Around The Wild Cape Horn

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[Verse]
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I was born a land-bound farm boy and in New England raised
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The rippling of the wheat fields, well they were my ocean waves
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Each rise and fall, each cry and call, of the crows across the corn
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Were seagulls swooping around the bow
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Of the ship I dreamed I’d sail around Cape Horn

[Instrumental]
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[Verse]
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My deck was the dusty farmyard, my mast was the telegraph pole
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The windblown whine in the telegraph wire, was the sound called in my soul
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And it seemed to have been singing since the day that I was born
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You're gonna take a trip on a sailing ship
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All the way around the wild Cape Horn

[Instrumental]
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[Verse]
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Well, I found that ship in Hamburg and her name it was Peking
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Our skipper’s name was Jervis, well I never met a man like him
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He pulled two men out from the sea, by the hair, in a raging storm
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And he kept that grip on the sailing ship
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All the way around the wild Cape Horn

[Verse]
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Well, the cargo weighed five thousand tons, the ship three thousand more
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An acre of sail was up aloft, some seventeen storeys tall
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And we had a pig and a scruffy dog and a turkey fed on corn
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Willing hands to drive her on
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All the way around the wild Cape Horn

[Verse]
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Well, its four hours on and its four hours off
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And you sleep in your wet clothes
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The only dry thing on the ship is the cargo down below
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Eleven thousand miles we sailed, nigh on one hundred dawns
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Thirty two sails on a heaving ship
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Hauling us around the wild Cape Horn

[Instrumental]
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[Verse]
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Seventeen days we were becalmed, then Friday the thirteenth
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Sixty-eight great ships were lost in the storm of the century
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We blew into the Atlantic on a sunlit sparkling morn
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The turkey got sick, so we ate him quick
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On the way around the wild Cape Horn

[Verse]
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We lost two boys along the voyage, they got washed overboard
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Silence from us down below, no one could put in words
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Two empty bunks to mark the space, their two lives to mourn
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Torn between all life and death
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All the way around the wild Cape Horn

[Verse]
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Well, she had us sort of hypnotised
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No time to catch our breath
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If you want to love your life, you have to flirt with death
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Sail close to the harnessed wind and treat all risks with scorn
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A farm boy and an unyoked team
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Ploughed their way around the wild Cape Horn

[Instrumental]
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[Verse]
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Mountain waves like avalanches, crashed upon the decks
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The screaming winds ripped ropes and spars and tried to have us wrecked
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But she rose and fell through foam and swell, her sails all ripped and torn
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Eight thousand tons, tossed like a cork
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We made it 'round the wild Cape Horn

[Verse]
          E
Well, she had us sort of hypnotised
   Bm                D
No time to catch our breath
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If you want to love your life, well you have to flirt with death
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Sail close to the harnessed wind and treat all risks with scorn
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A farm boy and an unyoked team
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Ploughed their way around the wild Cape Horn
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A farm boy and an unyoked team
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Ploughed their way around the wild Cape Horn