The Raftsman's Song



(Collected by Ellen Stekert from Ezra "Fuzzy" Barhight, Recorded

by Stekert 1958 on Songs of a New York Lumberjack, Folkways

FA2354)(I don't know where the tune came from, but I know it best

as the tune for The Ball of Kerrymuir )



Come all you jolly raftsmen, who run the river down,

Be careful where you run your raft or you will run aground



CHO: And Boys, shove your grog around

The scores are on their own.

For we're the boys that fear no noise

Although we're far from home.



Well we sailed around old Butler, and nothing did we fear

Until we came to Sawmill Rift, and plunged against the pier.



CHO:

Now, Henry Lodge stood at the oar, his voice so firm and strong

For when he struck the rock, by God, it almost knocked him down.



CHO:



There was one among our number, and his name was Little Moe

He plunged right in among the logs and saved 'most all our clothes.



Note: A book called Canoeing the Delaware River, Letcher, quotes the first

verse, and attributes it to Robert "Boney" Quillan, "...a raftsman-poet

of the nineteenth century. Place names are on the Delaware River in

Pennsylvania, just above the New York border. RG



@water @work @river

filename[ RAFTSMN

play.exe KERIMUIR

RG

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