"My friends and relations, they live in the Nation,
They know not where their boy has gone,
I first came to Texas and hired to a ranchman
Oh, I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong."

Well, the internal rhyme in the first line sound more Irish than the non-rhyme in the third, so I'd say it may have been poetic license and a nebulous meaning. I'd lean towards "back east" instead of the Indian Nation, myself. For one thing, the two places aren't far enough apart for the family to be so out-of-touch (yes, I know that 19th-Century travel was very slow, so they wouldn't be in constant touch, but it seems to me that the states across the Mississippi were much farther "away" than the Indian Territories, which were athwart the cattle trails anyway).

Anyone know the older songs in the cycle? Do any of them have similar stanzas? Might be the source of this verse.

Bob Clayton