Day and night, through fair weather and foul, American sailing packets ploughed the North Atlantic. Between 1818 and 1870, they ferried the elite of society to and from Europe, sped vital manufactured goods, and transported millions of emigrants to the New World. Their crews, drawn from both sides of the Atlantic,were hard men driven as mercilessly as the ships, yet their work-time shanties and leisure-time forebiters reflect both a cheerful resilience and an unexpected depth of emotion. These songs are theirs, shaped and sung on their way across the Western Ocean.