“Manuel’s love song“ was written by
Gus Kahn and Franz Waxman. The words to the song are, I believe, a
combination of traditional and written ones, with the tune and
the chorus being very similar to that found in Meredith and
Anderson’s “Folksongs of Australia“ in their song “The Little
Fish.“ They report the song to be Portuguese in origin, but
fairly widely known in North Queensland, Australia.
Here is the Song Spencer Tracy Sang in the 1937 Picture Captains Courageous
“Yeah, ho, little fish Don’t cry,