Days of Forty-Nine
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JOE BOWERS
My name is Joe Bowers,
I’ve got a brother Ike,
I came here from Missouri,
Yes, all the way from Pike.
I’ll tell you why I left there
And how I came to roam,
And leave my poor old mammy,
So far away from home.
I used to love a gal there,
Her name was Sallie Black,
I asked her for to marry me,
She said it was a whack.
She says to me, “Joe Bowers,
Before you hitch for life,
You ought to have a little home
To keep your little wife.”
Says I, “My dearest Sallie,
O Sallie, for your sake,
I’ll go to California
And try to raise a stake.”
Says she to me, “Joe Bowers,
You are the chap to win,
Give me a kiss to seal the bargain,”—
And I throwed a dozen in.
I’ll never forget my feelings
When I bid adieu to all.
Sal, she cotched me round the neck
And I began to bawl.
When I begun they all commenced,
You never heard the like,
How they all took on and cried
The day I left old Pike.
When I got to this here country
I hadn’t nary a red,
I had such wolfish feelings
I wished myself most dead.
At last I went to mining,
Put in my biggest licks,
Came down upon the boulders
Just like a thousand bricks.
I worked both late and early
In rain and sun and snow,
But I was working for my Sallie
So ’twas all the same to Joe.
I made a very lucky strike
As the gold itself did tell,
For I was working for my Sallie,
The girl I loved so well.
But one day I got a letter
From my dear, kind brother Ike;
It came from old Missouri,
Yes, all the way from Pike.
It told me the goldarndest news
That ever you did hear,
My heart it is a-bustin’
So please excuse this tear.
I’ll tell you what it was, boys,
You’ll bust your sides I know;
For when I read that letter
You ought to seen poor Joe.
My knees gave ‘way beneath me,
And I pulled out half my hair;
And if you ever tell this now,
You bet you’ll hear me swear.
It said my Sallie was fickle,
Her love for me had fled,
That she had married a butcher,
Whose hair was awful red;
It told me more than that,
It’s enough to make me swear,—
It said that Sallie had a baby
And the baby had red hair.
Now I’ve told you all that I can tell
About this sad affair,
’Bout Sallie marrying the butcher
And the baby had red hair.
But whether it was a boy or girl
The letter never said,
It only said its cussed hair
Was inclined to be red.
THE COWBOY’S DREAM2
Last night as I lay on the prairie,
And looked at the stars in the sky,
I wondered if ever a cowboy
Would drift to that sweet by and by.
Roll on, roll on;
Roll on, little dogies, roll on, roll on,
Roll on, roll on;
Roll on, little dogies, roll on.
The road to that bright, happy region
Is a dim, narrow trail, so they say;
But the broad one that leads to perdition
Is posted and blazed all the way.
They say there will be a great round-up,
And cowboys, like dogies, will stand,
To be marked by the Riders of Judgment
Who are posted and know every brand.
I know there’s many a stray cowboy
Who’ll be lost at the great, final sale,
When he might have gone in the green pastures
Had he known of the dim, narrow trail.
I wonder if ever a cowboy
Stood ready for that Judgment Day,
And could say to the Boss of the Riders,
“I’m ready, come drive me away.”
For they, like the cows that are locoed,
Stampede at the sight of a hand,
Are dragged with a rope to the round-up,
Or get marked with some crooked man’s brand.
And I’m scared that I’ll be a stray yearling,—
A maverick, unbranded on high,—
And get cut in the bunch with the “rusties”
When the Boss of the Riders goes by.
For they tell of another big owner
Whose ne’er overstocked, so they say,
But who always makes room for the sinner
Who drifts from the straight, narrow way.
They say he will never forget you,
That he knows every action and look;
So, for safety, you’d better get branded,
Have your name in the great Tally Book.
THE COWBOY’S LIFE3
The bawl of a steer,
To a cowboy’s ear,
Is music of sweetest strain;
And the yelping notes
Of the gray cayotes
To him are a glad refrain.
And his jolly songs
Speed him along,
As he thinks of the little gal
With golden hair
Who is waiting there
At the bars of the home corral.
For a kingly crown
In the noisy town
His saddle he wouldn’t change;
No life so free
As the life we see
Way out on the Yaso range.
His eyes are bright
And his heart as light
As the smoke of his cigarette;
There’s never a care
For his soul to bear,
No trouble to make him fret.
The rapid beat
Of his broncho’s feet
On the sod as he speeds along,
Keeps living time
To the ringing rhyme
Of his rollicking cowboy song.
Hike it, cowboys,
For the range away
On the back of a bronc of steel,
With a careless flirt
Of the raw-hide quirt
And a dig of a roweled heel!
The winds may blow
And the thunder growl
Or the breezes may safely moan;—
A cowboy’s life
Is a royal life,
His saddle his kingly throne.
Saddle up, boys,
For the work is play
When love’s in the cowboy’s eyes,—
When his heart is light
As the clouds of white
That swim in the summer skies.
THE KANSAS LINE
Come all you jolly cowmen, don’t you want to go
Way up on the Kansas line?
Where you whoop up the cattle from morning till night
All out in the midnight rain.
