Ireland

Farewell to the groves of shillelagh and shamrock
Farewell to the girls of old Ireland all round
May their hearts be as merry as ever I would wish them
When far away across the ocean I’m bound.

Oh, my father is old and my mother quite feeble;
To leave their own country it grieves their heart sore,
Oh the tears in great drops down their cheeks they are rolling
To think they must die upon some foreign shore.

But what matter to me where my bones they be buried
If in peace and contentment I can spend my life
Oh the green fields of Canada they daily are blooming
It’s there I’ll put an end to my miseries and strife.

Then it’s pack up your sea stores and tarry no longer
Ten dollars a week isn’t very bad pay
With no taxes or tithes to devour up your wages
When you’re on the green fields of Amerikay.

The sheep run unsheared and the land’s gone to rushes
The handyman’s gone and the winders of creels,
Away across the ocean, good journeyman tailors
And fiddlers that play out the old mountain reels

Ah but I ‘mind the time when old Ireland was flourishing,
When lots of her tradesmen could work for good pay
But since our manufacturies have crossed the Atlantic
It’s now we must follow to Amerikay.

Farewell to the dances in homes now deserted
When tips struck the lightning in planks from the floor
The paving and crigging of hobnails on flagstones
The tears of the old folk and shouts of encore.

For the landlords and bailiffs in vile combination
Have forced us from hearthstone and homestead away
May the crowbar brigade all be doomed to damnation
When we’re on the fields of Americay.

The timber grows thick on the slopes of Columbia
With Douglas in grandeur two hundred feet tall
The salmon and sturgeon dam streamlet and river
and the high Rocky Mountains look down over all.

Over prairie and plain sure the wheat waves all golden
The maple gives sugar to sweeten your tay
You won’t want for corn cob way out in Saskatchewan
When you’re on the green fields of Amerikay.

And if you grow weary of pleasure and plenty
Of fruit from the orchard and fish from the foam
There’s health and good hunting way back in the forests
Where herds of great elk and wild buffalo roam.

And it’s now to conclude and to finish my ditty
If ever friendless Irishman chances my way
With the best in the house I will treat him, and welcome,
At home on the green fields of Americay.