I ship out on the Sunday from the kyle.  
      D               F            
And from the church I hear them singing  
C                   Bb     F/A        G5  
as the ship moves sadly from the pier.  
  Am                     F  
Oh, poacher's daughter, Sunday best,  
     D                   G                A5  D5  E5  F5 C5  
two hundred brave souls share the farewell tear.  
 
C5 F5 C5 double time  
F5  
There's a house on the hillside,  
                           D5  
where the drifting sands are born.  
F5  
Lay down and let the slow tide wash me  
G5                              Bb  
back to the land where I came from.  
C            Bb                Dm  
   Where the mountain men are kings  
C                       Bb          F     Dm         C   Bbsus4  
  and the sound of the piper counts for everything.  
 
same  
 
Did my tour, did my duty. I did all they asked of me.  
Died in the trenches and at Alamein  
...died in the Falklands on T.V.  
Going back to the mountain kings  
where the sound of the piper counts for everything.  
 
Am            F  
Long generations from the Isles  
D            G                 Am  
sent to tread the foreign miles  
           D5           E5  
where the spiral ages meet.  
                      F5  
Felt naked dust beneath their feet.  
Gm                           Eb/G  
Future sun called winds to blow  
Gm                               Eb/G  
and the past and present hard-eyed crow  
       Gm             Eb/G  
flew hunting high and circling low over  
  F        Eb     F   C5  F4  C5 F4  
blackened plains of Eden.  
 
REST OF LYRICS  
 
There's a child and a woman praying for an end to the mystery.  
Hoping for a word in a letter  
fair wind-blown from across the sea  
to where the mountain men are kings  
and the sound of the piper counts for eveything.  
 
There's a house on the hillside, where the drifting sands are born.  
Lay down and let the slow tide wash me  
back to the land where I came from.  
Where the mountain men are kings  
and the sound of the piper counts for everything.  
Where the real mountain men are kings  
and the sound of the piper counts for everything.  
 
Feel the naked dust beneath my toes  
while the future sun calls winds to blow  
and the past and present black-eyed crow  
flies hunting high and circling low  
between dream mountains of our Eden.