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Miss Fogarty's Christmas Cake (The McNulty Family)
See also: Trinity Cake (Johnny Burke)
And also: The Rich Wedding Cake (Collected by Kenneth Peacock)

       #1470 YouTube video by oldirishladdie ©2010
                  ~ Used with permission ~

As I sat at my window last evening,
The letterman brought unto me;
A little gilt-edged invitation,
Sayin', "Gilhooley come over to tea."
Sure, I knew that the Fogartys sent it,
So I went just for old friendship's sake;
And the first thing they give me to tackle,
Was a slice of Miss Fogarty's cake.

Now, there was plums and prunes and cherries,
There was citrons and raisins and cinnamon, too;
There was nutmeg, cloves and berries,
And a crust that was nailed on with glue.
There were caraway seeds in abundance,
Sure t'would build up a fine stomach ache;
It would kill a man twice after 'atin' a slice,
Of Miss Fogarty's Christmas cake.

Miss Mulligan wanted to taste it,
But really there wasn't no use;
They worked at it over an hour,
And they couldn't get none of it loose.
Till Kelly come in with a hatchet,
And Murphy come in with a saw;
That cake was enough be the powers,
To paralyze any man's jaw.

Now, there was plums and prunes and cherries,
There was citrons and raisins and cinnamon, too;
There was nutmeg, cloves and berries,
And a crust that was nailed on with glue.
There were caraway seeds in abundance,
Sure t'would build up a fine stomach ache;
It would kill a man twice after 'atin' a slice,
Of Miss Fogarty's Christmas cake.

Miss Fogarty, proud as a peacock,
Kept smiling and blinking away;
Till she fell over Flanagan's brogans,
And she spilt the homebrew in her tea.
"Oh, Gilhooley," she cried, "you're not eatin',
Try a little bit more for my sake."
"No thanks, Missus Fogarty," says I,
But I'd like the resate* for that cake."

Now, there was plums and prunes and cherries,
There was citrons and raisins and cinnamon, too;
There was nutmeg, cloves and berries,
And a crust that was nailed on with glue.
There were caraway seeds in abundance,
Sure t'would build up a fine stomach ache;
It would kill a man twice after 'atin' a slice,
Of Miss Fogarty's Christmas cake.

Maloney was took with the colic,
McNulty complained of his head;
McFadden lay down on the sofa,
And he swore that he wished he was dead.
Miss Daly fell down in hysterics,
And there she did wriggle and shake;
While every man swore he was poisoned,
Through eating Miss Fogarty's cake.

Now, there was plums and prunes and cherries,
There was citrons and raisins and cinnamon, too;
There was nutmeg, cloves and berries,
And a crust that was nailed on with glue.
There were caraway seeds in abundance,
Sure t'would build up a fine stomach ache;
It would kill a man twice after 'atin' a slice,
Of Miss Fogarty's Christmas cake.

*["resate" = receipt = recipe]
####.... Variant of a song by C. Frank Horn [1851-1928] of Tamaqua and Middleport, Pennsylvania, published in 1883 by W.F. Shaw, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. ....####
The You Tube video above features a variant recorded by The McNulty Family who popularized this song in Newfoundland and Labrador (Decca Records, 1941 78rpm.

See more songs by The McNulty Family.

Johnny Burke [1851-1930] of St. John's, NL, wrote a song along a similar theme but with a different tune which was published as Trinity Cake in Gerald S. Doyle's Old-Time Songs And Poetry Of Newfoundland: Songs Of The People From The Days Of Our Forefathers (Third edition, p.62, 1955).

Another song along this same theme but with a different tune was collected in 1958 from Everett Bennett of St. Paul's, NL, by Kenneth Peacock and published as The Rich Wedding Cake in Songs Of The Newfoundland Outports, Volume 1, pp.92-93, by the National Museum Of Canada (1965) Crown Copyrights Reserved.


See more Christmas songs from Newfoundland and Labrador.





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