Mary Anne – Traditional, as sung by Ian and Sylvia. SheetMusic(pdf)
Fare thee well, my own true love.
Fare thee well, my dear.
For the ship is a-waiting and the wind blows high
And I am bound away to the sea, Mary Anne.
And I am bound away to the sea, Mary Anne.
Ten thousand miles away from home,
Ten thousand miles or more.
The sea may freeze and the earth may burn
If I never no more return to you, Mary Anne.
If I never no more return to you, Mary Anne.
A lobster boiling in a pot,
Bluefish on a hook.
They're suffering long but it's nothing like
The ache I bear for you, my dear Mary Anne.
The ache I bear for you, my dear Mary Anne.
Oh, had I but a flask of gin,
Sugar here for two,
And a great big bowl for to mix 'em in.
I'd pour a drink for you, my dear Mary Anne.
I'd pour a drink for you, my dear Mary Anne.
Fare thee well, my own true love.
Fare thee well, my dear.
For the ship is a-waiting and the wind blows high
And I am bound away to the sea, Mary Anne.
And I am bound away to the sea, Mary Anne.
Notes. This unusual sailor's song comes from the collection of Dr. Marius Barbeau, the dean of Canadian folklorists. He heard it in 1920 in the town of Tadoussac in the province of Quebec. The singer, Edouard Hovington, who was then ninety, had been for many years an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, the famous fur-trading company which played such an important part in Canada's early history. He said he had learned it from an Irish sailor some seventy years earlier, which would carry it back at least to 1850.
Mary Anne is obviously descended from the old English song, The True Lover's Farewell, which is also the ancestor of The Turtle Dove and Burns' My Luve's Like a Red, Red Rose, but this is one of the most unusual of the many variants. The nautical references give it a salty flavour quite appropriate to the Tadoussac region which abounds in tiny fishing villages. However it did not originate in Canada, for almost the same words are given in a book of Victorian Street Ballads edited by W. Henderson and published in London in 1937. Even the lobster and the blue fish, which seem typically Canadian, are found in the English version.