The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #92154   Message #1758172
Posted By: Zhenya
12-Jun-06 - 02:00 PM
Thread Name: Logging Songs
Subject: RE: Logging Songs
The Jolly Raftsman O    --- it's in The Penguin Book of Canadian Folk Songs and also see the references below. I have a recording on an old LP. The chorus is:

To hew and score it is his plan
And handle the broad ax neatly o
It's lay the line and mark the pine
And do it most completely o


This is what I found online just now:

Jolly Raftsman O, The
DESCRIPTION: "I am sixteen, I do confess, I'm sure I am no older O, I place my mind, it never shall move, It's on a jolly raftsman, O." She praises his work and calls him "brave as Alexander," though someone (her mother?) wants her to marry a freeholder
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1961 (Fowke)
KEYWORDS: love logger courting mother
FOUND IN: Canada(Ont)
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Fowke-Lumbering #58, "The Jolly Raftsman O" (1 text, 1 tune)
Fowke/MacMillan 51, "The Jolly Raftsman O" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #2318
Notes: No particular storyline here, a short (three verses) love song wherein the singer repeatedly states her conviction to wait for and marry her jolly raftsman. [Fowke's source was] Mrs. A. Fraser of Lancaster, Ontario, who said she learned it from her mother. - RBW
File: FowL58
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