Bill’s Health

He set around in Stokes’s store

The blessed livelong day;

A-talkin’ pollertics an’ sech

     The same ol’ hum-drum way.

He never hed a new idee,

     Nur nothin’ much tur tell;

But he could hold a nail kag down

     An’ hold it mighty well.

‘Twuz whispered round thet on his farm

     Things wuz a bit run down;

Thet while he set in Stokes’s store

     An’ criticized the town

His land wuz goin’ all to pot

     Becuz it hed no care;

An’ ef it wuzn’t fur his wife

     They’d starve to death fur fair.

Hen Billin’s saw him settin’ there

     One night, short time ago;

An’ when it comes to right an’ wrong,

     Now Hen ain’t very slow.

“How be you, Bill?” Hen says to him,

     “I’m sorry you hain’t well;

Fust time you’ve been right down real sick

     I guess fur quite a spell?”

“Sho, I ain’t sick,” says Bill to Hen,

     “What makes you think I be?

Fact I ain’t felt no better in

     My hull blame’ life,” says he.

“It’s my mistake,” says Hen to Bill,

     “I’m glad you feel so slick;

I seen your wife a-splittin’ wood,

     An’ s’posed thet you wuz sick.”

Oct, 14, ‘10