Who has e’er been at Baldock, must needs know the mill,
With the sign of The Horse, at the foot of the hill;
Where the grave, and the gay, the clown and the beau,
Without all distinction promiscuously go.
This man of the Mill has a daughter so fair,
Of so pleasing a shape, and so winning an air;
That once on the evergreen bank as she stood,
I could swear’t had been Venus, just sprang from the flood.
But looking again I perceived my mistake,
For Venus though fair has the looks of a rake;
Where nothing but virtue and modesty fill,
The more beautiful looks of the “Lass of the Mill.”
Prometheus stole fire, as the poets all say,
To enliven the mass he had moulded of clay;
But had Polly been near him, the beams of her eyes,
Would have saved him the trouble of robbing the skies.
The famously beautiful Polly, the "Maid of the Mill" was a real person who lived in Baldock in the mid-18th century. She was well known throughout England because of the this popular song.
Although it is not the most poetic county, Poetry Atlas does have other poems about Hertfordshire.