Background Info: Chicken on a Raft^^^

Subject: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft
From: Bellsie (inactive)
Date: 30 Sep 01 - 07:23 PM

I would love the words to this shanty, and I`m sure someone out there has got them tucked away! Cheers

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Sep 01 - 07:28 PM

See that blue box near the top of the screen?

Oh, never mind...

Click here: CHICKEN ON A RAFT

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft
From: 8_Pints
Date: 30 Sep 01 - 07:28 PM

These are in the DT!

Type "Chicken" in the "DigiTrad & Forum" search field and you will see a number of threads including one refering to the lyrics you require.

Enjoy!

Bob vG

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft
From: wildlone
Date: 30 Sep 01 - 07:36 PM

Lets try this Click here

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 01 Oct 01 - 01:43 AM

Find the songs of Cyril Tawney----he has a lot more, and every one a gem! Boab

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft (answered)^^^
From: Nemesis
Date: 01 Oct 01 - 10:40 AM

What is this, ecto-morphic fields or something? I get the words to "Chicken on a raft" off the Digitrad last week to sing tomorrow - cor! Now everyone's at it :)

(PS, we're cutting out and amalgamating a couple of the verses as it is rather tedious - I mean GREAT song - but I think it can pall with an audience if they are listening (we've worked out a 3-part harmony) rather than joining in (and it's amazing how many audiences are hard work to get to join in with even something simple like this).

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft (answered)^^^
From: Bellsie (inactive)
Date: 01 Oct 01 - 06:48 PM

thank you all for your mostly understanding replies. I did try digi thingy with no result, so Guest get off your box, not everyone is a genius, as you obviously are!

Subject: RE: Lyrics for Chicken on a raft (answered)^^^
From: Cllr
Date: 01 Oct 01 - 08:28 PM

yer guest dont be so rude not everyone can spell ciken sorry chickhen dang no its urrm aghh sorry guest you must be a genius.

Cllr, Oh by the way guest I thought it was very thoughtful of you to post the the link, chicken in a basket is one of my favourites.

Subject: Lyr Add: CHICKEN ON A RAFT^^^
From: GUEST,I'm not giving my name to a machine
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 09:26 AM

CHICKEN ON A RAFT^^^
(Cyril Tawney)

Skipper in the wardroom drinkin' gin,
Hey yo, chicken on a raft!
I don't mind knockin', but I ain't goin' in!
Hey yo, chicken on a raft!
The jimmy's laughin' like it'd rain,
Hey yo, chicken on a raft!
He's lookin' at me comic cuts again!
Hey yo, chicken on a raft!

cho: Chicken on a raft on a Monday morning,
      Oh, what a terrible sight to see,
      Dabtoes forward and the dustmen aft,
      Sittin' there a'pickin' at a chicken on a raft!
      Hi, ho, chicken on a raft!
      Hey, ho, chicken on a raft!
      Hi, ho, chicken on a raft!
      Hey, ho, chicken on a raft!

Gave me the middle and the forenoon too,
Now I'm pullin' on a whalin' crew.
Seagulls wheelin' overhead,
I oughter be home in me featherbed!

cho:

I had a little girl in Donny-B,
And did she make a fool of me.
Her heart was like a pusser's shower,
Run hot to cold in a quarter of an hour!

cho:

We kissed goodbye on a midnight bus,
She didn't cry and she didn't fuss,
Am I that one she loves the best,
Or just a cuckoo in another man's nest?

cho:

An amazon girl lived in Dumfries,
Only had her kids in two's and three's,
She's got a sister in Maryhill,
Says she won't but I think she will!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 10:23 AM

The words in stanza 1, line 5, are actually "laughing like a drain", English services idiom: see online phrase entry below
=======
Laugh like a drain
Meaning
To laugh coarsely or loudly, especially at the discomfort of others.
Origin
This is a UK phrase, from around the time of WWII. It is first recorded by Eric Partridge in A dictionary of forces' slang 1939–45, 1948. He describes it as 'Ward-room and also Army officers' slang'.
The reason why drain was picked for this simile isn't clear. Most similes include items that especially display the property being described, e.g. as white as as snow. Drains don't immediately make one think of laughter, although the gurgling sound might have been thought of as being similar to chuckling.
========
Chicken On A Raft is, of course, also naval slang: for a fried or poached egg on toast.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Green Man
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 11:15 AM

Chicken on a raft = Egg on Toast.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Bernard
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 11:20 AM

According to Archie (Cyril was his 'little brother'), it was DRIED egg on toast...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 03:58 PM

Definitely fried egg on toast

Enjoy!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Bernard
Date: 01 Feb 11 - 07:03 PM

