The origins of this song seem obscure for me.  A.L. Lloyd collected it from a Mr. Bob Roberts, the captain of a coastal barge along the east coast of England in the 1950s. Lloyd apparently had found evidence of the song coming from the very late 19th century (1880s or 90s), and is probably Scottish in origin, but he didn’t go on to cite that evidence.  Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill of the iconic Irish neo-trad band The Bothy Band made it famous in their first album released in 1975; the song is also known as “Still I Love Him”, and “I’ll Go With Him”.  Ewan MacColl & Peggy Seeger also state that, essentially, the song can be traced in one form or another to the mid-19th century, but I have nothing to offer you here to illustrate this.  Whatever the case, it is indeed in the public domain.

Cliff used to sing this as part of his regular repertoire; only recently has be brought it back.

Jos. Morneault

Do you love an apple? Do you love a pear?
Do you love a laddie with curly brown hair?

Chorus:
Still I love him, I can’t deny him
I’ll be with him wherever he goes

Before I got married I wore a black shawl
But since I got married I wear bugger all

He stood at the corner, a fag in his mouth*
Two hands in his pockets, he whistled me out

He works at the pier for nine bob a week
Come Saturday night, he comes rolling home drunk

Before I got married I’d sport and I’d play
But now, the cradle, it gets in me way

Do you love an apple? Do you love a pear?
Do you love a laddie with curlie brown hair?

*A cigarette.  Cliff sings “A bag and his mount” not because he seeks to remove anything that sounds controversial to offense-seeking ears, but because it is how he remembers it.