Rogue’s Gallery: The Art of the Siren, #17

Song: Eliza Carthy: Rolling Sea (4:49 minutes)
from Rogue’s Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs, and Chanteys, ANTI- 2006.
Buy CD in Germany and elsewhere.
Cover Art: Diane Webber (July 27, 1932—August 19, 2008, Playboy Centerfold for Miss May 1955),
Cover Mermaid. A Magazine for Adults! Collector’s Edition, 1958.

Lyrics:

1. Don’t you see the ships a-coming?
Don’t you see them in full sail?
Don’t you see the ships a-coming
With the prizes at the tail?

Chorus:
Oh my little rolling sailor,
Oh my little rolling he;
How I love my rolling sailor,
When he’s on a rolling sea;
When he’s on a rolling, rolling,
When he’s on a rolling sea.

2. Sailors they get all the money,
Soldiers they get none but brass.
How I love my rolling sailor,
Soldiers they can kiss my …

3. How can I be blithe and merry
With my true love far from me?
All this pretty little sailors,
They’ve been pressed and tanged to sea.

4. How I wish the press were over
And the wars were at an end.
Then every sailor laddie
Would be happy with his friend.

5. When the wars they are all over
Peace and plenty come again;
Everybody sailor laddie
Will come sailing on the main.

6. Oh, the wars will soon be over
And the sailors once come home;
Every lass will get a lad,
She won’t have to sleep alone.

Explanatory liner notes by ANTI-:

This song is from the perspective of a woman ashore, waiting for her sailor (or any sailor) to return home (with prize money). The lyrics are from the Napoleonic period. Some verses are the voice of a wife or sweetheart. The verse that compares sailors and soldiers is a well-known whore’s ditty of the time.