Ef the way a man lights out of this world
Helps fix his heft for the other sp'ere,
I reckon my old friend Golyer's Ben
Will lay over lots of likelier men
For one thing he done down here.
You didn't know Ben? He driv a stage
On the line they called the Old Sou'-west;
He wa'n't the best man that ever you seen,
And he wa'n't so ungodly pizen mean,--
No better nor worse than the rest.
He was hard on women and rough on his friends;
And he didn't have many, I'll let you know;
He hated a dog and disgusted a cat,
But he'd run off his legs for a motherless brat,
And I guess there's many jess so.
I've seed my sheer of the run of things,
I've hoofed it a many and many a miled,
But I never seed nothing that could or can
Jest git all the good from the heart of a man
Like the hands of a little child.
Well! this young one I started to tell you about,--
His folks was all dead, I was fetchin' him through,--
He was just at the age that's loudest for boys,
And he blowed such a horn with his sarchin' small voice,
We called him "the Little Boy Blue."
He ketched a sight of Ben on the box,
And you bet he bawled and kicked and howled,
For to git 'long of Ben, and ride thar too;
I tried to tell him it wouldn't do,
When suddingly Golyer growled,
"What's the use of making the young one cry?
Say, what's the use of being a fool?
Sling the little one up here whar he can see,
He won't git the snuffles a-ridin' with me,--
The night ain't any too cool."
The child hushed cryin' the minute he spoke;
"Come up here, Major! don't let him slip."
And jest as nice as a woman could do,
He wrapped his blanket around them
And was off in the crack of a whip.
We rattled along an hour or so,
Till we heerd a yell on the still night air.
Did you ever hear an Apache yell?
Well, ye needn't want to, _this_ side of hell;
There's nothing more devilish there.
Caught in the shower of lead and flint
We felt the old stage stagger and plunge;
Then we heerd the voice and the whip of Ben,
As he gethered his critters up again,
And tore away with a lunge.
The passengers laughed. "Old Ben's all right,
He's druv five year and never was struck."
"Now if _I_'d been thar, as sure as you live,
They'd 'a' plugged me with holes as thick as _a_ sieve;
It's the reg'lar Golyer luck."
Over hill and holler and ford and creek
Jest like the hosses had wings, we tore;
We got to Looney's, and Ben come in
And laid down the baby and axed for his gin,
And dropped in a heap on the floor.
Said he, "When they fired, I kivered the kid,--
Although I ain't pretty, I'm middlin' broad;
And look! he ain't fazed by arrow nor ball,--
Thank God! my own carcase stopped them all."
Then we seen his eye glaze, and his lower jaw fall,--
And he carried his thanks to God
