Bluey Brink

There once was a shearer, bename Bluey Brink
A devil for work and a devil for drink.
He could shear his hundred a day without fear
And drink without winking, four gallon of beer.

Now Jimmy, the barman, who served out the drink,
He hated the sight of this here Bluey Brink,
Who stayed much too late and who come much too soon;
At evening, at morning, at night and at noon.

One morning as Jimmy was cleaning the bar
With sulfuric acid he kept in a jar,
Old Bluey come yelling and bawling with thirst,
"Whatever you got, Jim, just hand me the first."

Now, it ain't in the history, it ain't put in print
But Bluey drank acid with never a wink,
Saying, "That's the stuff, Jimmy! Well, strike me stone dead.
This'll make me the ringer of Stevenson's shed."

Now all that long day, as he served out the beer
Poor Jimmy was sick with his trouble and fear.
Too worried to argue, too anxious to fight,
Seeing the shearer a corpse in his fright.

Now early next morning he opened the door,
And along come the shearer asking for more;
With his eyebrows all singed and his whiskers deranged,
And holes in his hide like a dog with the mange.

Says Jimmy, "And how did you find the new stuff?"
Says Bluey, "It's fine, but I ain't had enough.
It gives me great courage to shear and to fight,
But why does that stuff set me whiskers alight

I thought I knew drink, but I must have been wrong;
For that stuff that you give me was proper and strong.
It set me to coughing, and you know I'm no liar
And every cough set me whiskers on fire."


Per AL Lloyd on Australian Bush Songs (Riverside RLP 12-606.) The
tune is a variant of "Dinah and her Villikins" (without the refrain &
softened out & syncopated a bit) which tune, Lloyd notes, has probably
been used for more texts than any other in the English-speaking
world. AJS
tune here supplied by MG

AJS