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The Shanty Book
Part I
Sailor Shanties
(Curwen Edition 6308)
Collected and Edited, with Pianoforte Accompaniment, by RICHARD
RUNCIMAN TERRY, with a Foreword by SIR WALTER RUNCIMAN, Bart.
LONDON
J. Curwen & Sons Ltd., 24 Berners Street, W. 1
Copyright, 1921, by J. Curwen & Sons Ltd.
FOREWORD
By SIR WALTER RUNCIMAN
It is sometimes difficult for old sailors like myself to realize that
these fine shanty tunes--so fascinating to the musician, and which no
sailor can hear without emotion--died out with the sailing vessel, and
now belong to a chapter of maritime history that is definitely closed.
They will never more be heard on the face of the waters, but it is
well that they should be preserved with reverent care, as befits a
legacy from the generation of seamen that came to an end with the
stately vessels they manned with such skill and resource.
In speech, the old-time 'shellback' was notoriously reticent--almost
inarticulate; but in song he found self-expression, and all the
romance and poetry of the sea are breathed into his shanties, where
simple childlike sentimentality alternates with the Rabelaisian humour
of the grown man. Whatever landsmen may think about shanty words--with
their cheerful inconsequence, or light-hearted coarseness--there can
be no two opinions about the tunes, which, as folk-music, are a
national asset.
I know, of course, that several shanty collections are in the market,
but as a sailor I am bound to say that only one--Capt. W.B. Whall's
'Sea Songs, Ships, and Shanties'--can be regarded as authoritative.
Only a portion of Capt. Whall's delightful book is devoted to
shanties, of which he prints the melodies only (without
accompaniment); and of these he does not profess to give more than
those he himself learnt at sea. I am glad, therefore, to welcome
Messrs. Curwen's project of a wide and representative collection. Dr.
Terry's qualifications as editor are exceptional, since he was reared
in an environment of nineteenth-century seamen, and is the only
landsman I have met who is able to render shanties as the old seamen
did. I am not musician enough to criticize his pianoforte
accompaniments, but I can vouch for the authenticity of the _melodies_
as he presents them, untampered with in any way.
WALTER RUNCIMAN.
_Shoreston Hall_,
_Chathill_, 1921.
CONTENTS
PAGE
FOREWORD by Sir Walter Runciman iii
INTRODUCTION v
NOTES ON THE SHANTIES xiii
WINDLASS & CAPSTAN SHANTIES:
1 Billy Boy 2
2 Bound for the Rio Grande 4
3 Good-bye, fare ye well 6
4 Johnny come down to Hilo 8
5 Clear the track, let the Bullgine run 10
6 Lowlands away 12
7 Sally Brown 16
8 Santy Anna 18
9 Shenandoah 20
10 Stormalong John 22
11 The Hog's-eye Man 24
12 The Wild Goose Shanty 26
13 We're all bound to go 28
14 What shall we do with the drunken sailor? 30
HALLIARD SHANTIES:
15 Blow, my bully boys 32
16 Blow the man down 34
17 Cheer'ly, men 36
18 Good morning, ladies all 38
19 Hanging Johnny 40
20 Hilo Somebody 42
21 Oh run, let the Bullgine run 44
22 Reuben Ranzo 46
23 The Dead Horse 48
24 Tom's gone to Hilo 50
25 Whisky Johnny 52
26 Boney was a warrior 54
FORE-SHEET OR SWEATING-UP SHANTIES:
27 Johnny Boker 55
28 Haul away, Joe 56
29 We'll haul the bowlin' 58
BUNT SHANTY:
30 Paddy Doyle's boots 59
ALPHABETICAL INDEX OF SHANTIES
PAGE
Billy Boy 2
Blow, my bully boys 32
Blow the man down 34
Boney was a warrior 54
Bound for the Rio Grande 4
Cheer'ly, men 36
Clear the track, let the Bullgine run 10
Dead Horse, The 48
Good-bye, fare ye well 6
Good morning, ladies all 38
Hanging Johnny 40
Haul away, Joe 56
Hilo Somebody 42
Hog's-eye Man, The 24
Johnny Boker 55
Johnny come down to Hilo 8
Lowlands away 12
Oh run, let the Bullgine run 44
Paddy Doyle's boots 59
Reuben Ranzo 46
Sally Brown 16
Santy Anna 18
Shenandoah 20
Stormalong John 22
Tom's gone to Hilo 50
We'll haul the bowlin' 58
We're all bound to go 28
What shall we do with the drunken sailor? 30
Whisky Johnny 52
Wild Goose Shanty, The 26
INTRODUCTION
APOLOGIA
It may reasonably be asked by what authority a mere landsman publishes
a book on a nautical subject. I may, therefore, plead in extenuation
that I have all my life been closely connected with seafaring matters,
especially during childhood and youth, and have literally 'grown up
with' shanties. My maternal ancestors followed the sea as far back as
the family history can be traced, and sailor uncles and grand-uncles
have sung shanties to me from my childhood upwards. During boyhood I
was constantly about amongst ships, and had learnt at first hand all
the popular shanties before any collection of them appeared in print.
I have in later years collected them from all manner of sailors,
chiefly at Northumbrian sources. I have collated these later versions
with those which I learnt at first hand as a boy from sailor
relatives, and also aboard ship. And lastly, I lived for some years in
the West Indies, one of the few remaining spots where shanties may
still be heard, where my chief recreation was cruising round the
islands in my little ketch. In addition to hearing them in West Indian
seaports, aboard Yankee sailing ships and sugar droghers, I also heard
them sung constantly on shore in Antigua under rather curious
conditions. West Indian negro shanties are movable wooden huts, and
when a family wishes to change its _venue_ it does so in the following
manner: The shanty is levered up on to a low platform on wheels, to
which two very long ropes are attached. The ropes are manned by as
many hands as their length will admit. A 'shantyman' mounts the roof
of the hut and sits astride it. He sings a song which has a chorus,
and is an exact musical parallel of a seaman's 'pull-and-haul' shanty.
The crowd below sings the chorus, giving a pull on the rope at the
required points in the music, just as sailors did when hauling at sea.
Each pull on the rope draws the hut a short distance forward, and the
process is continued till its final resting-place is reached, when the
shantyman descends from the roof. The hut is then levered off the
platform on to _terra firma_ and fixed in its required position.
WHAT A SHANTY IS
Shanties were labour songs sung by sailors of the merchant service
only while at work, and never by way of recreation. Moreover--at
least, in the nineteenth century--they were never used aboard
men-o'-war, where all orders were carried out in silence to the pipe
of the bo'sun's whistle.
Before the days of factories and machinery, all forms of work were
literally _manual_ labour, and all the world over the labourer,
obeying a primitive instinct, sang at his toil: the harvester with his
sickle, the weaver at the loom, the spinner at the wheel. Long after
machinery had driven the labour-song from the land it survived at sea
in the form of shanties, since all work aboard a sailing vessel was
performed by hand.
The advent of screw steamers sounded the death-knell of the shanty.
Aboard the steamer there were practically no sails to be manipulated;
the donkey-engine and steam winch supplanted the hand-worked windlass
and capstan. By the end of the seventies steam had driven the sailing
ship from the seas. A number of sailing vessels lingered on through
the eighties, but they retained little of the corporate pride and
splendour that was once theirs. The old spirit was gone never to
return.
When the sailing ship ruled the waters and the shanty was a living
thing no one appears to have paid heed to it. To the landsman of those
days--before folk-song hunting had begun--the haunting beauty of the
tunes would appear to have made no appeal. This may be partly
accounted for by the fact that he would never be likely to hear the
sailor sing them ashore, and partly because of the Rabelaisian
character of the words to which they were sung aboard ship. We had
very prim notions of propriety in those days, and were apt to overlook
the beauty of the melodies, and to speak of shanties in bulk as 'low
vulgar songs.' Be that as it may, it was not until the late
eighties--when the shanty was beginning to die out with the sailing
ship--that any attempt was made to form a collection.
ORIGIN OF THE WORD
Here let me enter my protest against the literary preciosity which
derives the word from (_un_) _chante_ and spells it 'chanty'--in other
words, against the gratuitous assumption that unlettered British
sailors derived one of the commonest words in their vocabulary from a
foreign source. The result of this 'literary' spelling is that
ninety-nine landsmen out of every hundred, instead of pronouncing the
word 'shanty,' rhyming with 'scanty' (_as every sailor did_),
pronounce it 'tchahnty,' rhyming with 'auntie,' thereby courting the
amusement or contempt of every seaman. The vogue of '_ch_anty' was
apparently created by the late W.E. Henley, a fine poet, a great man
of letters, a profound admirer of shanty tunes, but entirely
unacquainted with nautical affairs. Kipling and other landsmen have
given additional currency to the spelling. The 'literary' sailors,
Clark Russell and Frank Bullen, have also spelt it '_ch_anty,' but
their reason is obvious. The modest seaman always bowed before the
landsman's presumed superiority in 'book-larnin'.' What more natural
than that Russell and Bullen, obsessed by so ancient a tradition,
should accept uncritically the landsman's spelling. But educated
sailors devoid of 'literary' pretensions have always written the word
as it was pronounced. To my mind the strongest argument against the
literary landsman's derivation of the word is that the British sailor
cultivated the supremest contempt for everything French, and would be
the last person to label such a definitely British practice as
shanty-singing with a French title. If there had been such a thing in
French ships as a labour-song bearing such a far-fetched title as
(_un_) _chante_, there might have been a remote possibility of the
British sailor adopting the French term in a spirit of sport or
derision, but there is no evidence that any such practice, or any such
term, achieved any vogue in French ships. As a matter of fact, the
Oxford Dictionary (which prints it '_sh_anty') states that the word
never found its way into print until 1869.
The truth is that, however plausible the French derivation theory may
sound, it is after all pure speculation--and a landsman's speculation
at that--unsupported by a shred of concrete evidence.
If I wished to advance another theory more plausible still, and
equally unconvincing, I might urge that the word was derived from the
negro hut-removals already mentioned. Here, at least, we have a very
ancient custom, which would be familiar to British seamen visiting
West Indian seaports. The object moved was a _shanty_; the music
accompanying the operation was called, by the negroes, a _shanty_
tune; its musical form (solo and chorus) was identical with the sailor
_shanty_; the pulls on the rope followed the same method which
obtained at sea; the soloist was called a _shanty_man; like the
shantyman at sea he did no work, but merely extemporized verses to
which the workers at the ropes supplied the chorus; and finally, the
negroes still pronounce the word itself exactly as the seaman did.
