Honourable senators, today I am pleased to present Chapter 79 of “Telling Our Story.”

For generations, the history and culture of Newfoundland and Labrador has been passed down through both story and song. Many of those are of a serious and profound nature, detailing a way of life our people have endured for centuries on that beautiful rock in the Atlantic Ocean. Then there are those songs and stories that are more lighthearted, such as the one I am going to tell you today.

One of our province’s most successful recording artists was a man by the name of Dick Nolan. In due course, I will be pleased to expand on Mr. Nolan’s long and distinguished music career, but today I want to tell you about one of his most popular and, indeed, signature songs titled, “Aunt Martha’s Sheep.” Written by Terrance White and Arthur Butt of Perry’s Cove and later rewritten by Ellis Coles, Nolan released the song in 1972 and the album went platinum, selling more than 100,000 copies. With our province’s population hovering around 500,000 people at the time, you can easily understand why the song became a fan favourite for many years and still is today.

The song tells the tale of boys from the picturesque town of Carmanville, Newfoundland, who decided they were going to steal a calf from Aunt Martha’s barn and cook up a scoff. Now, for those of you who do not know what a scoff is, it is a big, hearty meal.

Later on that evening, the boys crept up over Joe Tulk’s hill and headed into the barn, but they ran into a problem. The old cow got angry when they woke her from sleep, so they had no other choice: they had to steal the sheep. As you would expect, when Aunt Martha discovered what had taken place, she became pretty angry herself. The very next morning, she sent a telegram off to the RCMP telling them about her loss and asking the police to catch the robbers no matter what the cost.

In the meantime, it was getting up around midnight and the boys were up at the cabin and “had the sheep a’cooking” and everyone was feeling pretty tight. “The smell of mutton and onions no man could ask for more,” when lo and behold, the “. . . Mountie walked in the door.” He said:

 . . . sorry, boys, your party I really don’t mean to wreck.

I smelled the meat a’cooking and I had to come in and check.

Now, the boys were not too worried about the arrival of the RCMP, so they welcomed the officer, and said, “. . . come right in and join us, sir, we’re having a piece of moose.” So he came right in and sat right down, and the boys gave him a piece of the sheep. After the officer had a taste, he said to the lads, “This is the finest piece of moose I knows I’ll ever eat.”

They had a grand old evening, and at about two o’clock in the morning, the officer bid farewell, with a promise from the lads that if they got any clues on the stolen sheep, they would phone him right away. He then looked at them and said that if everyone was as good as the boys, he was sure Aunt Martha wouldn’t have lost her sheep.

After the officer left, the boys finished off the piece of mutton they had in the oven to roast, because, friends, the boys may have stolen Aunt Martha’s sheep — “. . . but the Mountie ate the most.”