Another version here (click).
-Joe Offer-

Days of Forty-Nine

During the Gold Rush many Cowboys had been in California. This tune is the most nostalgic ballad conjuring up those bygone days.

1. You are gazing now on old Tom Moore, a relic of bygone days;
'tis a bummer too they call me now, but what care I for praise?
It's oft, says I, for the days gone by, it's oft do I repine
for the days of old when we dug gold in the days of forty-nine.

2. My comrades they loved me well, a jolly, saucy crew,
a few hard cases I will admit, though they were brave and true;
whatever the oinch, they ne'er would flinch, they never would fret or whine
- like good old bricks, they stood the kicks in the days of forty-nine.

3. There's old "Aunt Jess", that hard old cuss, who never would repent;
he never missed a single meal, nor never paid a cent.
But old "Aunt Jess", like all the rest at death, he did resign,
and in his bloom he went up the flume in the days of forty-nine.

4. There is Ragshag Jim, the roarin' man, who could out-roar a buffalo, you bet,
he roared all day and he roared all night, and I guess he's roarin' yet.
One night Jim fell in a prospect's hole, it was a roarin' bad design,
for in that hole Jim roared out his soul in the days of forty-nine.

5. There was New York Jake, the butcher boy who was fond of getting tight.
And every time he got on a spree he was spoilin' for a fight.
One night Jake jumped against a knife in the hands of old Doc Sine.
And over Jake they held a wake in the days of forty-nine.

6. Of all the comrades that I've had there's none that's left to boast,
and I'm left alone in my misery like some poor wandering ghost.
And as I pass from town to town, they call me the rambling sign,
since the days of old when we dug gold in the days of forty-nine.

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Almost the same as the John Lomax version, but missing the "Monte Pete" verse.