Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 102 pages of information about Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse.

Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 102 pages of information about Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse.

Jason drives a sorrel mare,
  Bones an’ skin at all her j’ints,
“Blooded stock,” says Jase; “I swear,
  Jest see how she shows her p’ints! 
Walkin’ ’s her best lay,” says he,
  Eyes a-twinklin’ full of fun,
“Named her Keely Motor.  See? 
  Sich hard work ter make her run.”

Jason’s jest the slickest scamp,
  Full of jokes as he can hold;
Says he beats Aladdin’s lamp,
  Givin’ out new stuff fer old;
“Buy your rags fer more ’n they’re worth,
  Give yer bran’-new, shiny tin,
I’m the softest snap on earth,”
  Says old Jason, with a grin.

Jason gits the women’s ear
  Tellin’ news and talkin’ dress;
Can ‘t be peddlin’ forty year
  An’ not know ’em more or less;
Children like him; sakes alive! 
  Why, my Jim, the other night,
Says, “When I git big I’ll drive
  Peddler’s cart, like Jason White!”

* * * * *

“SARY EMMA’S PHOTYGRAPHS”

Our Sary Emma is possessed ter be at somethin’ queer;
She’s allers doin’ loony things, unheard of fur and near. 
One time there wa’n’t no limit ter the distance she would tramp
Ter get a good-fer-nothin’, wuthless, cancelled postage-stamp;
Another spell folks couldn’t rest ontil, by hook or crook,
She got ’em all ter write their names inside a leetle book;
But though them fits was bad enough, the wust is nowadays,
Fer now she’s got that pesky freak, the photygraphin’ craze.

She had ter have a camera—­and them things cost a sight—­
So she took up subscriptions fer the “Woman’s Home Delight”
And got one fer a premium—­a blamed new-fangled thing,
That takes a tin-type sudden, when she presses on a spring;
And sence she got it, sakes alive! there’s nothin’ on the place
That hain’t been pictured lookin’ like a horrible disgrace: 
The pigs, the cows, the horse, the colt, the chickens large and small;
She goes a-gunnin’ fer ’em, and she bags ’em, one and all.

She tuk me once a-settin’ up on top a load er hay: 
My feet shets out the wagon, and my head’s a mile away;
She took her Ma in our back yard, a-hanging out the clothes,
With hands as big as buckets, and a face that’s mostly nose. 
A yard of tongue and monstrous teeth is what she calls a dog;
The cat’s a kind er fuzzy-lookin’ shadder in a fog;
And I’ve got a suspicion that what killed the brindle calf
Was that he seen his likeness in our Sary’s photygraph.

She’s “tonin’,” er “develerpin’,” er “printin’,” ha’f the time;
She’s allers buyin’ pasteboard ter mount up her latest crime: 
Our front room and the settin’-room is like some awful show,
With freaks and framed outrages stuck all ’round ’em in a row: 
But soon I’ll take them picters, and I’ll fetch some of ’em out
And hang ’em ’round the garden when the corn begins ter sprout;
We’ll have no crows and blackbirds ner that kind er feathered trash,
’Cause them photygraphs of Sary’s, they beat scarecrows all ter smash.

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.