Good morning, and welcome back to Ireland, and to this interview. I see from your CV that you have been a "wild rover" for a considerable period of time?
For many's the year.
I see. And your financial situation deteriorated over this period.
I spent all me money on whiskey and beer.
An unwise course. You did, however, succeed in reversing your fortunes.
Now I'm returning with gold in great store.
And your appetite for foreign travel appears to have abated.
I never will play the Wild Rover no more.
I understand you are keen to be reconciled with your family.
I'll go home to my parents, confess what I've done, and ask them to pardon their prodigal son.
Tell me: are you related to the Rover who by self-admission is "seldom sober"?
He is my first cousin once removed.
Your extended family displays a rather alarming history of alcohol abuse. Well, to tell you the truth my cousin is more of a man for the lassies.
Is that so?
Yes. When he's drinking, he's always thinking, how to gain his love's company.
Does he ever succeed in these endeavours?
Indeed and he does. She opens the door with the greatest pleasure, she opens the door and she lets him in, they both shake hands and embrace each other, until the morning they lie as one.
Please, the details are unnecessary. Is your cousin gainfully employed?
He is a trainee ploughman on a small tillage farm.
Demanding work. Is his punctuality not affected by the amorous nocturnal activities you mentioned?
The cousin is very conscientious in that regard. When the cocks are crowing, the birds are whistling, the streams run free about the brae, the lass must remember he's a ploughman laddie, and the farmer he must obey.
His sense of duty is admirable. Tell me: are you also related to the Irish Rover?
You have the wrong end of the stick there. The Irish Rover is not an Irishman at all but a boat.
A boat?
Some class of a ferry or maybe a container ship, it's hard to say.
A fairly large craft, then?
Bigger than Baidin Fheillimi, that's for sure.
I do not understand the reference, but let it pass. What kind of goods does this vessel carry?
They would be, on an average trip, one million bags of the best Sligo rags, two million barrels of bones, three million sides from old blind horses' hides, and four million bags full of stones. Also, five million dogs and six million hogs and seven million bundles of clover, plus eight million bales of old nannygoats' tails, in the hold of the Irish Rover.
Yes, well, we must hurry along. Are you also related to the Whistling Gypsy Rover?
He is a distant cousin on my mother's side.
Another unsettled character, it would seem.
On the contrary, he is settled in a mansion fine, down by the river Clady, and there is music and there is wine, for the gypsy and his lady.
Tell me now - are you at all acquainted with Paddy Reilly?
Is it Paddy from Bally jamesduff? Didn't I spend three solid weeks drinking with him in Camden Town, and never saw a better man to sink a pint.
I was merely wondering if he will ever . . .
Come back to Ballyjamesduff? I wouldn't bet on it. He misses the old country but he is well got on the building sites of London this many a year, and has little enough to return to since his lass Rosie married another man.
Have you met any other interesting characters during your rover days?
I have. Among them the Croppy Boy, Eileen Aroon, Mary from Dungloe, Dark Rosaleen, the Wild Colonial Boy, the Rose of Tralee, Muirsheen Durkin, Kathleen the daughter of Houlihan, Kelly the Boy from Killane and a fair few of the Bold Fenian Men.
And now you are home. You missed certain aspects of your native land, no doubt.
Lake water.
Lake water?
Always night and day I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore.
You have a strong romantic streak.
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone, it's with O'Leary in the grave.
You would be happy then to join our company and resettle in Ireland?
I would. For she's a fresh and fair land, oh she's a true and rare land, yes she's a rare and fair land, this native land of mine.
You may need to learn some economy of statement, but we will be delighted to have you none the less.