I am quite aware of the flaws in the above argument, but at least it
shows a manual labour act performed both afloat and ashore under
precisely similar conditions as to (_a_) its nature, (_b_) its musical
setting; called by the same name, _with the same pronunciation_ in
each case; and lastly, connected, in one case, with an actual hut or
_shanty_. Against this concrete argument we have a landsman's abstract
speculation, which (_a_) begs the whole question, and (_b_) which was
never heard of until a few years before the disappearance of the
sailing ship. I do not assert that the negroid derivation is
conclusive, but that from (_un_) _chante_ will not bear serious
inspection.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The material under this head is very scanty. Nothing of any
consequence was written before the eighties, when W.L. Alden, in
_Harper's Magazine_, and James Runciman, in the _St. James's Gazette_
and other papers, wrote articles on the subject with musical
quotations. Since then several collections have appeared:
1887. _Sailors' Songs or Chanties_, the words by Frederick
J. Davis, R.N.R., the music composed and arranged upon
traditional sailor airs by Ferris Tozer, Mus. D. Oxon.
1888. _The Music of the Waters_, by Laura Alexandrine Smith.
1910 and 1912. _Sea Songs, Ships, and Shanties_, by Capt.
W.B. Whall.
1912. _Songs of Sea Labour_, by Frank T. Bullen and W.F.
Arnold.
1914. _English Folk Chanteys_ with Pianoforte Accompaniment,
collected by Cecil J. Sharp.
Of all these collections Capt. Whall's is the only one which a sailor
could accept as authoritative. Capt. Whall unfortunately only gives
the twenty-eight shanties which he himself learnt at sea. But to any
one who has heard them sung aboard the old sailing ships, his versions
ring true, and have a bite and a snap that is lacking in those
published by mere collectors.
Davis and Tozer's book has had a great vogue, as it was for many years
the only one on the market. But the statement that the music is
'composed and arranged on traditional sailor airs' rules it out of
court in the eyes of seamen, since (_a_) a sailor song is not a
shanty, and (_b_) to 'compose and arrange on traditional airs' is to
destroy the traditional form.
Miss Smith's book is a thick volume into which was tumbled
indiscriminately and uncritically a collection of all sorts of tunes
from all sorts of countries which had any connection with seas, lakes,
rivers, or their geographical equivalents. Scientific folk-song
collecting was not understood in those days, and consequently all was
fish that came to the authoress's net. Sailor shanties and landsmen's
nautical effusions were jumbled together higgledy-piggledy, along with
'Full Fathom Five' and the 'Eton Boating Song.' But this lack of
discrimination, pardonable in those days, was not so serious as the
inability to write the tunes down correctly. So long as they were
copied from other song-books they were not so bad, but when it came to
taking them down from the seamen's singing the results were
deplorable. Had the authoress been able to give us correct versions of
the shanties her collection would have been a valuable one. The book
contains altogether about thirty-two shanties collected from sailors
in the Tyne seaports. Since both Miss Smith and myself hail from
Newcastle, her 'hunting ground' for shanties was also mine, and I am
consequently in a position to assess the importance or unimportance of
her work. I may, therefore, say that although hardly a single shanty
is noted down correctly, I can see clearly--having myself noted the
same tunes in the same district--what she intended to convey, and
furthermore can vouch for the accuracy of some of the words which were
common to north country sailors, and which have not appeared in other
collections.
If I have been obliged to criticize Miss Smith's book it is not
because I wish to disparage a well-intentioned effort, but because I
constantly hear _The Music of the Waters_ quoted as an authoritative
work on sailor shanties; and since the shanties in it were all
collected in the district where I spent boyhood and youth, I am
familiar with all of them, and can state definitely that they are in
no sense authoritative. I should like, however, to pay my tribute of
respect to Miss Smith's industry, and to her enterprise in calling
attention to tunes that then seemed in a fair way to disappear.
Bullen and Arnold's book ought to have been a valuable contribution to
shanty literature, as Bullen certainly knew his shanties, and used to
sing them capitally. Unfortunately his musical collaborator does not
appear to have been gifted with the faculty of taking down authentic
versions from his singing. He seems to have had difficulty in
differentiating between long measured notes and unmeasured pauses;
between the respective meanings of three-four and six-eight time;
between modal and modern tunes; and between the cases where irregular
barring was or was not required. Apart from the amateur nature of the
harmonies, the book exhibits such strange unacquaintance with the
rudiments of musical notation as the following (p. 25):
[Music illustration]
A few other collections deserve mention:
1912. _The Esperance Morris Book_, Part II (Curwen Edition
8571), contains five shanties collected and arranged by
Clive Carey.
1914. _Shanties and Forebitters_, collected and
accompaniments written by Mrs. Clifford Beckett (Curwen
Edition 6293).
_Journal of the Folk-Song Society_, Nos. 12, 18, and 20,
contain articles on shanties, with musical examples
(melodies only), which, from the academic point of view, are
not without interest.
1920. _The Motherland Song Book_ (Vols. III and IV, edited
by R. Vaughan Williams) contains seven shanties. It is
worthy of note that Dr. Vaughan Williams, Mr. Clive Carey,
and Mrs. Clifford Beckett all spell the word 'shanty' as
sailors pronounced it.
1920. _Sailor Shanties arranged for Solo and Chorus of Men's
Voices_ by the present editor; two selections (Curwen
Edition 50571 and 50572).
There are one or two other collections in print which are obviously
compilations, showing no original research. Of these I make no note.
