> Folk Music > Songs > The Sailor’s Frolic
The Sailor’s Frolic / Bright Golden Store / Miss Doxy
[ Roud 1638 ; Master title: The Sailor’s Frolic ; Mudcat 22855 ; trad.]
John Holloway, Joan Black: The Tar’s Frolic, or, the Adventures of a British Soldier Later English Broadside Ballads. Maud Karpeles: Come All Brother Seamen Cecil Sharp’s Collection of English Folk Songs Frank Purslow: The Sailor’s Frolic The Wanton Seed Roy Palmer: All Hail, Brother Seamen The Valiant Sailor Steve Roud, Eddie Upton, Malcolm Taylor: Come All Brother Seamen Still Growing
Harry Cox of Catfield, Norfolk, sang Miss Doxy to Mervyn Plunkett in September 1958. This recording was included in 2000 on his Topic anthology The Bonny Labouring Boy. Steve Roud noted:
A sailor-on-shore theme (see also Green Bed and Jack Tar on Shore) in which Jack foils the plot of the thieving doxy with the usual direct action favoured by traditional songs. It does not seem to have been widely known. It was noted a few times in the Edwardian era, and was in Walter Pardon’s repertoire, and only one or two broadside printings (as The Tar’s or Sailor’s Frolic) have come to light, the earliest being about 1810.
Frank Purslow and John Pearse sang The Sailor’s Frolic on their 1960 Folklore album of “English folk songs Miss Pringle never taught us”, Rap-a-Tap-Tap. Frank Purslow noted:
Typical of so many Jack Tar on Shore songs in which the sailor always gets the better of the flash-girls and boarding house keepers who first got the bettor of him. Tune collated from three versions and text amplified from B.M. broadside.
Walter Pardon of Knapton, Norfolk, sang Bright Golden Store—which seems to be a mis-hearing of the phrase “bright gold in store” in the song’s lyrics—to Mike Yates on 12 March 1983. This recording was published in 1983 as the title track of Pardon’s Home-Made Music album Bright Golden Store. It was also included in 1998 on the EFDSS anthology A Century of Song. Mike Yates noted:
A song that probably dates from the latter half of the 18th century. One early text—titled The Adventures of a British Tar—was printed c. 1800 by a printer called Catharine of 19, Turnmill Street, London. A century later, the song was sufficiently popular for the Hammond Brothers to note three versions, which they called either The Frolic or The Sailor’s Frolic, from singers in Dorset; while George Gardiner noted a single version in Hampshire. Walter tells me that most of his uncles and cousins used to sing the song.
Gordon Halls sang The Merchant’s Son and the Beggar Wench on his privately produced cassette set from the 1990s, Warts & Hall.
Kings of the South Seas (Ben Nicholls, Richard Warren and Evan Jenkins) sang Sailor’s Frolic; or, Life in the East in 2014 on their eponymous first album, Kings of the South Seas.
Lyrics
Harry Cox sings Miss Doxy
I just got paid off with some bright gold in store,
And I’ll soon tell you all how I came by some more.
I just got paid off; to the alehouse I went.
To dance and to caper it was my intent.
Miss Doxy stood there in a one, two and three.
Thought I to myself, “Here’s a missus for me.”
She said to me, “Young man, we lodgings provide,
And I’ll be the young girl that will lay by your side.”
I called up the waiter some liquors to bring.
He said, “Damn your eyes, Jack. Well, that’s just the thing.”
The liquors were brought up; they drank my health round.
I gave her a wink and she bid me sit down.
I called up the waiter the reckoning to pay.
“Ten shillings and sixpence,” the waiter did say.
“Ten shillings and sixpence,” the waiter replied.
I paid down the money and upstairs went I.
I pulled off my clothes and I hopped into bed.
I placed my shot locker safe under my head.
I hopped into bed and I blew out the light,
And shammed fast asleep and I thought it all right.
Twelve o’clock just when Miss Doxy arose,
And all her old search was to find out my clothes.
To rifle my pockets her mind it seemed bent,
For all her old search was to find out my rent.
So a stick standing by about the size of my thumb.
I hopped out of bed and I well laid him on.
Her old smock she had on her in ribbons it flew,
Crying, “Ten thousand murders. Oh, what shall I do?”
I gave her no time for to put on her clothes.
I hopped round the room and I followed my blows.
The door she flung open and downstairs did run.
I shut the door after and laughed at the fun.
I searched round the room to see what I could find.
She forgot she had left her old pockets behind.
Ten shillings and sixpence and two five-pound notes,
A gold watch and chain besides stockings and boots.
So all you young men, wheresomever you be,
Mind what you do when you’re out on the spree.
They laugh at your folly and drink your health round,
But mind you don’t cruise on the very same ground.