Michael was hearty, Michael was young
High was the step in the jig that he sprung
He had good looks, Lord, and sootherin’ tongue
He wanted a girl with a fortune

Nanny was grey-eyed, and Nanny was tall
Fair was the face hidden under her shawl
For he loved her the best of them all
She hadn’t a penny to a fortune

So he bead a look out for a likelier match
When he married a girl who was counted a catch
Ugly as need be, with a dark little patch
“Well, that’s just a trifle,” he told her

So she’d brought him her good-lookin’ gold to admire
She brought him her good-lookin’ cows to his barn
Far from good-lookin’, she’d sit by the fire
And paid him the trifle he told her

And he met pretty Nan when a month had gone by
He fought like a fool to get round her, he tried
With a smile on her lips and a spark in her eye
“How is the woman who owns you?”

And it’s never been tellin’ the life that he’s led
Sure many’s a night that he’s wished himself dead
For the sake of the two eyes in pretty Nan’s head
And the tongue of the woman who owns him
Oh Michael was hearty, Michael was young
High was the step in the jig that he sprung
He had good looks, Lord, and sootherin’ tongue
He wanted a girl with a fortune