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You sporting young fellows from Prince Edward Island,
You think on your farms you are doing no good;
With your minds never easy, continually crazy,
To go off to Bangor and work in the wood.
Well, a new suit of clothes is prepared for the journey,
A new pair of boots made by Sherlock and Clark;
And a fine kennebecker done up with good homespun,
And then the young islander makes his embark.
When he reaches Bangor he gets off at the station,
And the woodsmen gaze on him all with the keen eye;
But they know by the clothes that the youngster is wearing,
'Tis easy to see he's from old P.E.I.
In Bangor they'll poison the youth with bad whiskey,
To the devil they banish their whiskey and ale;
And then on the corner they'll find the youth tipsy,
They'll call for Tim Leary and drag him to jail.
You may talk of your laws, by the mother of Moses,
Sure I've seen better laws from the heathen Chinee;
Where a man can get drunk and in comfort get sober,
All under the shade of his mulberry tree.
So come all you young fellows who want to leave farming
Don't go to the woods where you're sure to meet harm
Just take my advice and give heed to my warning
Stay home on the island and work on the farm.
This variant was arranged and recorded by Ryan's Fancy (Songs From The Shows, trk#5, 2001, produced for CBC Television by Jack Kellum, and recorded at CBC Television Studios, St. John's, NL) and was originally taped for television on location on Prince Edward Island in 1977.
Liner Notes: Vocal — Dermot O'Reilly.
Prince Edward Island proved to be a picturesque setting for several of our television shows. As it has been a farming community for centuries we found many songs that sang the praises and virtues of life on the land.
See more songs by Ryan's Fancy.
A variant was arranged by Steve Romanoff and recorded by Schooner Fair (And Both Shall Row, 2005).
From Schooner Fare's liner notes — Tim O'Leary was a former woodsman-turned-sheriff who enforced local law by locking up drunken woodsmen at Bangor's Haymarket Square jail.
See more songs by Schooner Fare.
From the Dictionary of Prince Edward Island English by T. K. Pratt (University of Toronto Press, 1996):
Kennebecker — a lumberman's duffle-bag or carpet-bag.
From the Larry Gorman Folk Festival — Born in Tyne Valley, Larry Gorman was well-known in Prince Edward Island, the Miramichi (New Brunswick) and Maine for his satirical songs. No one was spared: friends, relatives, co-workers, enemies. He made songs about shortcomings in human nature, about people he considered lazy, miserly, abusive, or just plain stupid. He made songs about people he worked with in the lumber woods, and he wrote about people at home on the Island. Folks would go out of their way to be pleasant to Gorman, for fear that he would song them. Larry Gorman died in Maine in 1917, at the age of 70.
