The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #17160   Message #164681
Posted By: Uncle_DaveO
18-Jan-00 - 12:58 PM
Thread Name: Ice Harvesting Songs?
Subject: Billy Brink (sheep shearing)
Has anyone heard of a song called Billy Brink?

I used to have an OLD songbook (30s or thereabouts) with this song, among others. Now I'd like to go back to doing it, but alas, the book is gone. The tune is well in my mind, but it's words I can't round out.

As much as I can remember, it started like this:

"There once was a shearer by name Billy Brink,
A dev-ill for work and a dev-ill for drink.
He'd shear his two hundred a day without fear
And drink without winking four gallons of beer!

"Now Jimmy the waiter, who served out the rum,
He hated the sight of old Billy, the bum,
Who stayed much too late and who came much too soon,
At morning, at evening, at night and at noon."

The story then goes on that Jimmy was cleaning the bar one morning with sulfuric acid. Billy came in, "roaring and balling with thirst. Whatever you've got, Jim, just hand to me first!" You guessed it, it's the acid. Billy drinks it, and the song ends with these two lines:

"They say I drink whiskey, you know I'm no liar,
But every blamed cough sets my whiskers on fire!"

If any great benefactor of the human race can fill in the words, or direct me to a source for them, I'd be forever grateful.

Dave Oesterreich