| lyric | One evening of late as I happened to stray,
To the County Tip’rary I straight took my way:
To dig the potatoes and work by the day,
I hired with a Galbally farmer.
I saked him how far we were bound for to go;
The night it was dark; and the north wind did blow:
I’m hungry and tired and my spirits are low,
I have niether whiskey nor cordial.
He made me no answer but mounted his steed,
To the Galbally mountains he posted with speed;
I certainly thought my heart it would bleed
To be trudging behind that old naygur
When Icame to his cottage I entered it first;
It seemed like a kennel or ruined old church,
Then says I to myself, ‘I am left in the lurch
In the house of old Darby O'Leary.’
I well recollect it was Michaelmas night,
To a hearty good supper he did me invite,
A cup of sour milk that would physic a snipe
Your stomach ’twould put in disorder.
The wet old potatoes would poison the cats,
The barn where my head was was swarming with rats,
’Tis little I thought it would e’er be my lot
To lie in that hole until morning.
By what he had said to me I understood,
My bed in the barn it was not very good;
The blanket was made at the time of the flood,
The quilts and the sheets in proportion.
’Twas on this old miser I looked with a frown,
When the straw was brought out for to make my Shakedown;
I wish thatI never saw Galbally town,
Or the sky over Darby O'Leary.
I worked in Kilconnell, I worked in Kilmore,
I worked in Knockainy and Shanballymore,
In Pallas-a-Nicker and Sollohodmore,
With decent respectable farmers.
I worked in Tipperary, the Rag and Rosegreen,
At the mount of Kilfeakle, the Bridge of Aleen,
But such woeful starvation I’ve never yet seen
As I got from old Darby O’Leary. |