SHANTY FORMS
Shanties may be roughly divided, as regards their use, into two
classes: (_a_) Hauling shanties, and (_b_) Windlass and Capstan. The
former class accompanied the setting of the sails, and the latter the
weighing of the anchor, or 'warping her in' to the wharf, etc. Capstan
shanties were also used for pumping ship. A few shanties were
'interchangeable,' i.e. they were used for both halliards and capstan.
The subdivisions of each class are interesting, and the nature of the
work involving 'walk away,' 'stamp and go,' 'sweating her up,' 'hand
over hand,' and other types of shanty would make good reading; but
nautical details, however fascinating, must be economized in a musical
publication.
Capstan shanties are readily distinguishable by their music. The
operation of walking round the capstan (pushing the capstan bars in
front of them) was continuous and not intermittent. Both tune and
chorus were, as a rule, longer than those of the hauling shanty, and
there was much greater variety of rhythm. Popular songs, if they had a
chorus or refrain, could be, and were, effectively employed for
windlass and capstan work.
Hauling shanties were usually shorter than capstan ones, and are of
two types: (_a_) those used for 'the long hoist' and (_b_) those
required for 'the short pull' or 'sweating-up.' Americans called these
operations the 'long' and the 'short drag.' The former was used when
beginning to hoist sails, when the gear would naturally be slack and
moderately easy to manipulate. It had two short choruses, with a
double pull in each. In the following example, the pulls are marked
[music accent symbol].
[Music illustration: REUBEN RANZO
SOLO. Oh pity poor Reuben Ranzo,
CHORUS. [accent] Ranzo, boys, [accent] Ranzo,
SOLO. Oh poor old Reuben Ranzo,
CHORUS. [accent] Ranzo, boys, [accent] Ranzo.]
It is easy to see how effective a collective pull at each of these
points would be, while the short intervals of solo would give time for
shifting the hands on the rope and making ready for the next combined
effort.
When the sail was fully hoisted and the gear taut, a much stronger
pull was necessary in order to make everything fast, so the shanty was
then changed for a 'sweating-up' one, in which there was only one
short chorus and one very strong pull:
[Music illustration: HAUL THE BOWLIN'
SOLO: We'll haul the bowlin', so early in the morning,
CHORUS: We'll haul the bowlin', the bowlin' [accent] haul.]
So much effort was now required on the pull that it was difficult to
sing a musical note at that point. The last word was therefore usually
shouted.
SOURCES OF TUNES
The sailor travelled in many lands, and in his shanties there are
distinct traces of the nationalities of the countries he visited.
Without doubt a number of them came from American negro sources. The
songs heard on Venetian gondolas must have had their effect, as many
examples show. There are also distinct traces of folk-songs which the
sailor would have learnt ashore in his native fishing village, and the
more familiar Christy Minstrel song was frequently pressed into the
service. As an old sailor once said to me: 'You can make anything into
a shanty.'
Like all traditional tunes, some shanties are in the ancient modes,
and others in the modern major and minor keys. It is the habit of the
'folk-songer' (I am not alluding to our recognized folk-song experts)
to find 'modes' in every traditional tune. It will suffice, therefore,
to say that shanties follow the course of all other traditional music.
Many are modern, and easily recognizable as such. Others are modal in
character, such as 'What shall we do with the drunken sailor?' No. 14,
and 'The Hog's-Eye Man,' No. 11. Others fulfil to a certain extent
modal conditions, but are nevertheless in keys, e.g. 'Stormalong
John,' No. 10.
Like many other folk-songs, certain shanties--originally, no doubt, in
a mode--were, by the insertion of leading notes, converted into the
minor key. There was also the tendency on the part of the modern
sailor to turn his minor key into a major one. I sometimes find
sailors singing in the major, nowadays, tunes which the very old men
of my boyhood used to sing in the minor. A case in point is 'Haul
away, Joe,' No. 28. Miss Smith is correct in giving it in the minor
form which once obtained on the Tyne, and I am inclined to hazard the
opinion that that was the original form and not, as now, the
following:
[Music illustration:
Way, haul away,
We'll haul away the bowlin'.
Way, haul away,
We'll haul away, Joe.]
In later times I have also heard 'The Drunken Sailor' (a distinctly
modal tune) sung in the major as follows:
[Music illustration:
What shall we do with the drunken sailor?
What shall we do with the drunken sailor? etc.]
I have generally found that these perversions of the tunes are due to
sailors who took to the sea as young men in the last days of the
sailing ship, and consequently did not imbibe to the full the old
traditions. With the intolerance of youth they assumed that the modal
turn given to a shanty by the older sailor was the mark of ignorance,
since it did not square with their ideas of a major or minor key. This
experience is common to all folk-tune collectors.
Other characteristics, for example: (_a_) different words to the same
melody; (_b_) different melodies to the same or similar words, need
not be enlarged upon here, as they will be self-evident when a
definitive collection is published.
Of the usual troubles incidental to folk-song collecting it is
unnecessary to speak. But the collection of shanties involves
difficulties of a special kind. In taking down a folk-song from a
rustic, one's chief difficulty is surmounted when one has broken down
his shyness and induced him to sing. There is nothing for him to do
then but get on with the song. Shanties, however, being labour songs,
one is 'up against' the strong psychological connection between the
song and its manual acts. Two illustrations will explain what I mean.
