The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #22855   Message #1443117
Posted By: Charley Noble
24-Mar-05 - 08:36 PM
Thread Name: Penguin: Ratcliffe Highway
Subject: LYR.ADD: Ratcliffe Highway IN 1842
Well, here are some further adventures along the Highway as it was known in London. Apparently in 1842 Paddy's Goose was still a rough place, had not yet been taken over by reformers as a Sailr's Home:

RATCLIFFE HIGHWAY IN 1842

(Reprinted in John Ashton's REAL SAILOR SONGS, 1891, p. 149)

You jolly sailors list to me,
I've been a fortnight home from sea,
Which time I've rambled night and day,
To have a lark on the Highway.

Chorus:

Listen you jovial sailors gay,
To the rigs of Ratcliffe Highway.

Some lasses their heads will toss,
With bustles as big as a brewer's horse,
Some wear a cabbage net, called veil,
And a boa just like a buffalo's tail. (CHO)

I married a lass with her face so red,
She eat three salt herrings and a bullock's head,
She danc'd a jig, and began to sing,
Drank a gallon of beer, and a pint of gin. (CHO)

I have sailed, indeed, all over the world,
And never before my flag unfurled,
In India, China, or Bungo Bay,
As the spot we call Ratcliffe Highway. (CHO)

One night a lady did me drag,
To have a spree at the Lamb and Flag,
Then she got drunk, and got in a row,
And sold her shoes at the Barley Mow. (CHO)

There is eels and shrimp as black as fleas,
And a covey a selling blue grey peas,
There's ugly Bet and Dandy Jane,
At the King William in Gravel Lane. (CHO)

Yes, you'll see some girls as smart and neat,
As the Dowager Queen of Otaheite,
There's every colour, indeed 'tis true,
Green, black, and purple, yellow and blue. (CHO)

I went one night to have a reel,
At the Angle tap in Blue Coat Fields,
I danced and capered, and sung a song,
And married a lady they called Miss Long. (CHO)

I fell in with a lady so modest and meek,
She ate thirteen faggots, and nine pig's feet,
Three pounds of beef, and, to finish the meal,
Eat eight pounds of tripe, and a large cow heel. (CHO)

I met with another borne down with fear,
She guzzled down thirteen pots of beer,
She threw up her heels, and play'd the deuce,
And broke her nose at the Paddy's Goose. (CHO)

You jovial sailors, one and all,
When you in the Port of London call,
Mind Ratcliffe Highway, and the Damsels loose,
The William, the Bear, and the Paddy's Goose.

You sailors bold, my song obtain,
And learn it on the raging main!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble