Who’d fight though the black blood was flowing like butter-milk out of his buff.
There’s broken-nosed Bat from the mountain—last week he burst out of jail—
And Murty, the beautiful Tory, who’d scorn in a row to turn tail;
Bloody Bill will be there like a darling—and Jerry—och! let him alone
For giving his blackthorn a flourish, or lifting a lump of a stone!
And Tim, who’d served in the Militia, has his bayonet stuck on a pole;
Foxy Dick has his scythe in good order—a neat sort of tool on the whole;
A cudgel, I see, is your weapon, and never I knew it to fail;
But I think that a man is more handy who fights, as I do, with a flail.
We muster a hundred shillelahs, all handled by iligant men,