A friend of mine who lives in Kerry wished a collector to hear some of
the traditional keening, and an old woman with the reputation of being
the best keener in the district, when brought to the house to sing the
funeral chants, made several attempts and then replied in a distressed
manner: 'I can't do it; there's no body,' This did not mean that she
was unwilling to keen in the absence of a corpse, but that she was
unable to do so. Just before giving up in despair my friend was seized
with a brain wave, and asked her if it would suffice for him to lie
down on the floor and personate the corpse. When he had done this the
old woman found herself able to get on with the keening.
An incident related to me quite casually by Sir Walter Runciman throws
a similar light on the inseparability of a shanty and its labour. He
described how one evening several north country ships happened to be
lying in a certain port. All the officers and crews were ashore,
leaving only the apprentices aboard, some of whom, as he remarked,
were 'very keen on shanties,' and their suggestion of passing away the
time by singing some was received with enthusiasm. The whole party of
about thirty apprentices at once collected themselves aboard one
vessel, sheeted home the main topsail, and commenced to haul it up to
the tune of 'Boney was a warrior,' changing to 'Haul the Bowlin'' for
'sweating-up.' In the enthusiasm of their singing, and the absence of
any officer to call ''Vast hauling,' they continued operations until
they broke the topsail yard in two, when the sight of the wreckage and
the fear of consequences brought the singing to an abrupt conclusion.
In my then ignorance I naturally asked: 'Why couldn't you have sung
shanties without hoisting the topsail?' and the reply was: 'How could
we sing a shanty without having our hands on the rope?' Here we have
the whole psychology of the labour-song: the old woman could not keen
without the 'body,' and the young apprentices could not sing shanties
apart from the work to which they belonged. The only truly
satisfactory results which I ever get nowadays from an old sailor are
when he has been stimulated by conversation to become reminiscent, and
croons his shanties almost subconsciously. Whenever I find a sailor
willing to declaim shanties in the style of a song I begin to be a
little suspicious of his seamanship. In one of the journals of the
Folk-Song Society there is an account of a sailor who formed a little
party of seafaring men to give public performances of shanties on the
concert platform. No doubt this was an interesting experience for the
listeners, but that a self-conscious performance such as this could
represent the old shanty singing I find it difficult to believe. Of
course I have had sailors sing shanties to me in a fine declamatory
manner, but I usually found one of three things to be the case: the
man was a 'sea lawyer,' or had not done much deep-sea sailing; or his
seamanship only dated from the decline of the sailing vessel.
It is doubtless interesting to the folk-songer to see in print
shanties taken down from an individual sailor with his individual
melodic twirls and twiddles. But since no two sailors ever sing the
same shanty quite in the same manner, there must necessarily be some
means of getting at the tune, unhampered by these individual
idiosyncrasies, which are quite a different thing from what folk-song
students recognize as 'variants.' The power to discriminate can only
be acquired by familiarity with the shanty as it was in its palmy
days. The collector who comes upon the scene at this late time of day
must necessarily be at a disadvantage. The ordinary methods which he
would apply to a folk-song break down in the case of a labour-song.
Manual actions were the soul of the shanty; eliminate these and you
have only the skeleton of what was once a living thing. It is quite
possible, I know, to push this line of argument too far, but every one
who knows anything about seamanship must feel that a shanty nowadays
cannot be other than a pale reflection of what it once was.
That is why I deprecate the spurious authenticity conferred by print
upon isolated versions of shanties sung by individual old men. When
the originals are available it seems to me pedantic and academic to
put into print the comic mispronunciations of well-known words by old
and uneducated seamen.
And this brings me to the last difficulty which confronts the
collector with no previous knowledge of shanties. As a mere matter of
dates, any sailors now remaining from sailing ship days must
necessarily be very old men. I have found that their octogenarian
memories are not always to be trusted. On one occasion an old man sang
quite glibly a tune which was in reality a _pasticcio_ of three
separate shanties all known to me. I have seen similar results in
print, since the collector arrived too late upon the scene to be able
to detect the tricks which an old man's memory played him.
One final remark about collectors which has an important bearing upon
the value of their work. There were two classes of sailing vessels
that sailed from English ports--the coaster or the mere collier that
plied between the Tyne or Severn and Boulogne, and the Southspainer,
under which term was comprised all deep-sea vessels. On the collier or
short-voyage vessel the crew was necessarily a small one, and the
shanty was more or less of a makeshift, adapted to the capacity of the
limited numbers of the crew. Purely commercial reasons precluded the
engagement of any shantyman specially distinguished for his musical
attainments. Consequently, so far as the shanty was concerned, 'any
old thing would do.' On the Southspainer, however, things were very
different. The shantyman was usually a person of considerable musical
importance, who sang his songs in a more or less finished manner; his
melodies were clean, clear-cut things, without any of the
folk-songer's quavers and wobbles. I heard them in the 'seventies and
'eighties before the sailing-ship had vanished, consequently I give
them as they were then sung--undisfigured and unobscured by the
mixture of twirls, quavers, and hiccups one hears from octogenarian
mariners who attempt them to-day.
METHOD OF SINGING
So far as the music was concerned, a shanty was a song with a chorus.
The song was rendered by one singer, called the shantyman, and the
chorus by the sailors who performed their work in time with the music.
