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Mainsail Café / Songs / Boston

Boston

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Colcord credits this song to Capt. Whall's collection.

Halsam and Millar's rendition has a separate familiar chorus of "Derry down, down, down derry-down".

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From Boston harbor we set sail
When it was blowing a devil of a gale,
With our ringtail set all abaft the mizzen peak,
And our dolphin striker plowing up the deep

With a big Bow-wow! Tow-row-row! Fol-de-rol de-ri-do-day!

Up comes the skipper from down below,
And he looks aloft and he looks alow,
And he looks alow and he looks aloft,
And it's "Coil up your ropes there, fore and aft."

Then down to his cabin he quickly crawls,
And unto his steward he loudly bawls,
"Go mix me a glass that will make me cough,
For it's better weather here than it is up aloft."

We poor sailors standing on the deck,
With the blasted rain all a-pouring down our necks;
Not a drop of grog would he to us afford,
But he damns our eyes with every other word.

And one thing which we have to crave
Is that he may have a watery grave,
So we'll heave him down into some dark hole,
Where the sharks'll have his body and the devil have his soul

From Roll and Go by Joanna Carver Colcord (1924)

Metadata

DT Index: 865
Forecastle song
American

Selected recordings:

Colonial & Revolutionary War Sea Songs & Chanteys Cliff Haslam and John Millar

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