You can tell a Nova Scotian
By the fragrance of the ocean,
For they always wear the perfume of the North Atlantic spray
But if you can't seem to smell 'em,
There's another way to tell 'em
For you'll always know a Bluenose by his diet right away!
(spoken) What do we eat? We eat...
Fish bones, herrin', oysters when we're daring.
And we often take a bake of hake 'cause that's a dandy dish!
To make chowder fit for dolphins, throw in everything but
sculpins
And you ain't a Nova Scotian if you don't like fish!
What we eats, until we're bustin'
Most Albertans find disgustin'.
For it seems salt cod's upsettin' to that dainty western tongue.
And with faces hard and stony,
They say "Herrin's too durn boney"
But there's nothing for dissolving bones like Nova Scotian rum.
(spoken) and so we eat:
Cod cheeks, cod tongues, even though they're odd tongues
Fish sticks and beefy chicks as dainty as you wish.
We eat flat fish, like the flounder
And some others that are rounder
And you ain't a Nova Scotian if you don't like fish!
You won't find no haddock fillets
In them Manitoba skillets
And away out in Saskatchewan they don't know fish from beets
Way out in Red River Valley
They can't tell scallops from tomally
And you'll get no clams or salmon with your dandelion treats.
(spoken) But us, we eat:
Finnan haddie, good for lass or laddie
And a smoked eel will make you feel
Like dancin'
We cook up salimugundi
Twenty seven ways from Sunday
And you ain't a Nova Scotian if you don't like fish!
Now lest there be a mix-up
There's just one thing I should fix up
For there's some that can't tell us from
Newfoundlanders tried and true;
We eat hake and cod and kippers,
But we don't eat seal flippers
And that's how you tell the difference, 'cause the Newfoundlanders do!
(spoken) We just eat:
Mackerel, pollock
They never give you colic
If you wash down your tuna with a little drink of squish
We love a mess of shad roe
And you ain't a Nova Scotian
(By the Holy land o' Goshen)
And you've never seen the ocean
If you don't like fish!