The Little Beggar Man

(Johnny Dhu / The Oul' Rigadoo)

Well I am a little beggarman, a begging I have been For three score years in this little isle of green I'm known along the Liffy from the Basin to the Zoo And everybody calls me by the name of Johnny Dhu Of all the trades a going, sure the begging is the best For when a man is tired he can sit him down and rest He can beg for his dinner, he has nothing else to do But to slip around the corner with his old rigadoo I slept in a barn one night in Currabawn A shocking wet night it was, but I slept until the dawn There was holes in the roof and the raindrops coming thru And the rats and the cats were a playing peek a boo Who did I waken but the woman of the house With her white spotted apron and her calico blouse She began to frighten and I said boo Sure, don't be afraid at all, it's only Johnny Dhu I met a little girl while a walkin out one day Good morrow little flaxen haired girl, I did say Good morrow little beggarman and how do you do With your rags and your tags and your auld rigadoo I'll buy a pair of leggins and a collar and a tie And a nice young lady I'll go courting by and by I'll buy a pair of goggles and I'll color them with blue And an old fashioned lady I will make her too So all along the high road with my bag upon my back Over the fields with my bulging heavy sack With holes in my shoes and my toes a peeping thru Singing, skin a ma rink a doodle with my auld rigadoo O I must be going to bed for it's getting late at night The fire is all raked and now tis out of light For now you've heard the story of my auld rigadoo So good and God be with you, from auld Johnny Dhu

This fast-paced Irish tune shows up on several albums, including as a hornpipe on Jim McGrath’s 1977 Whiskey Johnny, and as a banjo instrumental on the National Geographic Society’s 1973 Songs & Sounds of the Sea.

This is not a shanty. It is a forecastle song, the kind of thing sailors sang in their off-hours rather than at the capstan or halyards. The tune is a well-known Irish and Scottish hornpipe, sometimes called “The Red-Haired Boy” in America, and the song built on top of it is a purely terrestrial comic ballad about an Irish vagrant. Its appearance in sea music collections reflects how broadly sailors drew on the popular songs of their home countries for entertainment, not any particular connection to maritime life.