Interesting for several reasons. Has this already been posted?

Anon., "Recollections of a West Indiaman," The Master, Mate and Pilot, Vol. VII (July, 1914), p. 40:

"Owing to the trouble that our captain had had at various times with drunkenness amongst English crews, he decided in the future to ship only negroes in the forecastle, and for the remaining years of my apprenticeship [which began in 1864] I sailed with colored crews. Many of them hailed from Baltimore and the cotton ports of the Southern United States. They were fine sailors, these men, quiet, strong and respectful: but my pleasantest memory in regard to them was their chanteying. They sang the choruses in weird falsetto notes and with the fascinating pronunciation of the Southern darkey. They sang a chantey for every little job and the way they thundered out such plaintive melodies as 'Shenandoah,I Love Your Daughter' and 'My Lowlands Away' made them a treat to listen to. I once heard a well-known prima donna in Liverpool say that our singing was the finest harmony she had ever heard, and I have seen crowds of people on the dock head there listening to our colored 'jacks' warping out to 'Ladies, fare-ye-well' (an outward bound song), and, as sailors say, 'Their tears were running down into the dock.'"