SING POLLY WOLLY DOODLE
'Negro Song.' From Mrs. Nilla Lancaster, Wayne County, North Carolina; without date.

I'm going down South for to see my gal,
Singing Polly Wolly duoll doll da.
My Sal is a spunky gal,
Singing Polly Wolly duoll doll da.

Chorus:
Farewell, farewell, my fair fae,
Goin' to Louisiana to see my Susiana,
Singing Polly Wolly duoll doll da.

I went to the river and couldn't get across, etc.,
Jumped on a nigger, thought he was a hoss, etc.

Grasshopper sitting on a railroad track, etc.,
Picking his teeth with a carpet tack, etc.

I went to bed, but it was no use, etc.,
My feet stuck out for the chicken roost, etc.

That chicken sneezed so hard with the whooping cough, etc.,
He sneezed his head and tail right off, etc.

Source: Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore, Volume III, #462

Notes: Probably of minstrel origin, this song has been familiar to one of the editors of this volume since his boyhood days in Mississippi, where he knew the refrain as 'Sing Polly Wolly Doodle all day' and stanzas much like those below. There is a printed version of it in Spaeth's Read 'Em and Weep, 92; another in Plantation Songs, Arranged for Baritone Solo and Chorus of Mixed Voices with Pianoforte Accompaniment by Stanford Robinson (London and Philadelphia, c. 1928), pp. 14-15. With stanza 2 compare No. 193, above.

#193 is a jingle. Here's the entire text:

Went to the river and I couldn't get across.
Jumped on a nigger's back and thought he was a horse.