Читать книгу Cowboy Songs, and Other Frontier Ballads - Various - Страница 6

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.