The Baarley Mow (a harvest song).
Here’s a health to the baarley mow, my braave boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
We’ll drenk et out of the jolly brown boul,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
Chorus.
Here’s a health to the baarley mow, my braave boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
We’ll drenk et out of the nepperkin,[1] boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
The nepperkin, and the jolly brown boul.
Chorus.—Here’s a health, etc.
We’ll drenk et out of the quaarter pint, boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
The quaarter pint, nepperkin, and the jolly brown boul.
Chorus.—Here’s a health, etc.
This goes on through very many verses until all the different parts of liquid measure are exhausted; the three last verses are—
We’ll drenk et out of the well, my braave boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
The well, the hoosghead,[2] the haalf hoosghead, ainker,[3]
the haalf ainker, gallon, the pottle, the quaart, the
pint, the haalf a pint, quaarter pint, nepperkin,
and the jolly brown boul.
Chorus.—Here’s a health, etc.
We’ll drenk et out of the rever, my boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
The rever, the well, etc.
Chorus.—Here’s a health, etc.
We’ll drenk et out of the ocean, my boys,
Here’s a health to the baarley mow.
The ocean, the rever, the well, etc.
Chorus.—Here’s a health, etc.
“At Looe, in East Cornwall, it was usual forty years ago, and probably it is still, for labourers to sing ‘The Long Hundred’ (a song of numbers), when throwing ballast with shovels from a sand barge into a ship. The object was said to be threefold; ‘to keep time (i.e. work simultaneously), to prevent anyone from shirking his share of work, and to cheer themselves for the labour,’ which was by no means light. A shovelful of ballast was delivered by every man with each line of the song, which ran thus:—