“A Ship A-Sailing”

Description

"I saw a ship a-sailing, A-sailing on the sea, And it was deeply laden with pretty things for me. There were comfits in the cabin and almonds in the hold." The sails are satin; the mast, gold; the sailors, white mice; the captain, a duck.

Supplemental text

Ship A-Sailing, A
  Partial text(s)

          *** A ***

From Eloise Hubbard Linscott, Folk Songs of Old New England, pp. 284-285.
From Elizabeth Wheeler Hubbard.

I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea,
And it was deeply laden with pretty things for me.
There were comfits in the cabin and almonds in the hold.
The sails were made of satin and the mast it was of gold.

(1 additional stanza)

Notes

This seems to go back to Halliwell (1852), though Linscott connects it with a game called the "Duck Dance."

Katherine Elwes Thomas evolved the theory that the duck-Captain was Sir Francis Drake, while the "four-and-twenty white mice with chains about their necks" were slaves. I'd be more inclined to believe it if Thomas could bridge the more than two century gap between the actual song and the events it allegedly describes. - RBW

References

1. Linscott, pp. 284-285, "A Ship A-Sailing" (1 text, 1 tune)
2. Opie-Oxford2 470, "I saw a ship a-sailing" (1 text)
3. Baring-Gould-MotherGoose #271, p. 163, "(I saw a ship a-sailing)"
4. ST Lins284 (Partial)
5. Roud #3742
6. BI, Lins284