|
Come all you old-time cowboys and listen to my song-- |
|
Please do not grow weary, I'll not detain you long-- |
|
Concerning some wild cowboys who did agree to go |
|
And the spend the summer pleasant on the range of the buffalo. |
|
Well, I found myself in Griffin in 1883, |
|
When a well-known famous drover come walkin' up to me. |
|
He said, "How do you do, young feller, |
|
And how'd you like to go |
|
And spend the summer pleasant on the trail of the buffalo?" |
|
Well, me bein' out of work right then, to that drover I did say, |
|
"This goin' out on the buffalo road depends upon your pay. |
|
If you'll pay good wages, transportation to and fro, |
|
Well, I think I might go with you on the range of the buffalo." |
|
"Yes, I will pay good wages and transportation, too, |
|
If you'll agree to work for me until the season's through; |
|
But if you do grow homesick and try to run away, |
|
You'll starve to death out on the trail and you'll also lose your pay." |
|
Well, with all this flatterin' talkin', well, he signed up quite a train, |
|
Some ten or twelve in number, all able-bodied men. |
|
Our trip it was a pleasant one as we hit the westward road |
|
Until we struck old Boggy Creek in old New Mexico. |
|
Well, here our pleasures ended, and our troubles all begun, |
|
When a lightin' storm hit us and it made the cattle run. |
|
We got all full of stickers from the cactus that did grow, |
|
And the outlaws waitin' to pick us off in old New Mexico. |
|
Well, our workin' season ended, but that drover would not pay; |
|
He said, "You went and drunk too much, you're all in debt to me." |
|
But the cowboys never had heard of such a thing as a bankrupt law, |
|
So we left that drover's bones to bleach on the range of the buffalo. |