The cowboy’s life is a dreadful life,
He’s driven through heat and cold;
I’m almost froze with the water on my clothes,
A-ridin’ through heat and cold.
I’ve been where the lightnin’, the lightnin’ tangled in my eyes,
The cattle I could scarcely hold;
Think I heard my boss man say:
“I want all brave-hearted men who ain’t afraid to die
To whoop up the cattle from morning till night,
Way up on the Kansas line.”
Speaking of your farms and your shanty charms,
Speaking of your silver and gold,—
Take a cowman’s advice, go and marry you a true and lovely little wife,
Never to roam, always stay at home;
That’s a cowman’s, a cowman’s advice,
Way up on the Kansas line.
Think I heard the noisy cook say,
“Wake up, boys, it’s near the break of day,”—
Way up on the Kansas line,
And slowly we will rise with the sleepy feeling eyes,
Way up on the Kansas line.
The cowboy’s life is a dreary, dreary life,
All out in the midnight rain;
I’m almost froze with the water on my clothes,
Way up on the Kansas line.
THE COWMAN’S PRAYER
Now, O Lord, please lend me thine ear,
The prayer of a cattleman to hear,
No doubt the prayers may seem strange,
But I want you to bless our cattle range.
Bless the round-ups year by year,
And don’t forget the growing steer;
Water the lands with brooks and rills
For my cattle that roam on a thousand hills.
Prairie fires, won’t you please stop?
Let thunder roll and water drop.
It frightens me to see the smoke;
Unless it’s stopped, I’ll go dead broke.
As you, O Lord, my herd behold,
It represents a sack of gold;
I think at least five cents a pound
Will be the price of beef the year around.
One thing more and then I’m through,—
Instead of one calf, give my cows two.
I may pray different from other men
But I’ve had my say, and now, Amen.
THE MINER’S SONG4
In a rusty, worn-out cabin sat a broken-hearted leaser,
His singlejack was resting on his knee.
His old “buggy” in the corner told the same old plaintive tale,
His ore had left in all his poverty.
He lifted his old singlejack, gazed on its battered face,
And said: “Old boy, I know we’re not to blame;
Our gold has us forsaken, some other path it’s taken,
But I still believe we’ll strike it just the same.
“We’ll strike it, yes, we’ll strike it just the same,
Although it’s gone into some other’s claim.
My dear old boy don’t mind it, we won’t starve if we don’t find it,
And we’ll drill and shoot and find it just the same.
“For forty years I’ve hammered steel and tried to make a strike,
I’ve burned twice the powder Custer ever saw.
I’ve made just coin enough to keep poorer than a snake.
My jack’s ate all my books on mining law.
I’ve worn gunny-sacks for overalls, and ‘California socks,’
I’ve burned candles that would reach from here to Maine,
I’ve lived on powder, smoke, and bacon, that’s no lie, boy, I’m not fakin’,
But I still believe we’ll strike it just the same.
“Last night as I lay sleeping in the midst of all my dream
My assay ran six ounces clear in gold,
And the silver it ran clean sixteen ounces to the seam,
And the poor old miner’s joy could scarce be told.
I lay there, boy, I could not sleep, I had a feverish brow,
Got up, went back, and put in six holes more.
And then, boy, I was chokin’ just to see the ground I’d broken;
But alas! alas! the miner’s dream was o’er.
“We’ll strike it, yes, we’ll strike it just the same,
Although it’s gone into some other’s claim.
My dear old boy, don’t mind it, we won’t starve if we don’t find it,
And I still believe I’ll strike it just the same.”
JESSE JAMES
Jesse James was a lad that killed a-many a man;
He robbed the Danville train.
But that dirty little coward that shot Mr. Howard
Has laid poor Jesse in his grave.
Poor Jesse had a wife to mourn for his life,
Three children, they were brave.
But that dirty little coward that shot Mr. Howard
Has laid poor Jesse in his grave.
It was Robert Ford, that dirty little coward,
I wonder how he does feel,
For he ate of Jesse’s bread and he slept in Jesse’s bed,
Then laid poor Jesse in his grave.
Jesse was a man, a friend to the poor,
He never would see a man suffer pain;
And with his brother Frank he robbed the Chicago bank,
And stopped the Glendale train.
It was his brother Frank that robbed the Gallatin bank,
And carried the money from the town;
It was in this very place that they had a little race,
For they shot Captain Sheets to the ground.
They went to the crossing not very far from there,
And there they did the same;
With the agent on his knees, he delivered up the keys
To the outlaws, Frank and Jesse James.
It was on Wednesday night, the moon was shining bright,
They robbed the Glendale train;
The people they did say, for many miles away,
It was robbed by Frank and Jesse James.
It was on Saturday night, Jesse was at home
Talking with his family brave,
Robert Ford came along like a thief in the night
And laid poor Jesse in his grave.
The people held their breath when they heard of Jesse’s death,
And wondered how he ever came to die.
It was one of the gang called little Robert Ford,
He shot poor Jesse on the sly.
Jesse went to his rest with his hand on his breast;
The devil will be upon his knee.
He was born one day in the county of Clay
And came from a solitary race.
This song was made by Billy Gashade,
As soon as the news did arrive;
He said there was no man with the law in his hand
Who could take Jesse James when alive.