So far as the words were concerned there was usually a stereotyped
opening of one or more verses. For all succeeding verses the shantyman
improvized words, and his topics were many and varied, the most
appreciated naturally being personal allusions to the crew and
officers, sarcastic criticism on the quality of the food, wistful
references to the good time coming on shore, etc. There was no need
for any connection or relevancy between one verse or another, nor were
rhymes required. The main thing that mattered was that the rhythm
should be preserved and that the words should be such as would keep
the workers merry or interested. Once the stereotyped verses were got
rid of and the improvization began, things became so intimate and
personal as to be unprintable. It was a curious fact that such shanty
words as lent themselves most to impropriety were wedded to tunes
either of fine virility or haunting sweetness.
For 'pull-and-haul' shanties the shantyman took up his position near
the workers and announced the shanty, sometimes by singing the first
line. This established the tune to which they were to supply the
chorus. For capstan shanties he usually did the same. He frequently
sat on the capstan, but so far as I can learn he more usually took up
his position on or against the knightheads. The importance of the
shantyman could not be overestimated. A good shantyman with a pretty
wit was worth his weight in gold. He was a privileged person, and was
excused all work save light or odd jobs.
THE WORDS OF SHANTIES
I have already noted the shanties which were derived from popular
songs, also the type which contained a definite narrative. Except
where a popular song was adapted, the form was usually rhymed or more
often unrhymed couplets. The topics were many and varied, but the
chief ones were: (1) popular heroes such as Napoleon, and 'Santy
Anna.' That the British sailor of the eighteenth century should hate
every Frenchman and yet make a hero of Bonaparte is one of the
mysteries which has never been explained. Another mystery is the
fascination which Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna (1795-1876) exercised
over the sailor. He was one of the many Mexican 'Presidents' and was
defeated by the American General Taylor in 1847. That did not prevent
the British sailor presenting him in the light of an invariable victor
until he was led out to be shot (he really died a natural death) by
persons unknown. (2) The sailor had mythical heroes too, e.g. 'Ranzo,'
already mentioned, and 'Stormy,' who was the theme of many shanties.
No sailor could ever give the least explanation of them, and so they
remain the last echoes of long forgotten sagas. (3) High-sounding,
poetic, or mysterious words, such as 'Lowlands,' 'Shenandoah,'
'Rolling river,' 'Hilo,' 'Mobile Bay,' 'Rio Grande,' had a great
fascination, as their constant recurrence in many shanties shows. (4)
The sailor also sang much of famous ships, such as 'The Flying Cloud,'
'The Henry Clay,' or 'The Victory,' and famous lines, such as 'The
Black Ball.' Even famous shipowners were celebrated in song, as
witness 'Mr. John Tapscott,' in 'We're all bound to go.' (5) Love
affairs, in which 'Lizer Lee' and other damsels constantly figured,
were an endless topic. (6) But chiefly did Jack sing of affairs
connected with his ship. He never sang of 'the rolling main,' 'the
foaming billows,' 'the storm clouds,' etc. These are the
stock-in-trade of the landsman; they were too real for the sailor to
sing about. He had the instinct of the primitive man which forbids
mention of natural forces of evil omen. But intimate or humorous
matters such as the failings of his officers, the quality of the food,
the rate of pay, or other grievances were treated with vigour and
emphasis. Like the Britisher of to-day, he would put up with any
hardship so long as he were permitted to grouse about it. The
shantyman gave humorous expression to this grousing, which deprived it
of the element of sulks. Steam let off in this way was a wholesome
preventive of mutiny.
The choruses were usually jingles, with no relevance save maintenance
of the rhythm.
One feature of the words may be noted. The sailor's instinct for
romance was so strong that in his choruses, at least, no matter how
'hair-curling' the solo might be, he always took the crude edge off
the concrete and presented it as an abstraction if possible. For
example, he knew perfectly well that one meaning of 'to blow' was to
knock or kick. He knew that discipline in Yankee packets was
maintained by corporeal methods, so much so that the Mates, to whom
the function of knocking the 'packet rats' about was delegated, were
termed first, second, and third 'blowers,' or strikers, and in the
shanty he sang 'Blow the man down.' 'Knock' or 'kick,' as I have
recently seen in a printed collection, was too crudely realistic for
him. In like manner the humorous title, 'Hog's-eye,' veiled the coarse
intimacy of the term which it represented. And that is where, when
collecting shanties from the 'longshore' mariner of to-day, I find
him, if he is uneducated, so tiresome. He not only wants to explain to
me as a landsman the exact meaning (which I know already) of terms
which the old type of sailor, with his natural delicacy, avoided
discussing, but he tries where possible to work them into his shanty,
a thing the sailor of old time never did. So that when one sees in
print expressions which sailors did not use, it is presumptive
evidence that the collector has been imposed upon by a salt of the
'sea lawyer' type.
