(The Bonny) Shoals of Herring

With our nets and gear we're faring
On the wild and wasteful ocean.
It`s out there on the deep we harvest and reap our bread
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring.

O it was a fine and a pleasant day.
Out of Yarmouth harbour I was faring
As a cabin boy on a sailing lugger.
We were following the shoals of herring.

Now you're up on deck, you're a fisherman.
You can swear and show a manly bearing.
Take your turn on watch with the other fellows
As you`re hunting for the shoals of herring.

Now we fished the Swarth and the Broken Bank.
I was cook and I'd a quarter share in
And I used to sleep standing on me feet
As we hunted for the shoals of herring.

We left the home grounds in the month of June,
And for Canny Shiels we soon were bearing
With a hundred cran of the silver darlings
That we'd taken from the shoals of herring.

In the stormy seas and the living gales,
Just to earn your daily bread you're faring
From the Dover Straits to the Faroe Islands,
And you`re hunting for the shoals of herring.

Well I earned my keep and I paid my way,
And I earned the gear that I was wearing,
Sailed a million miles, caught ten million fishes.
We were hunting after shoals of herring.

You`re net rope man now, bor, you`re on the move,
And you`re learning all about sea faring.
That's your education, scraps of navigation
As you hunt the bonny shoals of herring.

Night and day the seas were daring.
Come wind or calm or winter gales,
Sweating or cold, growing up, growing old, or dying
As you hunt the bonny shoals of herring.