That's as maybe, but it was rehydrated DRIED egg!! Not particularly palatable, but standard fare on a submarine.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 04:34 AM

According to Cyril it's fried egg on fried bread.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 05:10 AM

Slang & colloquial terms like this are just as much a kind of folklore as the songs we write of; and so will exist in as many variations. No doubt on subs in which Cyril served it meant a fried egg on toast. In others it will have meant a poached egg, or dried egg, or fried bread, or any combo of these. No more point our arguing about here about what it 'meant' than in our trying to establish a 'correct' version of Barbara [or Barbra or Barbary or Barbry] Allen.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,Rosemary Tawney
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 05:45 AM

My apologies - the last Guest was me having a senior moment (or perhaps beginning to believe what others frequently write about Cyril's songs) and I accidentally sent the reply without checking or signing it. Dave is quite correct.

It's definitely fried egg on fried bread, which by the time they had been kept warm for a long time in the mess must have been more like rubber on leather. Cyril never, ever, mentioned dried egg in any of his notes to the song, and since he spent only 3 years or so in submarines, not his entire naval service (as legend sometimes has it) there's no reason to think that "Chicken on a Raft" has any special sub. connotations.

Once again, enjoy your eggs

Rosemary

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 06:25 AM

Even so, Rosemary, see my above post about probable variations in the meaning between vessels. So that, while Cyril was of course authoritative as to what he meant by it, and what it meant on the subs in which he served (although, as Dave H says above, some claim to have heard him say it was fried bread), his say-so is not necessarily universally applicable.

(Do you remember me, I wonder? We met more than once: I particularly recall at Fred Woods' marriage to Monica, when I was Fred's best man. I was also gratified that, on one of his cassettes, he acknowledges having learnt one of the songs, Magdalene Green, from me.)

All best wishes

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,Rosemary Tawney
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 07:56 AM

I take your point, Michael, which of course a valid one, but since the thread started off as being about Cyril's song I gave the facts as they relate to that.

I've often wondered about 'laughing like a drain' but never got around to looking it up'. Thanks for that info.

Yes, I remember you from way back, and hope that you're well

Rosemary

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Feb 11 - 08:18 AM

Yes, thanks, Rosemary. I lost my dear Valerie, whom you may remember, 4 years ago; but am now remarried, although 80 next year {ridiculous ~~ only old people are 80!}, so hope to keep going for a bit yet.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:24 AM

It would seem that it was A CURATES EGG

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Joe_F
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:01 PM

I never had any trouble imagining "laughing like a drain". It refers to the raucous noise that comes out of a drain when the last of the water goes down it. I do appreciate "laughing like it'd rain", tho -- an ingenious mondegreen.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,bill p
Date: 17 Feb 14 - 03:55 PM

The words were changed from shit to chicken, the raft is toast. The shit was tinned kidney's in gravy which tasted awful but contained all the nutrients needed by submariners during ww1. Sorry no eggs and no chicken.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,Victerr4
Date: 30 Jun 17 - 12:19 PM

Lordy me, this thread goes back a bit. Used to sing this shanty grouped around a stoked up Aga drinking tea and (when it was still politically correct to do so) smoking.
I always understood 'chicken on a raft' to be fried egg on fried bread; a lower mess deck staple but not so tasty after it'd been sitting in a bain marie for too long.
Dabtoes I believe refers to ordinary seamen, whereas Dustmen I believe were stokers. Frd and Aft being where they were individually grouped at mess.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jul 17 - 06:52 AM

This was the first folk song I ever heard and tried to join in on, 'twas at the Buck Inn at Malham in 1970 when I was on a two-week botany field course at Malham Tarn. We got the words more or less right but everyone deliberately slurred "dabtoes" as none of us knew what the word actually was, let alone what it meant! Actually, recalling my usual condition during those pub evenings, I probably slurred all the words...

And I've probably forgotten more than you'll ever know about clints and grykes!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jul 17 - 06:56 AM

The other song I remember from that time was Who's The Fool Now. Had an issue with a word or two in that one as well! Then there was the Pace-egging Song. Don't ask me why we singing that one in July.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jul 17 - 06:57 AM

we were

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 01 Jul 17 - 08:19 AM

bill p, what you refer to is 100% American, ie shit on a shingle.

Chicken on a raft is Royal Navy slang for fried egg on fried bread, I got this from Cyril himself. GET IT ?

Dave H

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Chicken on a Raft (answered)^^^
From: GUEST,pauperback
Date: 01 Jul 17 - 05:44 PM

https://www.navy-net.co.uk/community/threads/shit-on-a-raft.32224/ 

U.S. Army version is: creamed chipped (dried) beef on toast (S.O.S.)


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chipped_beef 

On a raft, haha. Sounds a little bit rubbery.