buoy [boy] ~ [BOO-ee]

[Dan Goodman]

Found this at Numachi.com:
The Man at the Nore

Now my father was the keeper of the Eddystone light
And he married a mermaid one fine night
 From this union there came three
Two of them were fishes and the other was me
Now when I was but a bit of a slip
I was put in charge of the Nore lightship
I kept my lamps in very fine style
Doing of the work according to Hoyle

      Oh the raging Nore, the rolling Nore
      The waves they tumble o'er and o'er
      There's no such a life to be had on shore
      As the one that's led by the Man at the Nore

Well, one evening as I was a-trimming of the glim
Singing a verse from the Evening Hymn
I spied by the light of my signal lamp
The form of my mother looking awfully damp
Just then a voice cried out, Ahoy
And there she was just a-sitting on a buoy
That's meaning a buoy for the ships that sail
And not a boy that's a juvenile male

Says I to my mother, Now how do you do
And how's my father and my sisters two
Says she, It's an orph-i-an you are
You've only one sister and you've got no pa
Your father was drowned with sever-i-al pals
And digested by the cannibals
Of your sisters, one was cooked in a dish
The other one is kept as a talking fish

Well, at that I wept like a soft-eyed scamp
My tears, they made the waters damp
Says I to my mother, Won't you step within
You look so wet, just to dry your skin
Says she, I likes the wet, my dear
Says I, Let me offer you the cabin chair
My mother, she looks at me with a frown
It's owing to my nature that I can't sit down

Says my mother, Now never you go on shore
But always remain the Man at the Nore
With that, I caught a glittering scale
And that was the end of my mother's tale
Now in deference to this maternal wish
I can't visit my sister, the talking fish
So if you sees her when you gets on shore
Give her the regards of the Man at the Nore


On 03/24/2014 08:07 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: buoy [boy] ~ [BOO-ee]
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> You can find a bunch of different versions (52) of "Eddystone Light" on iTunes; the excerpts I checked all have /@hoi/ and /boi/ (and the bit, I just after that couple, about how one of the offspring was exhibited as a talking fish and another served in a chafing dish; all very tragic), but I didn't come across any (without having checked all 52) that included the final spoken couplet below.  I guess it was the old "Brothers Four" version that I dimly recall.
>
> On Mar 24, 2014, at 8:00 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
>
>> Who's singing and can you give us an audio URL?
>>
>> Joel
>>
>> At 3/24/2014 01:51 PM, Dan Goodman wrote:
>>> ...
>>> My father was the keeper of the Eddystone Light.
>>> He slept with a mermaid one fine night.
>>> Out of this union there came three;
>>> A porgy, a porpoise, and the other was me.
>>>
>>> One day as I was trimming the glim,
>>> Singing a snatch of the evening's hymn;
>>> I heard a voice shouting "Ahoy!"
>>> And there was my mother, sitting on a boy.
>>>
>>> Spoken:  That is, a buoy what's for ships that sail;
>>> And not a boy what's a juvenile male.
>>>


--
Dan Goodman
Whatever you wish for me, may you have twice as much.
http://dsgoodman.blogspot.com

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