This song appears in L. A. Smith's The Music of the Waters (1888); Smith writes:
Any quick, lively tune, to which you might work a fire-engine, will serve for the music of a pumping song. The words vary with every fancy. "Pay me my money down" is a very favourite pumping chorus.
It is a very strange song for men so little given to avarice as sailors are. Their parting ceromy on embarking is usually to pitch their last shilling on to the wharf, to be scrambled for by the land-sharks. Nor yet does there seem much sense in it, but it serves to man and move the brakes merrily.
She provides one verse and explains the tune Paddle Your Own Canoe is sometimes used for the shanty.
Stan Hugill suggests it is an example of a West Indies shore-working song taken to sea and used for hauling.
The song was adopted by various skiffle groups and sung in a calypso manner. Other prominent recording groups include the Kingston Trio, who introduce the song as originating from the Bahamas.
Your money, young man, is no object to me.
Ch: Pay me the money down.
Half-a-crown's no great demand.
Ch: Pay me the money down.
All: Money down, money down;
Pay me the money down.
Your money, young man, is no object to me
Ch: Pay me the money down!
Oh, money down, oh money down,
Ch: Pay me the money down!
I went for a cruise, boys, around the town,
I there met a gal called Sally Brown.
I put my arm around her waist,
Sez she, "Young man, yer in great haste.
My price for love is half a crown,
An' money down, 'tis real money down."
Oh, the Yankee dollar some gits for their pay,
Will buy us rum, boys, for many a day.
A dollar a day is a white man's pay,
Stowin' cotton all the day.
Oh, if I had silver dollars galore,
I'd pack me bags and stay on shore.
I wisht I had ten thousand pound,
I'd sail this ol' world, around an' around.
I wisht I wuz Ol' Stormy's son,
I'd build a ship o' a thousan' ton.
We'd stay at the ports where we wuz in,
Drinkin'; beer an' whisky an' gin.
When the ship it ties up an' the voyage is through,
I wants me pay, sir, every sou.
The bumboatman he said to me,
"Bottles o' rum I don't give free."
My fancy gal she said to me,
"I don't give me give me favours free."
The Madam said to me one day,
"You've had yer fun so don't delay."
The tailorman he said to me,
"Ye'll pay me 'fore ye leave for sea."
The judge he said, "Look 'here you mug,
Ye'll pay yer fine or ye'll go to jug!"