As with many of MacColl's songs, it is often difficult to gett all the words from only one recording. I have recordings of him singing it on The New Briton Gazette, Freeborn Man, with Alf Edwards on The Art of the English Concertina, and Singing the Fishing. Bert LLoyd also does a fine rendition on the 4 volume set, The Electric Muse. I don't know where this recording of the song came from, but it is interspersed with commentaries by Larner.

I've heard Lou Killen sing this on several occssions, even sung it with him at a session, and he has never claimed, in any possible way, credit for this song, but always acknowledged MacColl as the composer.

Great work, Teribus. This is the most complete set of the lyrics I've yet seen in print.. However, some corrections and alternatives:

Verse 3 and the treatrment, sure, it took some bearin'
Verse 5 Shields, usually pron. as Sheels
Verse 6, the most elusive of all I have as:

You're net ropeman now, boy, you're on the move,
And you're learnin' all about seafarin'
Scraps of navigation, thats your education
As you're following the shoals of herrin'

I also use the "ten millioion fishes " verse as the end, rather than the "stormy seas."

A final comment; I don;t remember when or where I read it, many years ago, but supposedly a field collector in Ireland had the tune from a travveler whistle player who declared it to be a slow air, "The Shores of Erin." This happened about two months after Singing the Fishing was first aired.

Its still one of the world's finest composed "folk songs" -- Tom