Digital Tradition Mirror

The Texas Cowboy

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Pennywhistle notation and Dulcimer tab for this song is also available

The Texas Cowboy

O, I'm a Texas cowboy and far away from home,
If I get back to Texas, I never more will roam.
Montana is too cold for me and the winters are too long
Before the roundups do begin, your money is all gone.

To win these fancy leggins, you'll have enough to do
They cost me twenty dollars the day that they were new;
And this old hen-skin bedding is too thin to keep me warm
I nearly freeze to death, boys, whenever there's a storm.

I've worked down in Nebraska where the grass grows ten feet high,
Where the cattle are such rustlers, they hardly ever die;
I've worked up in the Sand Hills and down along the Platte
Where the punchers are good fellows and the cattle always fat.

I've traveled lots of country, from Nebraska's hills of sand
Down through the Indian Nation and up the Rio Grande
But the badlands of Montana are the worst I've ever seen
The cowboys are all tenderfeet and the dogies are too lean.

They wake you in the morning before the break of day
And send you on a circle a hundred miles away,
Your grub is bread and bacon and coffee black as ink
And water so full of alkali it's hardly fit to drink.

If you want to see some badlands, go over to the Dry
You'll bog down in the coulees where the mountains meet the sky.
With a tenderfoot to guide you, who never knows the way
You are playing in the best of luck if you eat three times a day.

Up along the Yellowstone, it's cold the whole year round,
And you'll surely get consumption if you sleep upon the ground;
Your pay is almost nothing for six months in the year
And when your debts are settled, there's nothing left for beer.

Now all you Texas cowboys, this warning take from me,
Don't come up to Montana to spend your money free.
But stay at home in Texas where there's work the whole year round
And you'll never get consumption from sleeping on the ground.

From He Was Singin' This Song, Tinsley
RG

Thanks to Mudcat for the Digital Tradition!