Song ID? - The Treadmill

Subject: Song ID?
From: GUEST,Jan
Date: 13 Feb 02 - 11:56 PM

Hi. I'm new here. Trying to ID a song referred to as "Song of the Old Treadmill".

Lyrics: The stars are rolling in the sky, The earth rolls on below, And we can feel the rattling wheel Revolving as we go; Then tread away my gallant boys, And make the axle fly! Why should not wheels go round-about, Like planets in the sky?

Subject: RE: Song ID?
From: GUEST,jan
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 12:00 AM

SHould have clarified...I'd like background and a source for the melody. Thanks.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE TREADMILL
From: masato sakurai
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 07:43 AM

There's an entry in The Traditional Ballad Index:

Treadmill, The
DESCRIPTION: "The stars are rolling in the sky, The earth rolls on below, And we can feel the rattling wheel Revolving as we go." The singer urges others to take their turns at the treadmill, and praises the pleasures of life among the mill workers
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1892 (Trifet's Budget of Music)
KEYWORDS: work technology
FOUND IN: US(So)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Randolph 497, "The Treadmill" (1 text, 1 tune)
File: R497

THE TREADMILL
("A very similar text and tune appeared in Trifet's Budget of Music No. 15, March, 1892, p. 37.
Manuscript copy, words and music, from Mrs. Laura Wasson, Elm Springs, Ark., Jan. 28, 1942. It was sung in her neighborhood in the late 80's, she says, and was not regarded as a new song then.")

The stars are rolling in the sky,
The earth rolls on below
And we can feel the rattling wheel
Revolving as we go,
Then tread away, my gallant boys,
And make the axle fly,
Why should not wheels go round about
Like planets in the sky?

Wake up, wake up, my duck-legged man,
And stir your solid pegs,
Arouse, arouse, my gawky friend,
And shake your spider legs.
What though you're awkward at this trade,
There're time enough to learn,
So lean upon the rail, my lads,
And take another turn.

They've built us up a noble wall
To keep the vulgar out,
We've nothing in the world to do
But just to stroll about,
So faster now, you middle men,
And try to beat the ends,
It's pleasant work to ramble round
Among one's honest friends.

From: Vance Randolph, ed., Ozark Folksongs, Vol. III (The State Historical Society of Missouri, 1949), no. 497 [p. 263]; with tune
[Not contained in the abridged edition published by University of Illinois Press]

~Masato