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By a fine old mother's side, sat her eldest by her pride,
Who would soon arrive at manhood's state of life;
When the lad began to tell of a girl he loved so well,
And intended asking her to be his wife.
On that kind old mother's face, tears at once your eye could trace,
Like the change of brightest sunlight into gloom;
"Have you stopped to think," said she, "What your lot in life may be,
Ere you ask a girl to leave a happy home?"
"When you ask a girl to leave her happy homestead,
To sail with you o'er matrimony's foam,
You should have employment, then earn your way and living well,
Ere you ask a girl to leave her happy home."
Then that kind old mother said, "Tell me, lad, if you were wed,
How would you support a wife and dress her well?"
Said the lad, "Why we could live, on the money you would give,
And in one of father's houses we could dwell."
"But the girl," the mother cried, "Has dignity and pride,
To depend on us for home will never do;
We will help you all we can, we want you to act a man,
When you ask a girl to leave her happy home."
"When you ask a girl to leave her happy homestead,
To sail with you o'er matrimony's foam,
You should have employment, then earn your way and living well,
Ere you ask a girl to leave her happy home."
Collected in 1951 from Mr. and Mrs. Michael Devereaux and published in MacEdward Leach And The Songs Of Atlantic Canada © 2004 Memorial University of Newfoundland Folklore and Language Archive (MUNFLA).
A variant was collected in 1927 from Leone Duvall by Vance Randolph and published as #861 on p.387 of Ozark Folksongs. Volume IV, Religious Songs and Others (University of Missouri Press, Columbia, Missouri, 1980/1946).
