[Verse]
Good evening all me jolly lads, I'm glad to see you well,
If you'll gather all around me now, the story I will tell,
For I have a situation and begorrah and begob,
I can whisper, "I've a weekly wage of nineteen bob."

It's twelve months come October since I left me native home,
After helping them Killarney boys to bring the harvest down,
But now I wear a gansey and around me waist a belt,
I'm the gaffer at the pot that makes the hot asphalt.

[Chorus]
We laid it in the hollows and we laid it in the flat,
And if it doеsn't last forever, then, I swеar I'll eat me hat,
I've travelled up and down this world, but sure, I never felt,
Any surface that the equal to the hot asphalt,
Riddly die, da dum, di, di, do, dilly di da da.

[Verse]
The other night, a peeler comes and says to me, "McGuire,
Would you kindly let me light me pipe down by your boiler fire?"
He planks himself right down and flips his coattails up to light,,
Says I, "Me decent man, you'd better go and mind your bite."

He ups and yells, "I'm down on you, I'm up to all your pranks,
Don't I know yer for a traitor from Tipperary ranks?"
Boys, I hit him from the shoulder and I gave him such a belt,
That I knocked him into the boiler full of the hot asphalt.

[Chorus]
We laid it in the hollows and we laid it in the flat,
And if it doеsn't last forever, then, I swеar I'll eat me hat,
I've travelled up and down this world, but sure, I never felt,
Any surface that the equal to the hot asphalt,
Riddly die, da dum, di, di, do, dilly di da da.

[Verse]
We quickly dragged him out again and immerss him in the tub,
And with soap and boiling water we began to rub and scrub,
But the devil, when air the tar came rough and he turned his hard as stone,
And with every single rub, sure, you could hear the peeler groan.

"I'm thinking" says O'Reilly, "That he's looking like the old Nick,
And burm me if I am not inclined to claim him with me pick"
"Well", says I, "It would be easier to boil him till he melts,
And to stir him nice and easy in the hot asphalt."

[Chorus]
We laid it in the hollows and we laid it in the flat,
And if it doеsn't last forever, then, I swеar I'll eat me hat,
I've travelled up and down this world, but sure, I never felt,
Any surface that the equal to the hot asphalt,
Riddly die, da dum, di, di, do, dilly di da da.

[Verse]
You may talk about your sailor, ballad singers and the rest,
Your shoemakers and tailors that can please the ladies best,
The only one that knows the way, their pretty old hearts to melt,
Are the lads around the boiler making the hot asphalt.

With the rubbing and the scrubbing, sure he caught his death a cold,
And for scientific purposes, his body it was sold,
In the Kelvin grove museum, me boys, he's dangling in his belt,
As a monument to the Irish, making the hot asphalt.

[Chorus]
We laid it in the hollows and we laid it in the flat,
If it doеsn't last forever, I swеar I'll eat me hat,
I've travelled up and down this world, but sure, I never felt,
Any surface that the equal to the hot asphalt,
Riddly die, da dum, di, di, do, dilly di da da.