FOD

1. As I went down to the mowin' field,
Hu-rye, tu-rye, fod-a-link-a-dye-do
As I went down to the mowin' field, Fod!
As I went down to the mowin' field,
A big black snake got me by the heel,
Tu-rolly-day.


2. Well, I fell down upon the ground, (3 times)
I shut both eyes and looked all around.

3. I set upon a stump to take my rest, (3)
I (It??) looked like a woodchuck on his nest.

4. The woodchuck grinned a banjo song (3)
And up stepped a skunk with the britches on.

5. The woodchuck and skunk got into a fight, (3)
The fumes was so strong they put out the light.

6. They danced and they played till the chimney begin to rust, (3)
It was hard to tell which smelt the wust.

Source: Alan Lomax, The Folk Songs of North America

Collected by C. Todd and R. Sonkin as adapted and arranged by the King Family, Visalia, Calif., Okie emigrants to Calif. from Missouri. AAFS 8 BI. see: Botkin V, 792; Brown III, 221; White, 203. This is a white remake of Negro animal jingles popular in blackface minstrel era. Tune is one of the Middlewestern variants of the Rattlesnake Song, which has also contributed to Fod.

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There is an identical version of the song in Old-Time String Band Songbook (Cohen/Seeger/Wood), except that the third verse has

It looked like a woodchuck on his nest.

Could it be that the King Family is the only source for this song?