O’Connell’s Steam Engine

Oh people of heart I pray pay attention
Listen to what I’m about to relate
Concerning a couple I overheard talking
As I was returning late home from a wake
As I rode along sure I saw an ould woman
Who sat in a gap, she was milking her cow
She was jigging that tune called: “Make haste to the wedding”
Or some other ditty I can’t tell you now

Ah, the next came along; it was a bould tinker
Who happened by chance to be passing that way
The day being fine they sat down together
What news of that man, the ould woman did say
There’s no news at all mam, replied the bould tinker
But the people all wish that he never had been
He’s a damnable rogue of a Daniel O’Connell
And he’s now making babies in Dublin by steam

Ah, the children are ruined replied the ould woman
Or has the quare fellow gone crazy at last
Or is it the sign of a war or rebellion
Or what is the reason he wants them so fast
It’s not that at all mam replied the bould tinker
The children of Ireland are getting too small
It’s O’Connell’s petition to the new Lord Lieutenant
That he won’t let us make them the ould way at all

By this pipe in me mouth, replied the ould woman
And that’s a strong oath on me soul for to say
But I am an ould woman and if I was near him
I bet you me life that he’d rue the day
For the people of Ireland they’re very well known
They gave him their earnings when needing them bad
And now that he is recompensing them for it
By taking the only diversion they have

Ah light to your coach mam replied the bould tinker
Long may you live now with youth on your side
If all the young girls in Ireland were like you
O’Connell could throw his steam engine aside
If I had the young men of Ireland around me
And girls making babies as fast as they can
And whenever Her Majesty wanted an army
We’d be able to send her as many as Dan’