Perhaps I ought to make this point clearer. Folk-song collecting was
once an artistic pursuit. Now it has become a flourishing industry of
high commercial value. From the commercial point of view it is
essential that results should be printed and circulated as widely as
possible. Some knowledge of seamanship is an absolute necessity where
folk-shanties are concerned. The mere collector nowadays does not
possess that knowledge; it is confined to those who have had practical
experience of the sea, but who will never print their experiences. The
mere collector _must_ print his versions. What is unprinted must
remain unknown; what is printed is therefore accepted as
authoritative, however misleading it may be. Many highly educated men,
of whom Captain Whall is the type, have followed the sea. It is from
them that the only really trustworthy information is forthcoming. But
so far as I can judge, it is uneducated men who appear to sing to
collectors nowadays, and I have seen many a quiet smile on the lips of
the educated sailor when he is confronted with printed versions of the
uneducated seaman's performances. For example, one of the best known
of all shanties is 'The Hog's-eye man'; I have seen this entitled 'The
Hog-eyed man,' and even 'The Ox-eyed man.' Every old sailor knew the
meaning of the term. Whall and Bullen, who were both sailors, use the
correct expression, 'Hog-eye.' The majority of sailors of my
acquaintance called it 'Hog's-eye.' Did decency permit I could show
conclusively how Whall and Bullen are right and the mere collector
wrong. It must suffice, however, for me to say that the term
'Hog's-eye' or 'Hog-eye' had nothing whatever to do with the optic of
the 'man' who was sung about. I could multiply instances, but this one
is typical and must suffice.
We hear a great deal of the coarseness and even lewdness of the
shanty, but I could wish a little more stress were laid on the
sailor's natural delicacy. Jack was always a gentleman in feeling.
Granted his drinking, cursing, and amours--but were not these, until
Victorian times, the hall-mark of every gentleman ashore? The
Rabelaisian jokes of the shantyman were solos, the sound of which
would not travel far beyond the little knot of workers who chuckled
over them. The choruses--shouted out by the whole working party--would
be heard all over the ship and even penetrate ashore if she were in
port. Hence, in not a single instance do the choruses of any shanty
contain a coarse expression.
EDITORIAL METHODS
As regards the tunes, I have adhered to the principle of giving each
one as it was sung by some individual singer. This method has not been
applied to the words. Consequently the verses of any given shanty may
have derived from any number of singers. Since there was no connection
or relevancy between the different verses of a shanty, the only
principle I have adhered to is that whatever verses are set down
should have been sung to me at some time or other by some sailor or
other.
Of course I have had to camouflage many unprintable expressions, and
old sailors will readily recognize where this has been done. Sometimes
a whole verse (after the first line) has needed camouflage, and the
method adopted is best expressed as follows:
There was a young lady of Gloucester
Who couldn't eat salt with her egg,
And when she sat down
She could never get up,
And so the poor dog had none.
As regards the accompaniments, I have been solely guided by the
necessity of preserving the character of the melodies in all their
vigour and vitality, and have tried, even in obviously modal tunes,
not to obscure their breeziness by academic treatment.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Amongst those to whom I owe thanks, I must number the Editors of _The
Music Student_ and _Music and Letters_, for allowing me to incorporate
in this Preface portions of articles which I have written for them.
Also to Capt. W.J. Dowdy, both for singing shanties to me himself, and
affording me facilities for interviewing inmates of the Royal Albert
Institution, over which he presides. I also wish to express my
gratitude to those sailors who have in recent years sung shanties to
me, especially Capt. R.W. Robertson, Mr. Geo. Vickers, Mr. Richard
Allen, of Seahouses, and Mr. F.B. Mayoss. And last, but not least, to
Mr. Morley Roberts, who has not only sung shanties to me, but has also
given me the benefit of his ripe nautical experience.
R.R.T.
_Hampstead_, 1921.
NOTES ON THE SHANTIES
1. BILLY BOY
This is undoubtedly a coast song 'made into a shanty.' I heard it in
Northumberland, both on shore and in ships, when I was a boy. The
theme of a 'Boy Billy' seems common to folk-songs in different parts
of the country. The tunes are different, and the words vary, but the
topic is always the same: 'Billy' is asked where he has been all the
day; he replies that he has been courting; he is then questioned as to
the qualifications of his _inamorata_ as a housewife. Dr.
Vaughan-Williams's 'My Boy Billie' is in print and well known, as is
also Mr. Cecil Sharp's 'My Boy Willie' ['English Folk-Songs,' vol. i,
page 98]. I have also collected different versions in Warwickshire and
Somerset. The version of line 1, page 3, bars 2 and 3, is older than
the one given in my arrangement for male-voice chorus (Curwen Edition
50572), so, upon consideration, I decided to give it here. There are
many more verses, but they are not printable, nor do they readily lend
themselves to camouflage. The tune has not appeared in print until
now.
2. BOUND FOR THE RIO GRANDE
The variants of this noble tune are legion. But this version, which a
sailor uncle taught me, has been selected, as I think it the most
beautiful of all. I used to notice, even as a boy, how it seemed to
inspire the shantyman to sentimental flights of _Heimweh_ that at
times came perilously near poetry. The words of the well-known song,
'Where are you going to, my pretty maid?' were frequently sung to this
shanty, and several sailors have told me that they had also used the
words of the song known as 'The Fishes.' Capt. Whall gives 'The
Fishes' on pages 96 and 97 of his book, and says that the words were,
in his time, sometimes used to the tune of 'Blow the man down.'
3. GOOD-BYE, FARE YE WELL
This is one of the best beloved of shanties. So strongly did its
sentiment appeal to sailors that one never heard the shantyman
extemporize a coarse verse to it. Whall prints a version, page 71.
4. JOHNNY COME DOWN TO HILO
This is clearly of negro origin. I learnt several variants of it, but
for its present form I am indebted to Capt. W.J. Dowdy.
5. CLEAR THE TRACK, LET THE BULLGINE RUN
The tune was a favourite in Yankee Packets. It does not appear in
Whall. 'Bullgine' was American negro slang for 'engine.' I picked up
this version in boyhood from Blyth seamen.
