Whall, 1910, presumably from recollection of the 1860s. Whall's text and speculations were often repeated.


“This was - and I daresay is - a well-known shanty. Either Bret Harte or Mark Twain - I forget which - has a character, an old skipper, who is fond of singing about the trials of a certain “Lorenzo. ” Whether this was the original name I do not know . But as far back as fifty years ago it was plain “Ranzo.” Lorenzo it might have been, for Yankee whalers took a large number of their men from the Azores, men of Portuguese descent, among whom "Lorenzo" would have been a common name enough. In the days I speak of the shanty was always sung to the regulation words, and when the story was finished there was no at

tempt at improvisation; the text was, I suppose, considered sacred.

"I never heard any variation from the words here given.

"Brisk...

"Oh, pity poor Reuben Ranzo,
Ranzo, boys, Ranzo!
Oh, poor old Reuben Ranzo,
Ranzo, boys, Ranzo!

O Ranzo was no sailor,
He shipped on board of a whaler.

And he could not do his duty ,
So they took him to the gangway.

And they gave him nine-and-thirty,
Yes, lashes nine-and-thirty.

Now, the captain being a good man,
He took him in the cabin.

And he gave him wine and water,
Rube kissed the captain's daughter.

He taught him navigation
To fit him for his station.

Now, Ranzo he's a sailor,
He's chief mate of that whaler.


(If Bret Harte or Mark Twain ever wrote of a skipper singing about "Lorenzo," their digitized works are silent about it.)