“Mission Song”
Description
The workers at the Mission "get the milk skimmed and de relations de cream." The poor get only rags while the Manager is off spending the proceeds in places like Carboneer or Boston.
Supplemental text
Mission Song
Partial text(s)
*** A ***
From MacEdward Leach, Folk Ballads & Songs of the Lower Labrador Coast,
#91, pp. 232-234. "Sung by Martin Hocko, Pinware, August 1960."
Come all ye poor women who work night and day,
Making mats for the Mission for three dollars pay,
But to tell you the truth the way it do seem,
You'll get the milk skimmed and de relations de cream.
(16 additional stanzas)
Notes
Leach-Labrador: "The Mission referred to is the Grenfell Mission at Red Bay.... This is a local gripe song that not at all expresses the feelings of the people in general toward the Mission. I was told that this song was composed ... by a man .. dismissed from his job at the Mission because of misconduct." - BS
References
- Leach-Labrador 91, "Mission Song" (1 text, 1 tune)
- ST LLab091 (Partial)
- Roud #9973
- BI, LLab091