6. LOWLANDS
For another version see Whall (page 80), who says it is of American
origin and comes from the cotton ports of the old Southern States. It
was well known to every sailor down to the time of the China Clippers.
My version is that of Capt. John Runciman, who belonged to that
period. I have seldom found it known to sailors who took to the sea
after the early seventies. The tune was sung in very free time and
with great solemnity. It is almost impossible to reproduce in print
the elusive subtlety of this haunting melody. In North-country ships
the shantyman used to make much of the theme of a dead lover appearing
in the night. There were seldom any rhymes, and the air was
indescribably touching when humoured by a good hand. A 'hoosier,' by
the way, is a cotton stevedore. An interesting point about this shanty
is that, whether by accident or design, it exhibits a rhythmic device
commonly practised by mediaeval composers, known as _proportio
sesquialtera_. Expressed in modern notation it would mean the
interpolation of bars of three-four time in the course of a
composition which was in six-eight time. The number of quavers would,
of course, be the same in each bar; but the rhythm would be different.
The barring here adopted does not show this.
7. SALLY BROWN
For another version of this universally known shanty see Whall, page
64. Although its musical form is that of a halliard shanty, it was
always used for the capstan. I never heard it used for any other
purpose than heaving the anchor. The large-sized notes given in the
last bar are those which most sailors sing to me nowadays; the small
ones are those which I most frequently heard when a boy.
8. SANTY ANNA
This fine shanty was a great favourite, and in defiance of all history
the sailor presents 'Santy Anna' in the light of an invariable victor.
The truth is that Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna (1795-1876) was the
last President of Mexico before the annexation by America of
California, Texas, and New Mexico. He defeated the Spaniards at
Zampico, and held Vera Cruz against the French, but was badly beaten
at Molina del Rey by the United States Army under General Taylor
(1847). He was recalled to the Presidency in 1853, but overthrown in
1855. He attempted to overturn the Republic in 1867; was captured and
sentenced to death, but was pardoned on condition that he left the
country. He retired to the United States until 1872, when a general
amnesty allowed his return to Mexico. Like other Mexican Presidents,
he lived a stormy life, but unlike most of them he died a natural
death. Whall gives a version on page 89.
9. SHENANDOAH
This is one of the most famous of all shanties. I never met a sailor
to whom it was unknown, nor have I ever found any two who sang it
exactly alike. This version (sung to me by Capt. Robertson) is almost,
but not quite, identical with the one I learnt as a boy. Shenandoah
(English seamen usually pronounced it 'Shannandore') was a celebrated
Indian chief after whom an American town is named. A branch of the
Potomac river bears the same name. The tune was always sung with great
feeling and in very free rhythm. Whall gives a version on page 1.
10. STORMALONG JOHN
This is one of the many shanties with 'Stormy' as their hero. Whatever
other verses were extemporized, those relating to digging his grave
with a silver spade, and lowering him down with a golden chain, were
rarely omitted. Other favourite verses were:
(_a_) I wish I was old Stormy's son.
(_b_) I'd build a ship a thousand ton.
Who 'Stormy' was is undiscoverable, but more than a dozen shanties
mourn him.
11. THE HOG'S-EYE MAN
Of the numberless versions of this shanty I have chosen that of Capt.
Robertson as being the most representative. Of the infinite number of
verses to this fine tune hardly one is printable. There has been much
speculation as to the origin of the title. As a boy my curiosity was
piqued by reticence, evasion, or declarations of ignorance, whenever I
asked the meaning of the term. It was only in later life that I learnt
it from Mr. Morley Roberts. His explanation made it clear why every
_sailor_ called it either 'hog-eye' or 'hog's-eye,' and why only
_landsmen_ editors ever get the word wrong. One collector labels the
shanty 'The hog-eyed man,' and another goes still further wide of the
mark by calling it 'The ox-eyed man.' The remarks on this shanty in
the Preface will show the absurdity of both titles. That is all the
explanation I am at liberty to give in print. Whall gives the shanty
on page 118, his version differing but slightly from Capt.
Robertson's.
12. THE WILD GOOSE SHANTY
This I learnt from Capt. John Runciman. Allusions to 'The Wild Goose
Nation' occur in many shanties, but I never obtained any clue to the
meaning (if any) of the term. The verse about 'huckleberry hunting'
was rarely omitted, but I never heard that particular theme further
developed. Whall gives another version (in six-eight time) on page
131.
13. WE'RE ALL BOUND TO GO
I used to hear this tune constantly on the Tyne. It is one of the few
shanties which preserved a definite narrative, but each port seems to
have offered variants on the names of the ships that were 'bound for
Amerikee.' 'Mr. Tapscott' was the head of a famous line of emigrant
ships. The last word in verse 5 was always pronounced _male_. This has
led to many shantymen treating it not as _meal_, but as the _mail_
which the ship carried. As the shanty is full of Irish allusions, the
probabilities are that the word was _meal_, to which the sailor gave
what he considered to be the Irish pronunciation. Whenever I heard the
shanty it was given with an attempt at Irish pronunciation throughout.
Capt. Whall (page 79) gives additional colour to the supposition that
this was a general practice, for his version of verse 6 runs:
'Bad luck unto them _say_-boys,
Bad luck to them I say;
They broke into me _say_-chest
And they stole me clothes away.'
14. WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THE DRUNKEN SAILOR?