Fond memories of a long gone ritual which many remember and few have forgotten.

In the Navy of the 70s, the beginning of the rot,
The day they killed the Andrew was the day they stopped the tot.

Oh! They don't go east of Suez, or west of Panama,
When your belly's full of limers, you can't go very far.

The legend on the rum tub is still there to be seen,
But the motto looks quite silly on the side of a goffer machine!

You will hear the old sailors saying, "It'll never be the same".
And when they talk of bubbly they don't mean French Champagne.

Did Jack flinch at Trafalgar, as he faced shot and shell?
With a tot inside his belly, our Jack would sail through hell.

At ten to twelve each forenoon, since the Andrew first began,
Jack drinks the 'blood of Nelson' from Jutland to Japan.

Their Lordships drink their sherry and cry, "More efficiency!"
But what works on paper doesn't always work at sea.

Now Jack is a humble sailor, who doesn't ask a lot
and, after Jutland and Trafalgar, who dares to stop his tot?

He's always done his duty to Country and the Throne
And all he asks is fairness, and to leave his tot alone.

 

You soothed my nerves and warmed my limbs
And cheered my dismal heart,
Procurred my wants, obliged my whims -
and now it's time to part.
'Mid endless perils of the deep,
and miseries untold,
you summoned sweet forgetful sleep,
cocooned me from the cold.

Tens years ago, the 'pound o' leaf',
that cast its fragrant spell
about the ship, expired in grief
and sadness of farewell.
Though guests may find the pantry bare
whene'er they chose to come,
your hospitality was there;
a tot of Pusser's rum

Two hundred years and more you filled
the storm tossed sailor's need.
Now you've been killed by spite distilled
from jealousy and greed,
and petty clerks with scrawny necks
who never saw a wave,
nor felt the spray nor heaving decks,
consign you to your grave.

Alas! However I protest
to save myself from hurt,
they tell me that it's for the best -
to keep us all alert.
And so the time has come, old friend,
to take the final sup.
Our tears are shed. This is the end.
Goodbye, and 'Bottoms Up'.

Yours aye

Bob