The Mummers Carol
Hark, what's the noise out by the porch door?
Dear Granny, there's Mummers, there's twenty or more.
Her old weathered face lightens up with a grin.
Any Mummers, nice Mummers 'lowed in?
Ah, come in lovely Mummers, don't bother the snow,
We'll wipe up the water sure after you go.
And sit if you can or on some mummer's knee.
We'll see if we knows who ye be.
Ah, there's big ones and small ones, tall ones and thin,
There's boys dressed as women and girls dressed as men,
With humps on their backs and mitts on their feet,
My blessed we'll die with the heat.
Well, there's only one there that I think that I know,
That tall fellow standing alongside the stove,
He's shaking his fist for to make me not tell,
Must be Willy from out on the hill.
Oh, but that one's a stranger, if ever was one,
With his underwear stuffed and his trapdoor undone;
Is he wearing his mother's big forty-two bra?
I knows, but I'm not going to say.
Well, I s'pose you fine Mummers would turn down a drop
Of home brew or alky, whatever you got;
Sure, the one with his rubber boots on the wrong feet
Ate enough for to do him all week.
Well I 'spose you can dance? Yeah, they all nod their heads,
They've been tapping their feet ever since they came in;
And now that the drinks have been all passed around,
The Mummers are plankin' 'er down.
Ah, be careful the lamp! Now hold on to the stove,
Don't you swing Granny hard, 'cause you know that she's old;
And never you mind how you buckle the floor,
'Cause the Mummers have danced here before.
Oh, my God, how hot is it? We'll never know.
I allow that we'll all get the devil's own cold;
Good night and good Christmas, Mummers me dear,
Please God, we will see you next year.
Good night and good Christmas, Mummers me dear,
Please God, we will see you next year.
Please God, we will see you next year.