LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,158)
  • Text Authors (19,574)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,115)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

by Patrick Joseph O'Reilly

Drake goes west
Language: English 
Drake is going West, lad,
His ships are in the bay.
Five and twenty sail all told,
Ready for the fray.
Oh! Hear it pass from lip to lip,
"Drake is off again!"
Aye, Drake's away at break of day
To sweep the Spanish Main.

Then here's to the Spanish Main -
And here's to the foe!
And here's to Drake and his merry, merry men,
Who'll never come back to Devon again
Till they've laid the enemy low.

Drake is going West, lad,
You'd like to go, would you?
Then go you shall, to share the fight
And the glory too!
Before our men the foe shall fall
Like the sickled grain.
Oh! Drake is going Westward, lad,
To sweep the Spanish Main.

Then here's to the Spanish Main.....etc

Some are going West, lad,
Who'll ne'er return again -
Some will sleep their long, long sleep
'Neath the Spanish Main.
But whatsoever be our fate,
Come what may, say I,
With Drake we'll go, for Drake we'll fight,
With Drake we'll win or die!

Then here's to the Spanish Main.....etc 

Text Authorship:

  • by Patrick Joseph O'Reilly  [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Wilfred Sanderson (1878 - 1935), "Drake goes west", published 1910. [
     text verified 1 time
    ]

Researcher for this page: Mike Pearson

This text was added to the website: 2009-01-01
Line count: 31
Word count: 179

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris