Cowboy Songs, and Other Frontier Ballads. Various

Чтение книги онлайн.

Читать онлайн книгу Cowboy Songs, and Other Frontier Ballads - Various страница 8

Cowboy Songs, and Other Frontier Ballads - Various

Скачать книгу

I ain't got no sister,

       I ain't got no sister

       To go and play with me.

      I ain't got no brother,

       I ain't got no brother,

       I ain't got no brother

       To drive the steers with me.

      I ain't got no sweetheart,

       I ain't got no sweetheart,

       I ain't got no sweetheart

       To sit and talk with me.

      I'm a poor, lonesome cowboy,

       I'm a poor, lonesome cowboy,

       I'm a poor, lonesome cowboy

       And a long ways from home.

      BUENA VISTA BATTLEFIELD

      On Buena Vista battlefield

       A dying soldier lay,

       His thoughts were on his mountain home

       Some thousand miles away.

       He called his comrade to his side,

       For much he had to say,

       In briefest words to those who were

       Some thousand miles away.

      "My father, comrade, you will tell

       About this bloody fray;

       My country's flag, you'll say to him,

       Was safe with me to-day.

       I make a pillow of it now

       On which to lay my head,

       A winding sheet you'll make of it

       When I am with the dead.

      "I know 'twill grieve his inmost soul

       To think I never more

       Will sit with him beneath the oak

       That shades the cottage door;

       But tell that time-worn patriot,

       That, mindful of his fame,

       Upon this bloody battlefield

       I sullied not his name.

      "My mother's form is with me now,

       Her will is in my ear,

       And drop by drop as flows my blood

       So flows from her the tear.

       And oh, when you shall tell to her

       The tidings of this day,

       Speak softly, comrade, softly speak

       What you may have to say.

      "Speak not to her in blighting words

       The blighting news you bear,

       The cords of life might snap too soon,

       So, comrade, have a care.

       I am her only, cherished child,

       But tell her that I died

       Rejoicing that she taught me young

       To take my country's side.

      "But, comrade, there's one more,

       She's gentle as a fawn;

       She lives upon the sloping hill

       That overlooks the lawn,

       The lawn where I shall never more

       Go forth with her in merry mood

       To gather wild-wood flowers.

      "Tell her when death was on my brow

       And life receding fast,

       Her looks, her form was with me then,

       Were with me to the last.

       On Buena Vista's bloody field

       Tell her I dying lay,

       And that I knew she thought of me

       Some thousand miles away."

      WESTWARD HO

      I love not Colorado

       Where the faro table grows,

       And down the desperado

       The rippling Bourbon flows;

      Nor seek I fair Montana

       Of bowie-lunging fame;

       The pistol ring of fair Wyoming

       I leave to nobler game.

      Sweet poker-haunted Kansas

       In vain allures the eye;

       The Nevada rough has charms enough

       Yet its blandishments I fly.

      Shall Arizona woo me

       Where the meek Apache bides?

       Or New Mexico where natives grow

       With arrow-proof insides?

      Nay, 'tis where the grizzlies wander

       And the lonely diggers roam,

       And the grim Chinese from the squatter flees

       That I'll make my humble home.

      I'll chase the wild tarantula

       And the fierce cayote I'll dare,

       And the locust grim, I'll battle him

       In his native wildwood lair.

      Or I'll seek the gulch deserted

       And dream of the wild Red man,

       And I'll build a cot on a corner lot

       And get rich as soon as I can.

      A HOME ON THE RANGE

      Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam,

       Where the deer and the antelope play,

      

Скачать книгу