Lyr. Add: THE TRAMP'S STORY
Let me set down a minute,
A stone's got in my shoe,
An' don't commence your cussin',
For I ain't done dothin' to you.

Yes, I'm a tramp. What of it?
Folks say we ain't no good,
But tramps have to live, I reckon,
Though folks don't think we should.

Down in that good old valley
Me an' my people grew
I was a blacksmith, captain,
Yes, an' a good one, too.

Me an' my wife an' Nellie,
Nellie was just sixteen,
She was the prettiest creature
The valley had ever seen.

Beaux, why she had a dozen,
Had 'em from far and near,
But they was mostly farmers,
None of them suited her.

There was a city stranger,
Young, handsome an' tall,
Damn him, I wish I had him
Strangled against that wall!

He was the man for Nellie,
She didn't know no ill,
Mother she tried to stop it,
But you know a young gal's will.

Well, it's the same old story,
Common enough, you'll say,
He was a slick-tongued rascal
An' got her to run away.

More than a month after
We heard from the poor young thing,
He'd gone away and left her
With only a weddin' ring.

Back to her home we brought her,
Back to her mother's side
Filled with a raging fever
She fell at my feet and died.

Frantic with shame and trouble
Her mother began to sink,
Dead in less than a fortnight-
That's when I took to drink.

Give me just one glass, colonel,
Then I'll be on my way,
I'll tramp till I find that rascal
If it takes till the Judgement Day!

Vance Randolph, Ozark Folksongs, vol. 4, no. 844, pp. 369-370. Said to be from the play "Squatter Soverignty," by Edward Harrigan. Contributed by Miss Lucille Morris, MO, Oct. 28, 1934.