The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #42245   Message #4211346
Posted By: Lighter
09-Nov-24 - 08:51 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Cruising round Yarmouth
Subject: RE: Origins: Cruising round Yarmouth
Norfolk fisherman Sam Larner (1878-1965) sang this version for Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger in 1958. Unfortunately it's incoherent in spots:

As I was got walking one morning in May,
I met a fair damsel these words she did say:
“I’m a fast going clipper, and that you can see,
I’m ready for cuttering to my own country’s free.

Chorus:
Singing fal the ral laddy, right fal the ral day,
Fal the ral laddy right fal the ral day.

Which country she came from I can’t tell you which,
But by her appearance I thought she was Dutch;
Her flags flew in colors, her mastheads were low,
She was round at the quarters and bluff at the bow.

Chorus

Now I gave her my hawser, I took her in tow,
Yardarms to yardarms together we’d go.
She lowered her tops’l, t’gans’ls and all,
Her lily-white hand on my reef-tackle fall.

Chorus

And now my fair woman, it’s time to give o’er,
For in her snug parlor she soon had me moored;
She opened her hatches with plenty of room;
Right into her cabin I shoved my jib-boom

Chorus

And now my fair woman it’s time to give o’er,
Betwixt wind and water you’ve land me on shore.
My shotbag is empty, my powders are all spent,
And my old [inaudible] is choked at the vent.


The meaning of "cuttering" is obscure.