Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William McCarty, comp. The American National Song Book. 1842.

The Lieutenant’s Complaint—1815

AS, pensive, this night on my sea-chest I lay,

Which serves me for bed, chair, and table:

I mourn’d the sad hour I was placed on half-pay,

Without tow-line, or anchor, or cable.

My money is gone, and my credit not good;

My heart swells with anguish and sorrow:

No messmate is near to supply me with food,

And honour forbids me to borrow.

Now I think on the time when, all snugly aboard,

In the ward-room assembled together,

With plenty of wine and a table well stored,

We laugh’d at dull care and foul weather.

Round, round went the song, and the jest, and the glance,

While we drank good success to the Ocean;

And secretly toasted a favourite lass,

Or talk’d about future promotion.

Then happiness smiled—I’d a plentiful purse,

And slept sweetly when laid on my pillow:

My cradle the ship, and the sea-boy my nurse,

While rock’d on old Neptune’s proud billow.

And when, safe in port, with my much-adored maid,

Who look’d like a goddess or fairy,

How blest was my heart as we joyously stray’d,

And I breathed forth my love to my Mary.

How changed is my fate! All my messmates are gone,

And perhaps are, like me, doom’d to perish:

By my Mary—O, horror!—now treated with scorn,

Though she vow’d long to love and to cherish.

Now I grasp my last cup—hard, hard is my lot,

And my mind like the billows of Biscay:

You may think it is poison—indeed, it is not,

But a special good jorum of whisky!