The Salty Sea

The shallow blue Pacific
 And the continental shelf
 Soon gave way to the black and gray
 Of the mid-sea trenches with their scaly wenches
 And their tales of the mountain elf
 Tales of the mountain elf
 Me oh my, there's a tear in my eye
 Big as the salty sea
 Come on down, we'll all drown
 Down in the salty sea
 They laughed and they danced and they fiddled
 They sang their ancient songs
 They pulled me into the circle
 And said laddy, come along
 The black and the gray did soon give way
 To the tops of the waves and the sun dappled caves
 On the volcanic sands of a virgin land
 In the 18th century
 In the 18th century
 Five hundred nights of drinking
 With my dancing fairy friends
 I came out of the fog of the gentry's grog
 Woke up in the sand of Van Dieman's land
 In a planter's chains with a brand new name
 And they yoked me to the plow
 They yoked me to the plow
 I burned the eucalyptus
 And I carried off the stones
 For fourteen years I worked the fields
 And my fingers to the bone
 And then one night the planter
 Plucked me from my toil
 He said I understand you're a dancing man
 And fast with a fiddle, and smack in the middle of
 The parlor I lept for the Queen
 I lept for the visiting Queen
 Well the planter he was very well pleased
 And kind disposed to me
 He invited me in to his cozy den
 For cigars and porter and the social order
 Was the topic of his drunken screed
 The topic of his drunken screed
 And he told me:
 It took slavery to tame these wild lands
 It took slavery to train ten thousand hands
 To redirect the river
 To build the Grand Canal
 The cotton fields, the pyramids, the well
 Now I ask you to forgive me
 For I struck a devil's deal
 My sheets are clean on this packet of steam
 For the Cape I am bound and Dublin town
 With southern gold in the bottom of the hold
 And my star crossed soul to trade for a load
 Of Fenian rebels and Carlow boys
 And a captain I will be
 Yes a captain I will be