"The Humours of Whiskey" Lyrics
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From: Pogue Mahone Means Kiss My Arse!
words and music Traditional
Let your quacks and newspapers be cuttin' their capers
And curing the vapors the scratch and the gout,
With their medical potions, their pills and their lotions
Upholding their notions, they're mighty put out.
Who can tell the true physics of all things pathetic,
And pitch to the devil, cramp, colic and spleen.
You'll know it I think if you take a big drink
With your mouth to the brink of a jug of poteen
So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For drowning your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh what moderation gives hope to a nation
Can give consolation like poteen me boys.
No liquid cosmetic to lovers athletic
Or ladies pathetic can give such a bloom
As the sweet by the powers in the garden of flowers
E'er gave their own bowers such a darling perfume.
And this liquid so rare if you willingly share
To be taking your hair when it's frizzled and dead.
Oh the sod has the merit to yield the true spirit,
So strong it will shake all the hairs from your head
So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For drowning your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh since its perfection, no doctor's direction
Can cleanse the complexion like poteen me boys.
As a child in me cradle, the nurse from her ladle
Was swillin her mouth with a notion of Pep.
When a drop from her bottle fell into my throttle.
I capered and scrambled right out of her lap
On the floor I lay crawlin' and screaming and bawling
'Til me mother and father were called to the fore.
All sobbing and sighing they feared I was dying.
They found I was only crying for more.
So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For drowning your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh lord how I'd chuckle if babes in their truckle
Could only be suckled on poteen me boys.
Through youthful digressions and times of depression,
My childhood's impression still clung to my mind.
And at school or at college, the basis of knowledge
I never could gulp 'til with whiskey combined.
And as older I'm growing times e'er bestowin'
On Erin's potation, a flavor so fine;
And how ere they may lecture on Jove and his nectar
Itself is the only true liquid divine.
So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For drowning your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh lord, 'tis the right thing for courting and fighting
There's naught so exciting as poteen me boys.
Come guess me this riddle: what beats pipes and fiddle?
What's hotter than mustard and wilder than cream?
What best wets your whistle? What's clearer than crystal?
What's sweeter than honey and stronger than steam?
What will make the dumb talk? What will make the lame walk?
The elixir of life and philospher's stone.
And what helped Mr. Brunel to dig the Thames Tunnel?
Wasn't it poteen from ould Inishowen?
So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For drowning your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh lord, it's no wonder, if lightning and thunder
Was made from the plunder of poteen me boys.
CHORDS: KEY
verse/chorus:
Background: Poitin is a term for illegal whiskey. Illegal because taxes were not paid to the British government for its creation. In gaelic it is called uisce beatha (pronounced ish-ka bah-ha), the water of life. And the Irish of have tons of different names for it which you'll see throughout the song. The lyrics are no older than the early 1800s.
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