BOUND TO AUSTRALIA

I'm leaving old Ireland, the land that I love
And I'm bound far across the sea
Oh, I'm bound for Australia, the land of the free
Where there'll be a welcome for me

Chorus:
So fill up yer glasses an' drink what ye please
For whatever the damage I'll pay
So be aisy an' free, whilst yer drinkin' wid me
Sure I'm a man you don't meet every day!

When I board me ship for the south'ard to go
She'll be lookin' so trim an' so fine
And I'll land me aboard, with me bags and me stores
From the dockside they'll cast off each line

To Land's End we'll tow, with our boys all so tight
Wave a hearty goodbye to the shore
And we'll drink the last drop to our country's green land
And the next day we'll curse our sore heads

We'll then drop the tug, and sheet tops'ls home taut
And the hands will crowd sail upon sail
With a sou'wester strong, boys, we'll just tack along
By the morn many jibs will turn pale

We'll beat past the Ushant and then down the Bay
Where the west wind it blows fine an' strong
We'll soon get the Trades and we should make good time
To the south'ard then we'll roll along

Round the Cape we will roll, take our flyin' kites in
For the Forties will sure roar their best
And then run our Eastin' with yards all set square
With the wind roaring out of the west

We'll then pass Cape Looin all shipshape and trim
Then head up for Adelaide Port
Off Semaphore roads we will there drop our hook
And ashore, boys, we'll head for some sport


Another song from Stan Hugill's Shanties from the Seven Seas. I changed the first line of the song from "I'm leaving Old England.." to "I'm leaving Old Ireland…" because I felt that the chorus words had an Irish feel to them, especially the "Sure I'm a man…" in the last line of the chorus. I tend not to sing in dialect so I'm not singing exactly what is in Hugill's book. I also left out the last two verses.

Of course there's the well known song Jock Stewart in the DT which is described as "an Irish narrative ballad that has been shortened to an Aberdeenshire drinking song." There are a few threads at Mudcat about this, here, here and here. These threads are mostly about the Jock Stewart / I'm A Man You Don't Meet Every Day songs that don't have nautical verses. Bound to Australia also uses a different melody, a variant of Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms.

Here's what Hugill has to say about Bound to Australia:

An old song known to most Irish and Liverpool-Irish seamen was Bound to Australia, sung to the air I'm a man ye don't meet every day - a variant of Believe me if all those endearing young charms. It was not a true forebitter perhaps, although it was sung in the dog-watches in the old sailing ships; but I never heard that it was used as a capstan shanty until I read in Doerflinger's Shantymen and Shantyboys that according to Captain P. Tayleur it was often sung by seamen in the Australian Emigrant Trade as the 'hove in their mooring lines' and 'brought the anchor to the hawse-pipe'. Captain Tayleur calls his song The First of the Emigrants and in the main it is the same as mine, which I had from old Paddy Griffiths. Gold was found in Australia in 1851 and from that time onwards for the rest of the century sailing ships packed to the scuppers with emigrants and gold-seekers headed for the 'Colonies'. No doubt it lent itself to being a fine capstan song.

Richard (Radriano)