With our nets and gear we're faring
O'er the wild and wasteful ocean
It's out there on the deep
That we harvest our bread
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring
It was on a fair and a pleasant day
Out of Yarmouth harbour I was faring
As a cabin boy on a sailing lugger
For to hunt the bonny shoals of herring
Oh, we left our home grounds in the month of June
And for Galashiels we soon were bearing
With a hundred cran of the silver darlings
That we'd taken from the shoals of herring
Now the work was hard and the hours were long
And the treatment surely took some bearing
And I used to sleep standing on me feet
And I'd dream about the shoals of herring
Now you're up on deck, you're a fisherman
And you're learning all about seafaring
That's your education, scraps of navigation
As you hunt the bonny shoals of herring
In the stormy seas and the living gale
I earned the gear that I was wearing
Sailed ten thousand miles, caught ten million fishes
As we hunted for the shoals of herring
Night and day we're faring
Come winter wave or winter gale
Sweating our course
Growing up, growing old
As we hunt the bonny shoals of herring