Lyr. Add: THE TRAIL TO MEXICO
(J. E.McCauley, in Lomax and Lomax, 1938)

1
I made up my mind to change my way,
And quit the crowd that was so gay,
And leave the girl who'd promised her hand,
And head down south of the Rio Grande.
And when I held her in my arms
I know she had ten thousand charms;
She promised that she would be true
And wait for me as lovers do.

Refrain:
I'm going back to Mexico,
Where the longhorn steers and cactus grow,
Where the girls are good day after day
And do not live just for your pay.

2
It was in the year of eighty-three
That A. J. Stinson hired me.
He says, "Young feller, I want you to go
And drive this herd to Mexico."
And when I held her in her arms
I thought she had ten thousand charms;
Her kisses were soft, her lips were sweet,
Saying, "We'll get married next time we meet."

3
The first horse they gave me was an old black
With two big set-fasts on his back;
I padded him with gunny-sacks and my bedding all;
He went up, then down, and I got a fall.
The next they gave me was an old gray-
I'll remember him till my dying day;
And if I had to swear to the fact,
I believe he was worse than the black.

4
Oh, it was early in the year
When I went on trail to drive the steer;
I stood my guard through sleet and snow
While on the trail to Mexico.
Oh, it was a long and toilsome go
As our herd rolled on to Mexico;
With laughter light and the cowboy's song
To Mexico we rolled along.

5
When I arrived in Mexico
I wanted to see my love but could not go;
So I wrote a letter, a letter to my dear,
But not a word from her could I hear.
When I arrived at my native home
I called for the darling of my own;
They said she had married a richer life,
Therefore, wild cowboy, seek another wife.

6
Oh, the girl is married I do adore,
And I cannot stay at home any more;
I'll cut my way to a foreign land
Or I'll go back West to my cowboy band.
I'll go back to the Western land,
I'll hunt up my old cowboy band-
Where the girls are few and the boys are true
And a false-hearted love I never knew.

7
"O Buddie, O Buddie, please stay at home,
Don't be forever on the roam.
There is many a girl more true than I,
So pray don't go where the bullets fly."
"It's curse your gold and your silver too,
Confound a girl that won't prove true;
I'll travel West where the bullets fly,
I'll stay on the trail till the day I die."

Refrain:
I'm going back to Mexico,
Where the longhorn steers and the cactus grow,
Where the girls are good day after day
And do not live just for your pay.

With music score from the Cowboy Band, San Angelo, Texas. Words from J. E. McCauley of Seymour, Texas, who said, "...don't remember when I first heard it and how long I have knew it."
John A. and Alan Lomax, 1938, "Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads," Revised and Enlarged, pp. 52-56.
The version bears evidence of cobbling together from several versions and other songs.

David Eiseman, in Western Folklore, v. 44, no. 1 (Jan. 1985), pp. 23-34, in a study of the song, noted influences from several old songs.
He says the versions in Lomax 1918 and 1938 are "heavily edited texts."
(References to the song in Lomax 1910 make the mistake of using the date of the first edition, not of later revised editions with additional songs. In an earlier post, I erred in dating the 1938 revised edition as 1928).

Versions with "I'm going back to Mexico, Where the longhorn steers and cactus grow," suggest that the verse was written after shorthorns became common.
No A. J. Stinson, or the several other names in other versions, has ever been identified and seems to be fictional.

Although several authorities suggest that the song dates back to the 1880s, the evidence consists primarily of similarity of lines in other songs that are attributed to that time.