Annotation:Cá rabáis anois a cailín big
X:1 T:Cá rabáis anois a cailín big T:Where have you been, my little girl? M:C L:1/8 Q:"Allegro con spirito" B:Petrie - Ancient Music of Ireland (1855, pp. 66-67) Z:AK/Fiddler's Companion K:C (cd)|.e2.{d}e2.f2.f2|.e2 (dc) B2 (cd)|.e2.e2 (fd) (d>B)|(c3B)G2 (cd)| .e2.{d}e2.f2 (gf)|e2 (dc) c2 (dc)|(BG) (GF) TE2 (FD)|D4 C2|| P:Chorus (EF)|.G2.G2.F2.(GF)|.E2.F2.D2 (EF)|.G2.G2.F2 (GF)|E3 D (CD) (EF)| .G2.G2.F2 (GF)|.E2.F2 .D2 c2|(BG) .G.F TE2 (F>D)|D4 C2||
CÁ RABÁIS ANOIS A CAILÍN BIN (Where have you been, my pretty girl?). Irish, Air (whole time). C Major (Petrie): D Major (Roche). Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. Petrie declined to give more than the first stanza of the song, saying it was "unfit for publication" being too risqué. Folklore had it that it was written for a "clever, but licentious Limerick poet" whose hey-day was in the mid-18th century, who was called after his trade Mangaire Sugach, or Jolly Merchant or Pedlar. Translated from the Irish, it goes:
Where have you been, my little girl?
My mother of me questioned:
I was abroad this freezing night,
Watching my bit of spinning
Sing Tow-row-row, &c.