Rewards and Fairies/Frankie's Trade
FRANKIE'S TRADE
Old Horn to All Atlantic said:
(A-hay O! To me O!)
'Now where did Frankie learn his trade?
For he ran me down with a three-reef mains'le.'
(All round the Horn!)
Atlantic answered:—'Not from me!
You'd better ask the cold North Sea,
For he ran me down under all plain canvas.'
(All round the Horn!)
The North Sea answered:—'He's my man
For he came to me when he began—
Frankie Drake in an open coaster.'
(All round the Sands!)
'I caught him young and I used him sore,
So you never shall startle Frankie more,
Without capsizing Earth and her waters.'
(All round the Sands!)
'I did not favour him at all,
I made him pull and I made him haul—
And stand his trick with the common sailors.
(All round the Sands!)
'I froze him stiff and I fogged him blind,
And kicked him home with his road to find
By what he could see of a three-day snow-storm.
(All round the Sands!)
'I learned him his trade o' winter nights,
'Twixt Mardyk Fort and Dunkirk lights
On a five-knot tide with the forts a-firing.
(All round the Sands!)
'Before his beard began to shoot,
I showed him the length of the Spaniard's foot—
And I reckon he clapped the boot on it later.
(All round the Sands!)
'If there's a risk which you can make,
That's worse than he was used to take
Nigh every week in the way of his business;
(All round the Sands!)
'If there's a trick that you can try,
Which he hasn't met in time gone by,
Not once or twice, but ten times over;
(All round the Sands!)
'If you can teach him aught that's new,
(A-hay O! To me O!)
I'll give you Bruges and Niewport too,
And the ten tall churches that stand between 'em.'
Storm along my gallant Captains!
(All round the Horn!)