| |
| I SAY, little Boy at the Nore, | |
| Do you come from the small Isle of Man? | |
| Why, your history a mystery must be,— | |
| Come tell us as much as you can, | |
| Little Boy at the Nore! | 5 |
| |
| You live, it seems, wholly on water, | |
| Which your Gambier calls living in clover; | |
| But how comes it, if that is the case, | |
| You ’re eternally half-seas over,— | |
| Little Boy at the Nore? | 10 |
| |
| While you ride, while you dance, while you float,— | |
| Never mind your imperfect orthography; | |
| But give us, as well as you can, | |
| Your watery autobiography, | |
| Little Boy at the Nore! | 15 |
| |
Boy at the Nore, Loquitur
I ’M the tight little Boy at the Nore, | |
| In a sort of sea negus I dwells; | |
| Half and half ’twixt salt-water and Port, | |
| I ’m reckoned the first of the swells,— | |
| I ’m the Boy at the Nore! | 20 |
| |
| I lives with my toes to the flounders, | |
| And watches through long days and nights; | |
| Yet, cruelly eager, men look | |
| To catch the first glimpse of my lights,— | |
| I ’m the Boy at the Nore. | 25 |
| |
| I never gets cold in the head, | |
| So my life on salt water is sweet; | |
| I think I owes much of my health | |
| To being well used to wet feet— | |
| As the Boy at the Nore. | 30 |
| |
| There ’s one thing, I ’m never in debt: | |
| Nay!—I liquidates more than I oughter; | |
| So the man to beat Cits as goes by, | |
| In keeping the head above water, | |
| Is the Boy at the Nore. | 35 |
| |
| I ’ve seen a good deal of distress, | |
| Lots of Breakers in Ocean’s Gazette; | |
| They should do as I do,—rise o’er all; | |
| Ay, a good floating capital get, | |
| Like the Boy at the Nore! | 40 |
| |
| I ’m a’ter the sailor’s own heart, | |
| And cheers him, in deep water rolling; | |
| And the friend of all friends to Jack Junk, | |
| Ben Backstay, Tom Pipes, and Tom Bowling, | |
| Is the Boy at the Nore! | 45 |
| |
| Could I e’er but grow up, I ’d be off | |
| For a week to make love to my wheedles; | |
| If the tight little Boy at the Nore | |
| Could but catch a nice girl at the Needles, | |
| We ’d have two at the Nore! | 50 |
| |
| They thinks little of sizes on water, | |
| On big waves the tiny one skulks,— | |
| While the river has Men of War on it,— | |
| Yes, the Thames is oppressed with Great Hulks, | |
| And the Boy ’s at the Nore! | 55 |
| |
| But I ’ve done,—for the water is heaving | |
| Round my body, as though it would sink it! | |
| And I ’ve been so long pitching and tossing, | |
| That sea-sick—you ’d hardly now think it— | |
| Is the Boy at the Nore! | 60 |
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