Our ship she lies in harbour,
Just ready to set sail,
May heaven be your guardian, love,
Till I return from sea.

Said the father to the daughter,
"What makes you so lament?
Is there no man in all the world
Could give your heart content?"

Said the daughter to the father,
"I'll tell [you] the reason why:
You have sent away the sailor-lad
That could me satisfy."

"If that's your inclination,"
The father did reply,
"I wish he may continue there,
And on the seas may die!"

She, like an angel weeping,
On the rocks sighed every day,
Awaiting for her own true love
Returning from the sea.

"Oh, yonder sits my angel!
She's waiting there for me,
To-morrow to the church we'll go,
And married we will be."

When they had been to church, and were
Returning back again,
She espied her honoured father
And several gentlemen.

Said the father to the daughter
"Five hundred pounds I'll give,
If you'll forsake that sailor-lad
And come with me to live."

"It's not your gold that glittered,
Nor yet your silver that shined,
For I'm married to the man I love
And I'm happy in my mind!"

 

 

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Source: Broadwood, L, 1908, English Traditional Songs and Carols, London, Boosey

Notes:
Sung by Mr Sparks, 1896.

Lucy Braodwood wrote:

An equally doggerel version of the words is on a broadside printed by Such. After the fifth verse he prints the following:

When nine long years were over,
And ten long tedious days,
She saw the ship come sailing in
With her true love from the seas.

The tune is sometimes used in Sussex to the words of the Sussex Mummers' Carol . In two cases the singers sang F natural consistently.

Roud: 1011 (Search Roud index at VWML) Take Six
Laws:
Child: