We’re off for China’s shore.
We need your prayers, your sympathies more now than e’er before,
For few the friends and hard the task on China’s distant shore;
We’re off for China’s shore.
We’re off etc.
We’ll heed our Master’s call; He is with us ever more;
Then farewell, dear friends, adieu, we’re off for China’s shore;
We’re off for China’s shore.
We’re off etc.
A close tune variant is ‘Lost City’, or ‘[To Glory I Will Go]’ in this collection. Tune and words are a parody of ‘A-Begging We Will Go’ which was widely popular in the latter part of the seventeenth century and traces of whose existence are found as early as 1611.