Music: Swing Together

A new story of British pluck made the rounds in London’s pubs last week. At a dinner part to which Red Army officers had invited their British colleagues, the Russians topped off the meal with a batch of rousing Russian folk songs. Asked to reciprocate with some folk songs of their own, the British officers went into an embarrassed huddle. Only song they could think of was the Eton Boating Song, which they promptly boomed out with old school fervor. Impressed, the Russians asked to be taught the words and tune. Soon, weeping in their vodka, the sturdy Muscovites bellowed:

Jolly boating weather

With a hay harvest breeze;

Blades on the feather

Shade off the trees;

Swing, swing together

With your body between your knees.