On the Fourth of July eighteen hundred and six We set sail from the sweet cob of Cork We were sailing away with a cargo of bricks For the Grand City Hall in New-York 'Twas a wonderful craft, she was rigged fore and aft And oh how the wild winds drove her She stood several blasts she had twenty seven masts And they called her The Irish Rover
We had one million bags of the best Sligo rags We had two million barrels of stone We had three million sides of old blind horses hides We had four million barrels of bones We had five million hogs six million dogs Seven million barrels of porter We had eight million bales of old nanny's goat's tails In the hull of the Irish Rover
There was old Mickey Coote who plaid hard on his flute When the lady's lined up for a set He was tootled with skill for each sparkling quadrille Till the dancers were fluttered and bet With his smart witty talk he was cock of the walk And he rolled the dames under and over They all knew at a glance when he took up his stance That he sailed in the Irish Rover
There was Barney McGee from the banks of the Lee There was Hogan, from County Tyrone There was Johny McQuirk, who was scared stiff of work And a man from Westmeath called Malone There was Slugger O'Toole, who was drunk as a rule And fighting Bill Tracy from Dover And your man Mick McCann, from the banks of the Bann Was the skipper on the Irish Rover
For a sailor it's always a bother in life It's so lonesome by night and by day That he longs for the shore and a charming young whore Who will melt all his troubles away? All the noise and the rout swilled poitín and stout For him soon it done and over Of the love of a maid he is never afraid That old son from the Irish Rover
We had sailed seven years when the measles broke out And our ship lost her sight in the fog And that quare of a crew was reduced down to two Just myself and the captain's old dog Then the ship struck a rock, O Lord what a shock The boat it was turned right over Turned nine times around, and the poor old dog was drowned I'm the last of the Irish Rover