I was standing in the fish shop, I'd an hour or two to wait, 'Cos the gentleman who kept the place was filleting a skate So I sang a little chorus, just to pass the time away, When a great big oyster looked at me and jumped out of the tray. He bit a lobster's leg off, and that fishman was so wild! He said "Now stop that singing! didn't you learn as a child ... that ... "A noise annoys an oyster, but a noisy noise annoys an oyster more. When the west wind whistles through the whiskers of a shrimp The poor old oyster feels a trifle limp. He'll murder mussels if the seaweed rustles Or the cockles croak a chorus on the shore For a noise annoys an oyster, But a noisy noise annoys an oyster more." I was cross with that young oyster, very very cross indeed So when the fuss was over, being of the bulldog breed, I scooped him out and and swallowed him, and said "Now there, old thing, that'll teach you to go biting lobsters just because I choose to sing." And as in my intestines he began to loop the loop, I said to the man sitting next to me "Don't gargle with your soup ... because ... "A noise annoys an oyster ... "A noise annoys an oyster ...
recording: Ed Emery (2018) [YouTube]