“Whiskey Is My Name (Donald Blue)”

Description

A smith has a drinking wife, often found drunk in the street. One day, as his wife is asleep, he is called out to rescue her. He finds a drunken woman who looks so like his wife he cannot tell them apart. His wife quits drinking as a result

Supplemental text

Whiskey Is My Name (Donald Blue)
  Complete text(s)

          *** A ***

My Name is Donald Blue

From John Ord, Ord's Bothy Songs and Ballads, pp. 52-53.

My name is Donald Blue, an' ye ken me fu' weel,
Straik me canny by the hair, I'm a quiet, simple ohiel;
But gin ye rouse the bear, I'm as rouche as the deil,
  Gin I get a claucht o' yer noddle.

But I'll tell ye o' a trick, man, that happened in the South;
A smith got a wife, an' she had an unco drouth;
She likes it sae weel, put sae muckle in her mouth,
  She was aften helpet hame in the mornin'.

So it happen'd ae day, the smith he was thrang,
They brocht a wife till him -- a wife that couldna gang;
He took her on his back, an' up the stair he ran,
  An' flang her on the bed wi' a fury.

He lockit the door, brocht the key in his han',
And cam' doon the stairs, cryin', "Oh, bewitched man!
This conduct o' her's I'm no' fit to stan';
  I'll enlist for a sodger in the mornin'."

He fell to his work -- he was shoein' a horse;
They cried, "Tak' in your wife, smith, she's lyin at the cross,"
He lifted up his hammer, and he strack wi' siccan force,
  He knockit doon the studdy in his fury.

"The deil's in the folk. What do they mean ava?
Gin I've ae drucken wife, L'od, I'm no' needin' twa."
But they cried a' the louder -- " Tak her in frae the snaw.
  Or surely she will perish ere the mornin'."

So the smith he gaed oot, an' viewed her a' roun',
"By my sooth! an' it's her; but hoo did she win doon?"
He hoisted her awa' on his back up to the room,
  Whaur the ither wife was lyin' soondly snorin'.

The smith, to his surprise, couldna tell which was his,
Frae the tap to the tae they were dressed in a piece,
An' sae closely they resembled each ither in the face,
  He couldna tell which was his Jeanie.

"Deil ma' care!" says the smith; "let them baith lie still,
When ance she's sober she'll surely ken hersel'."
Noo frae that day to this Jeanie never buys a gill,
  Nor will she wet her mou' in the mornin'.

Notes

Ford lists this as being sung to "Johnnie Cope," but his text will not fit that tune without drastic violence, and Ord uses another tune. - RBW

Cross references

• cf. "The Wee Wifikie"

Broadsides

• Murray, Mu23-y3:014, "Donald Blue," unknown, 19C
• NLScotland, RB.m.168(145), "Donald Blue," unknown, c. 1870

References

1. Ford-Vagabond, pp. 47-49, "Donald Blue" (1 text)
2. SHenry H835a, p. 512, "Whiskey Is My Name"; H835b, pp. 512-513, "Whiskey Is My Name/The Blacksmith" (2 texts, 2 tunes)
3. Ord, pp. 52-53, "My Name is Donald Blue" (1 text, 1 tune)
4. ST HHH835 (Full)
5. Roud #3799
6. BI, HHH835