H.M.S. Rose off Ferryland, August 1995. Printed from shanty.rendance.org Site contents © 1993-2009 Andrew Draskóy excepting product images and lyrics.
The Mermaid Song - as sung by Capt. Jim Parsons

When I was a lad in a fishing town
  My old man said to me:
"You can spend your life, your jolly life
  Sailing on the sea.
You can search the world for pretty girls
  Til your eyes grow weak and dim,
But don't go fishing for a mermaid, son
  If you don't know how to swim"

'Cause her hair was green as seaweed
Her skin was blue and pale
I loved that girl with all my heart
I only liked the upper part
I did not like the tail

So I signed aboard of a whaling ship
  And my first very day at sea
There I spied in the waves,
  Reaching out for me
"Come live with me in the sea said she,
  Down on the ocean floor
And I'll show you many's a wonderous thing
  That you've never seen before

So over I jumped and she pulled me down,
  Down to her seaweed bed
A pillow made of tortoise-shell
  She placed beneath my head
She fed me shrimp and caviar
  Upon a silver dish
From her head to her waist was just to my taste
  But the rest of her was a fish

'Cause ...

Then one day, she swam away
  So I sang to the clams and the whales
"Oh, how I miss her seagreen hair
  And the silvery shine of her scales
Then her sister, she swam by
  And set my heart awhirl
From her head to her waste was an ugly fish
  But the rest of her was a girl

'Cause her hair was green as seaweed
Her skin was blue and pale
I loved that girl with all my heart
I did not like the upper part
And that's how I get my ...