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| From Songs of Miramichi by Louise Manny and James Reginald Wilson, Brunswick Press, Fredericton, New Brunswick, 1968 |
My name is Peter Emberley
As you may understand,
I was born on Prince Edward Island
Near to the ocean strand. In eighteen hundred and eighty,
When the flowers were a brilliant hue,
I sailed away from my native isle
My fortune to pursue. I landed in New Brunswick
In a lumbering country,
I hired to work in the lumber woods
On the Sou’West Miramichi.
I hired to work in the lumber woods
Where they cut the tall spruce down,
While loading teams with yarded logs
I received a deadly wound. There’s danger on the ocean,
Where the waves roll mountains high.
There’s danger on the battlefield
Where the angry bullets fly.
There’s danger in the lumber woods,
For death lurks sullen there,
And I have fell a victim
Into that monstrous snare. I know my luck seems very hard
Since fate has proved severe,
But victor death is the worst can come
And I have no more to fear.
And he’ll allay those deadly pains
And liberate me soon,
And I’ll sleep the long and lonely sleep
Called the slumber in the tomb. Here’s adieu to Prince Edward’s Island
That garden in the seas,
No more I’ll walk its flowery banks
To enjoy a summer’s breeze.
No more I’ll view those gallant ships
As they go swimming by
With their streamers floating on the breeze
Above the canvas high. Here’s adieu unto my father
It was him who drove me here,
I thought he used me cruelly
His treatments were unfair,
For ’tis not right to oppress a boy
Or try to keep him down,
’Twill oft repulse him from his home
When he is far too young. Hire’s adieu unto my greatest friend,
I mean my mother dear,
She raised a son who fell as soon
As he left her tender care.
’Twas little did my mother know
When she sang lullaby,
What country I might travel in
Or what death I might die. Here’s adieu unto my youngest friend,
Those Island girls so true,
Long may they bloom to grace that isle
Where first my breath I drew.
For the world will roll on just the same
When I have passed away,
What signifies a mortal man
Whose origin is clay? But there’s a world beyond the tomb
To it I’m nearing on,
Where man is more than mortal
And death can never come.
The mist of death it glares my eyes
And I’m no longer here,
My spirit takes its final flight
Unto another sphere.