Sunday, October 4, 2015

The Red Devil’s Lament




O, my days are nearly over, I no longer am a rover, soon the wayback country hamlet will not hear my husky horn; when the snow and sleet come striking to the city I go hiking, I am simply out of business with the good old summer gone. All the old nags poor and wary, all the country people scary, they can all go out with safety for I’ll not go thund’ring by, and the children whom I pleasure in beyond measure, they can walk the streets in safety till the springtime draweth nigh.

How I long for country highways, all those shady, quiet byways; where the country horses tremble when they see me come in sight, how I like to see them rearing, kicking, prancing, snorting, tearing, then upset the whole caboodle, O, it gives me great delight. I’m the ripping roaring wonder of this lightning age, by thunder, I just like to see them scatter when I’m tearing down the line; and to think that I’ll be stabled, and from killing folks disabled, for a month or two it really fills my being with repine.

Oct. 4, 1904

                         (written on the back of Press Club of Chicago stationary)


                     Related (?) recording: Reuben Haskins’ ride in the ’Red Devil’
                                http://www.loc.gov/jukebox/recordings/detail/id/618/




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