Thanks for the effort, Charley! Pfft, why would I take offense?; rather, I am just very lazy when it comes to re-typing lyrics!

Although I cannot say whether the walkaway shanty was indeed used for that task in real life, however, I see no good reason why it couldn't be. If it is, as I suspect, a variation of what Hugill called the "Sailor Fireman," then it went along much like "Sacramento," and as such I think it would work just fine. Hugill had taken it from a 1850 collection of African-American songs, so we do know a water-related work-song of this strain was existing by then. I am also excited that the song in the 1853-observed SLAVE STATES text also bears similarity to the fireman song. I hope John M. might consider adding this song to the batch of possible 1853-era shanties.

What excites me more is the completely incidental/topical/ad-libbed nature of verses of the songs in the last two references I posted. Also, please compare them to the ART OF BALLET song earlier in the thread. While as Lighter stated, and in which I am in agreement with, the shanties were often identified by one or more "regulation verses," I think these were good examples of the kind of chantying that was pure "framework."

The narrators in these accounts are quite sympathetic to the singing of Blacks. The second one even has an abolitionist's agenda of reaffirming the value of Black expression. It makes me think of the idea of "ethnosympathy" -- which is a term (I believe) coined by Prof. Jon Cruz of UCSB in reference to the phenomenon whereby non-Blacks in the U.S. began to listen to Black singing sympathetically. Whereas in earlier times, Black expression may have been regarded as mere "noise" or "rude" singing, in their effort to humanize Blacks, abolitionists cited Black musical expression and talent as one way of demonstrating that they were indeed human beings and not chattels. The first author takes the interesting tack of showing the superiority of the United States to Britain due to her rich and varied population, including African-Americans. It is not their physical strength but their adaptability -- their willingness to utilize singing as a tool (as opposed to the British's supposed stuffy unwillingness). And the ART OF BALLET praises the Black singers for their ability to be topical.

However, both authors still appear to critique the Black songs as being of low standard in their texts (lack of rhyme, irregular number of metrical feet, and all that). I think it's likely that the aesthetic of creating incidental/improvised verses in this manner was something more valued in African-American (and indeed African) musical culture. For this reason, the emphasis on that went under-appreciated by the observers.

Incidentally, another approach to take to the material that John as laid out (e.g. for "Sally Brown") would be to compare the references in light of the ethnic backgrounds of who was said to be singing them (where texts are available, that is). Is there any difference between the sort of texts sung by Euro-/American and African-American sailors? Did a common aesthetic emerge for chantey-singing? Or did there remain a distinct stylistic difference between sailors of different ethnicities?