The sun, it rose all rosy and diverting,
The ship, she slipped softly out to sea...
It was the cabin boy’s first-ever voyage
Under the death’s head of piracy.

Listing to starboard, with sails a-flapping,
The two-masted brig made a sharp turn.
And the cabin boy’s heart went leaping
With the hempen ropes on the stern.

Hiding a tender soul beneath the coarseness,
The skipper gave him some advice that stuck:
"Be a gentleman whenever luck is with you,
There are no gentlemen without the luck."

The brig roamed the seas, hither and thither,
Meeting with quarry Fate would bring her way,
Breaking the thin oar-bones of carvels
Whenever it was time to board the prey.

Once when a prize loot was to be divvied,
The whole gang began to shout and swear.
The cabin boy turned pale and bared his blade:
He knew the’d gypped him of his share.

A girl stood by and neither hid nor cried.
And the boy, he recalled the advice that stuck:
"Be a gentleman whenever luck is with you,
There are no gentlemen without the luck."

And then he knew the captain would do nothing
To stop the bloody brawls among the brothers,
And then he knew he would not feel the pain
Of steel as he inflicted it on others.

The girl thought the boy’s as good as dead,
But if he’s not to have her, no one can.
And all of a sudden overboard she leapt,
The waves hid the gold of her body’s tan.

Dumbfounding his brigand brethren, into his chest
The cabin boy discharged his flaming gun.
He was the last of luck’s great gentlemen:
All have now gone, as luck itself has done.