How still lies the bay, in the light western airs
Which blow from the crimson horizon
Once more we tack home, with a dry empty hold
Saving gas with the breezes so fair

She's a kindly cape islander, old but still sound
But so lost in the long liners shadow
Make and Break and make do, but the fish are so few
That she won't be replaced should she founder

In Make and Break Harbour the boats are so few
Too many are pulled up and rotten.
Most houses stand empty old nets hung to dry
Are blown away lost and forgotten

It's so hard to not think of before the big war
When the cod went so cheap, but so plenty
Foreign trawlers go by now with long seeing eyes
Taking all where we seldom take any

And the young folks don't stay with the fisherman's ways
Long ago they all moved to the cities
And the ones left behind old and tired and blind
And work for a pound or a penny.

In Make and Break Harbour the boats are so few
Too many are pulled up and rotten.
Most houses stand empty old nets hung to dry
Are blown away lost and forgotten

I can see the big draggers that stirred up the bay
Leaving lobster traps smashed on the bottom
And they think it don't pay to respect the old ways
That Make and Break men have forgotten

For we still keep our time to the turn of the tide
And this boat that I built with my father
Still lifts to the sky, the "One Lunger" and I
Still talk like old friends on the water

In Make and Break Harbour the boats are so few
Too many are pulled up and rotten.
Most houses stand empty old nets hung to dry
Are blown away lost and forgotten

In Make and Break Harbour the boats are so few
Too many are pulled up and rotten.
Most houses stand empty old nets hung to dry
Are blown away lost and forgotten

FFrom the Sea to the Shore

FMingulay Boat Song

The term “make and break” refers to an durable marine engine that can be repaired with gum and bailing wire. The song is the late Stan Rogers’ lament for the failing fishing industry in his Canadian homeland.