"The Juice of the Barley" is a traditional Irish drinking song

Drinking song

A drinking song is a song sung while drinking alcohol. Most drinking songs are folk songs, and may be varied from person to person and region to region, in both the lyrics and in the music...

 from around the mid-19th century. The Clancy Brothers, as well as several other bands have made recordings, and popular dance renditions of the song.

The phrase "bainne na mbó ar na gamhna" in the chorus is Irish

Irish language

Irish , also known as Irish Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family, originating in Ireland and historically spoken by the Irish people. Irish is now spoken as a first language by a minority of Irish people, as well as being a second language of a larger proportion of...

, and means "Cows' milk for the calves".

Because most of the people who sing this song have not a word of Irish, and they usually learn it by hearing it (as is normal in the oral tradition) rather than seeing it in writing, the first line of the chorus exists in many strange forms. There are also several versions of the English verses.

Lyrics

In the sweet county Lim'rick, one cold winter's night

All the turf fires were burning when I first saw the light;

And a drunken old midwife went tipsy with joy,

As she danced round the floor with her slip of a boy,

Chorus:

Singing bainne na mbó do na gamhna

And the juice of the barley for me.

Then when I was a young lad of six years or so,

With me book and my pencil to school I did go,

To a dirty old school house without any door,

Where lay the school master blind drunk on the floor,

Chorus

At the learning I wasn't such a genius I'm thinking,

But I soon bet the master entirely at drinking,

Not a wake or a wedding for five miles around,

But meself in the corner was sure to be found.

Chorus

Then one Sunday the priest read me out from the altar,

Saying you'll end your days with your neck in a halter;

And you'll dance a fine jig betwix heaven and hell,

And his words they did haunt me the truth for to tell,

Chorus

So the very next morn as the dawn it did break,

I went down to the priest house the pledge for to take,

And in there in the room sat the priests in a bunch,

Round a big roaring fire drinking tumblers of punch,

Chorus

Well from that day to this I have wandered alone,

I'm a jack of all trades and a master of none,

With the sky for me roof and the earth for me floor,

And I'll dance out my days drinking whiskey galore,

Chorus