Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1907-02-09
PASSING OF THE CHANTEY.
planted by Groaning of the
Donkey Engine.

]
Donkey Engine.
| The chantey is another of the passing
conditions of the picturesque and roman-
tic side of the sea life. The snoring of
the donkey engine and the champing of
the steam capstan have almost entirely
taken its place
1t is the music of the sailing ship; the
measures to which the windass is hove
| around, sheets and halliards bowsed
taut, the pump wheels kept cIanking and
by which a hundred and one toilsome
Jobs are lightened.
CuriOusly enough, although the British
shellback has made these songs peculiar
~ his own, most of them are American
IN their origin. Their titles and chOruses
| bear evidence of this.
In the '40s when the famous Balti-
more clippers We're seriously menacing
our own commercial supremacy of the
sea, the stars and stripes waved over
as splendid race of sailors as the
world has ever seen.
Those We're the days of skyscrapers
ana moonrakers, when the dog funneled
paddle packet was still viewed with
derision and the mariner whose every
| finger was q tishhook and every hair Il
| rope yarn" had not yet dreamed that
steam would present render his tat
tooed muscles impotent.
So the chantey was devised in order
mat pulling and hauling might be done
III unison ard with that gusto which
is bred of rousing chorus.
Very plaintive are many of these
tunes, whose echoes have been flung
back from every league along the track
less highways of the seven seas.
The hear Il chantey in its full effective
ness you must needs be sufficiently dis
tant not to catch the jarring faesetto
into which mercantile jack inevitably
breaks, nor to hear his impromptu an
athemas upon the skipper and the mates.
AS the work of seamanshlp varies
from the rapid swinging down" of jib
sheets or royal halliards to the leisure
ly surging Of the windlaSS handspikes
in picking up an anchor, so is there a
| range of melodies to suit the cadence of
every job.
There is a picturesque appropriateness
about many of these chanteys. Thus
when Il ship is weighing to start upon
her voyage her crew will heave in the
ponderous cable to the slow, almost
pathetic refrain of goodbye, fare ye
we'll"
Many a moist eye and many a lump
i'll the throat has been raised to this
sailor chant of farewell to "a fair little
maiden" who is told that 1.-THE wind
does blow, so the ship must CO."
On the other hand. when a vessel is
heaving-up to start for home the favor
lite chantey is "hurrah, my lads. we're
homeward bound" The chorus encour-
ages the bully boys" to fresh eXertions
by the assurance that when we come
to the West Inde- locks. oh won't
the gels be there in tocks" For Jack
never forgets that the nymphs have
hold of the tow rope.
The ballard chanteys offer the largest
variety. Probably the most familiar of
these is elbow the Man Down." which
is a swinging, hand over fist air. HAUL
the Bovine" is another melody which
have heard hummed ashore. With these
two exceptions, | have never heard Il
chantey save on shipboard.
1t is in the Enthusiastically Yankee
chanteys that we find the prettiest mu-
sic. The long, lingering refrain of
Shenandoah, | Love Your Daughter"
has wild, yearning beauty about it
which is reminiscent of Irish melody
at its best.
way Down Rio" BLOW, Boys,
Blow" Roll the Cotton Down, .
Whisky, Johnnie Across the Plains
of Mexico" and "Ranzo." are indigenous
to the American fo'c'sle. although for
three generations past they have beer
very familiar in our town.
There is an indiscrihable, haunting
charm about the very simplicity of all
these Yankee chanteys. Doubtless the
romantic quality of their associations
counts for much.
Among the purely English chanteys
we may count '"Storm Along. Boys.
Stormy" 'Boney Was Warrior"
''Cheerily, Men" and DANDY Ship and
Dandy Crew"
These working sea songs may still be
heard, but with growing rareness. Yet
so long as the sailing ship and the Brit
ish shellback continue to exist they will
not utterly die.-London Express.