Lyr Add: The Cowboy's Song

Subject: Lyr Add: THE COWBOY'S SONG
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 23 Feb 11 - 05:01 PM

Lyr. Add: The Cowboy's Song
Anon.

First Cowboy.
I'm the howler from the prairies of the west;
If you want to die with terror, look at me;
I'm chained lightning, if I ain't may I be blest;
I'm the snorter of the boundless prairie.

Chorus.
He's a killer and a hater;
He's the great annihilator;
He's the terror of the boundless Prairie.

Second Cowboy.
I'm the snoozer from the upper trail;
I'm the reveler in murder and in gore;
I can bust more Pullman coaches on the rail
Than anyone who's worked the job before.

Chorus: He's a snorter and a snoozer;
He's the great *truck line abuser;
He's the man that put the sleeper on the rail.

Third Cowboy.
I'm the double-jawed hyena from the east;
I'm the blazing, bloody blizzard of the States;
I'm the celebrated slugger, I'm the beast;
I can snatch a man bald-headed while he waits.

Chorus.
He's the double-jawed hyena;
He's the villain of the scena;
He can snatch a man bald-headed while he waits.

*trunk line?

Bodleian Collection, Ballads Catalogue, Harding B 20(164), West, Printer, Brighton. 19th C. song sheet.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Cowboy's Song
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 27 Feb 11 - 04:55 PM

The same poem/song/recitation(?) can be found in Wit and Humor of the Age (Chicago: Star Publishing Company, 1901), page 212—

Except that the title is THE TEXAS COW BOY

And it does use the phrase "trunk line abuser."

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Cowboy's Song
From: Lighter
Date: 27 Feb 11 - 05:35 PM

ISTR that this song came from an American vaudeville show. Will look into it later.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Cowboy's Song
From: Lighter
Date: 27 Feb 11 - 07:49 PM

The song appeared in print, perhaps for the first time, in the humorous Austin paper, Texas Siftings (June 2, 1883), p. 2. It is titled "From 'Don Fillibusto" and credited to "Nym Crinkle" (Andrew C. Wheeler), the music and drama editor of the N.Y. World.

Wheeler was the librettist. The composer of "Don Fillibusto," according to the Detroit Free Press (Apr. 25, 1883), p.3, was "J. C." [correctly Edward J.] Darling.

The song, sometimes called "Arizona Cowboys," sometimes with no title, was printed in a number of papers in 1883 - including, in London, The Pall Mall Gazette.