"Finigan's Wake" (1864)
by J. Durnal

New York, NY: J. J. DALY
Plate No. 183
Quidor, Engraver.
[Source: 057/003Levy]

1. Then Finigan lived in Walker street,
  He was a gintleman mighty odd,
He was fond of a dhrop o’ the crature nate,
  And to rise in the world he carried the hod;
Now Tim one mornin’ got rather full,
  His head felt heavy— his hands did shake,
So he fell off the ladder and smashed his skull,
  And his friends too home the corpse to wake.

CHORUS [sung after each VERSE]
With my phillaloo, hubbahoo, whack hurroo boys,
  Didn’t we sing till our jaws did ache,
And shout and laugh ’till all was blue
  With the fun we had at Finigan’s wake?

2. They could him up in a clane white sheet,
  An fold him out upon the bed,
With eight dipped candles around his feet
  And a dozen at last, around his head;
Miss Biddy O’ Brian began to cry,
  Misses Finigan cried “asthore machree,
Millia murther Tim darlin’ och! why did you die?”
  “Arrah none o’yer peate” sez Judy McGee.

3. Thin Peggy O’Conner took up the cry,
  “Now Judy,” sez she, “yer wrong I’m sure;”
But Judy soon gev her a belt on the eye,
  Which left her sprawlin’ on the flure.
Both sides in the row did soon engage,
  (’Twas woman to woman, and man to man)
Shillelagh’s and “nails”* wor all the rage,
  An’ a “tarin’” ruction soon began.

4. Mieky Mulvany just show’d his head,
  When Tim Donavan flung a full quart at him,
It missed him, an’— fallin’ on the bed—
  The liquor was split on the face of Tim;
Now the sperrits new life gev the corpse, my joy,
  Tim jump’d like a Trojan from the bed,
Cryin’— whilst he wallop’d aitch girl an’ boy—
  “Tare an’ ages, yer sowls, d’ye think I’m dead?”