Cover!
Mrs. McGrath “Oh, Mrs. McGrath,” said the sergeant,
“Would you like your son Ted to become a soldier
with a scarlet tunic and a big feathered hat,
Oh, Mrs. McGrath, wouldn’t you?”
Mrs. McGrath lived by the sea
and after seven long years and even more
she saw a ship arrive in the bay
with her son coming back from afar.
“Oh, dear captain, where have you been,
you sailed the Mediterranean,
do you have news of my son Ted,
whether he is alive or dead?”
Here comes Ted without his legs
and in their place two wooden stumps,
she kissed him a dozen times or two
and said, “My God, Ted, is that really you?”
“But were you drunk or were you blind
when you lost your two lovely legs,
or did someone at sea
tear your lovely legs away from you?”
“No, I wasn’t drunk and I wasn’t blind
when I lost my two lovely legs,
it was a great cannon shot on the fifth of May
that tore my lovely legs away.”
“Teddy, my boy,” screamed the widow,
“Your mother was proud of your lovely legs,
two wooden stumps are of no use,
why didn’t you dodge that great cannon shot?”
“All foreign wars, I say it over and over,
live on the blood and the pain of mothers.
I would rather have my son as he was
than the King of America and all his navy.”
