The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #131762   Message #2975127
Posted By: GUEST,crumpybumpy
29-Aug-10 - 09:22 AM
Thread Name: Origins: Prefer I to Inishowen
Subject: Origins: Prefer I to Inishowen
I found this in A Tankard Of Ale
An Anthology Of 120 Drinking Song Lyrics but with no notes as to its origin:

The French, no doubt, are famous souls,
I love them for their brandy ;
In rum and sweet tobacco rolls
Jamaica men are handy.
The big-breeched Dutch in juniper gin,
I own are very knowing ;
But are rum, gin, brandy worth a pin,
Compared with Inishowen ?

Though here with a lord 'tis jolly and fine,
To tumble down Lachryma Christi,
And over a skin of Italy's wine
To get a little misty.
Yet not the blood of the Bordeaux grape,
The finest grape juice going,
Nor clammy Constania, the pride of the Cape,
Prefer I to Inishowen.