Mark Twain - Harry Belafonte

Many years ago on the Mississippi riverboats

They had men called gaugers

And the job of a gauger was to hang off

The side of the boat with one hand

And in the other hand he had a ball of twine

With a hunk a lead on the end of it

He'd wield the lead above his head

And let it fly into the river

Wherever the water marked the twine

He'd call up to the skipper and say

Marking on the twine is four fathoms

Cause then and there year after year

It was getting pretty monotonous

Until in the eighteen hundreds a little man

Came along and revolutionized the

Whole gauging industry

Instead of saying marking on the twine

He cut it short and said Mark twain

And in between each marking he'd

Fill it in with a little pattern about himself

And his every day life

Well if you'd been living at that time

Coming up from a distance on the Mississippi

It would have sounded like this

Mark Twain four fathoms off the starboard bow

I got a gal named Cindy-Lou

Feeds me gin and bake beans too

Mark Twain Mark Twain

Three fathoms off the starboard bow

I got a friend his name is Pete

Sings dirty songs down on Beel street

Mark Twain Mark Twain

Two fathoms off the starboard bow

I've been working the river since ninety two

I get a penny a day and bad liquor too

Mark Twain I won't save my money

Till the day I die

They gonna bury me all but my good right eye

Mark twain Mark Twain

No fathoms off the starboard bow

Look out skipper pull it to the side

You gonna bust your bow and split your hide

Oh great God we done run it down

Skipper gonna chase me with a big blood hound

Mark Twain