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William McCarty, comp. The American National Song Book. 1842.

Pasquinade: ‘You know there goes a tale’

Stuck up in the city of New York, August 12, 1781

YOU know there goes a tale,

How Jonas went on board a whale,

Once, for a frolic;

And how the whale

Set sail

And got the cholic;

And, after a great splutter,

Spew’d him up upon the coast,

Just like a woodcock on a toast,

With trail and butter.

There also goes a joke,

How Clinton went on board the Duke

Count Rochambeau to fight;

As he didn’t fail

To set sail

The first fair gale,

For once we thought him right;

But, after a great clutter,

He turn’d back along the coast,

And left the French to make their boast,

And Englishmen to mutter.

Just so, not long before,

Old Knyp,

And Old Clip

Went to the Jersey shore,

The rebel rogues to beat;

But, at Yankee farms,

They took alarms,

At little harms,

And quickly did retreat.

Then after two days wonder,

March’d boldly on to Springfield town,

And swore they’d knock the rebels down.

But as their foes

Gave them some blows,

They, like the wind,

Soon changed their mind.

And, in a crack,

Returned back,

From not one third their number.