The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #12170   Message #775864
Posted By: Dicho (Frank Staplin)
02-Sep-02 - 08:24 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Farewell to Nova Scotia
Subject: RE: Farewell to Nova Scotia --lyrics request
"The Soldiers Adieu" has six four-line verses. Dale Rose posted the first two and Crowhugger the last four, so they are all "present and accounted for" in this thread.

(A Union song by a Civil War soldier has the same title, but is unrelated).

The Nova Scotia Song, or Farewell to Nova Scotia took a while to become popular in Canada. It does not appear in "Canadian Folk Songs: A Centennial Collection" (1967).
It was printed in Creighton and Senior, Traditional Songs of Nova Scotia, pp. 264-265, 1950. This information from Masato Sakurai, in a website segment put together by George Seto. The song was combined from several versions. Farewell
I remember an interview on the CBC a long time ago in which Creighton was quoted as saying that her first collection was the first verse and chorus only (She first collected it in the 1930s, see comments by Seto in the link).
The Acadian Genealogy Home Page lists the song as "Acadian." Farewell So much for Tannahill! (This site has a number of Acadian-Cajun songs).