come listen you fellas young and so fine
and seek not your fortune in the dark dreary mind
you will form as a habit and seep in your soul
till the stream of your blood is as black as the coal
and it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
where the danger is double and the pleasures are few
where the pain never falls and the sun never shines
and it's dark as a dungeon way down in the mines
well it's many a man i've known in my day
who lived just to labor his whole life away
like a fiend with his ** or a drunkard his wine
a man will have lust for the lure of the mine
and it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
where the danger is double and the pleasures are few
where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
and it's dark as a dungeon way down in the mines
on the midnight of the morning or the middle of the day
it's the same to the miner who labors away
where the demons of death often come by surprise
one fall of the slate and you're buried alive
where it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
where the danger is double and the pleasures are few
where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
and it's dark as a dungeon way down in the mines
i hope when i'm gone and the ages shall roll
my body will blacken and turn into coal
and i'll look from the door of my heavenly home
and pity the miner for digging my bones
where it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
where the danger is double and the pleasures are few
where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
and it's dark as a dungeon way down in the mines