Drinking the blude-red wine,
O whare will I get a skeely skipper
To sail this ship of mine?
“Then up and spake an eldern knight,
Sat at the king’s right knee,
Sir Patrick Spens is the best sailor
That ever sailed the sea.”
Oh, I can yet hear my father’s strong voice rising over the dash of the water and the moan of the wind, as he sung the brave voyage of Sir Patrick to Norroway, to bring home the king’s daughter; but his tones would sink and grow hoarse and low, when he chanted the storm, and the perishing of all the fair company on the voyage home.
“O forty mile off Aberdeen
’Tis fifty fathom deep,