GREEN MOUNTAIN BOYS

It was on one Monday morning
In eighteen hundred and seventy-five,
I thought myself quite happy
To find myself alive.
I harnessed up my horses,
My business to pursue,
And I went to hauling cordwood
As I always used to do.

The taverns being opened
And the whisky running free,
As soon as one glass was empty
Another was filled for me.
Instead of hauling eight loads
I didn't haul but four,
For I got so very drunk
That I couldn't haul no more.

It was there I met my old companion—
Her name I will not tell.
She told me that night
Where the dance was to be held.
'Twas hard to be persuaded,
But with her I did agree
For to meet her there that night
Where the fiddler was to be.

I took my saddle on my arm
And I traveled to the barn.
I saddled up old Gray,
Not thinking of any harm.
I saddled up old Gray
And I rode away so quick
That I hadn't scarcely thought
Before I reached Greenland ville.

My father followed after me
As I heard the people say.
He must have had a pile of tail,
He never found the way.
He peeked through every keyhole
Where he could spy a light
'Til his old grey locks were wet
By the dew of the night.

Fourteen of the Green Mountain boys
Were up on the floor to dance,
As many of the prettiest girls
That ever sailed from France.
The fiddler, being Irish
And his elbow being strong,
He played the grounds of Ireland
For five hours long.

"It's past five o'clock, boys,
We've all danced enough.
Our pockets are empty
Making change those old cuffs.
We'll go home to our plows, boys,
We'll whistle, dance and sing
And we never shall be caught
In such a drunken scrape again.

"Come all ye good old women
Who tattle-tale about,
Don't add anything to this
For it's bad enough without.
Don't add anything to this
Or try to raise a fuss,
For you're guilty of the same
And perhaps a great deal worse."

Source: Vermont Folk-Songs & Ballads, edited by Helen Hartness Flanders & George Brown (1931), pages 43-45


Notes:

MR. PAUL LORETTE of Manchester Center, Vermont, when questioned as to the authorship of this apparently Vermont production, said that three or four of the men in the camp (Chaffee Lumber Camp, Rutland-Chittenden) got together and made up the story. What one wouldn't think of, another would fill in. He had never since heard the song sung by anyone else. Mr. Franz Rickaby has discovered portions of this ballad in Grand Forks, North Dakota. He has included it as THE BACKWOODSMAN in his highly entertaining collection BALLADS AND SONGS OF THE SHANTY-BOY. It is also in the Barry collection. Both latter versions have the date of the events "1805" instead of "1875."