GOSSIP
You’venever heard Bill Sunday speak?No more had I until last week.Yes, every mother’s sonWas there—bar none,And women folks—the kids all cameJust like it was a baseball game!Up to the grove on Dobson’s Hill,And there was Bill—Thumpin’, jumpin’, hell-fire BillRight from his ranch to spillReligion till we’d drunk our fill.Well say,Since Bill let loose that dayThere’s not a kid ’round here for milesBut what can juggle more new stylesOf double-jointed, back-talk stuffAnd compound cursin’ guffThan they’d have picked up with their earsIn twenty yearsFrom other folks. But to resume,Bill started on the temperance boom!Statistics? Gosh! Blood-curdlin’ tales—He had ’em stacked ’round there in bales,With starvin’ children, murdered wives,And drunken males with guns and knives.The way Bill talked you would have thoughtOur Valley here had gone to potAnd ruin from the curse of drink.But what I thinkIs mostly wrong with this here placeIs just a simple caseOf scandal!Why, drinkin’ doesn’t hold a candleTo all the dirty mess that’s stirredWith every slanderous wordThat’s rolled along—and every timeIt’s shoved a bit, it gathers slime.When certain people get togetherIt ain’t the weatherWorries them! Not much! It’s who the heckDeserves it hardest in the neck!I’ve read somewhere how they could hearA little whisper ringin’ clearAcross the domeOf old St. Peter’s there in Rome.Well, I have heard a whisper goFrom Hillman’s ranch down there belowThe base-line road, to Eric Lane’sThen shoot across and hit MacGrain’s,From where it kept on bouncin’ tillIt struck the Hendricks on the hill,Then glanced and hit our house kerzip,Two days exactly on the trip!Though whisperin’s good down there in Rome,We’ve some acoustics here at home.Accordin’ to Amanda Higgins,Jim Gillan’s wild on Mrs. Wiggins;That’s why Jim’s wife goes ’round so whiteAnd frets her heart out day and night.Accordin’ to Matilda Blink“That teacher last year used to drink—She roamed at will with Ruf MacGrore,Who was immoral to the core;That car Zeb Brinker bought for BlancheMeant one more mortgage on their ranch,While Hiram Tyler, he sets backAnd drives the same old squeaky hackAnd makes his wife and daughters faceShame and disgrace—Old Hiram who has laid awayEnough to payFor twenty cars—My stars!”So runs the gospel link by linkAccordin’ to Matilda Blink.Of course you can’t gainsay the claimThat some small flameOf truth might beWhere gossip’s smoke blows ’round so free,But oh the misery that’s begunWhen each poor family skeletonIs wakened from its peaceful tranceAnd made to danceA shandigeeFor all the blame community.What’s wanted most around this placeIs supernatural grace.If we could findSome heavenly-antiseptic kindOf moral mouth-wash that would takeA slanderous tongue and makeIt CLEAN—and God knows thereWould have to be enough to spareFor all of us—both wives and men,To take a gargle now and then—If we could ever hopeTo find that kind of dope,Our little parson on the hillAs well as Bill,Could save a precious pileOf energy and rest a while.
You’venever heard Bill Sunday speak?No more had I until last week.Yes, every mother’s sonWas there—bar none,And women folks—the kids all cameJust like it was a baseball game!Up to the grove on Dobson’s Hill,And there was Bill—Thumpin’, jumpin’, hell-fire BillRight from his ranch to spillReligion till we’d drunk our fill.Well say,Since Bill let loose that dayThere’s not a kid ’round here for milesBut what can juggle more new stylesOf double-jointed, back-talk stuffAnd compound cursin’ guffThan they’d have picked up with their earsIn twenty yearsFrom other folks. But to resume,Bill started on the temperance boom!Statistics? Gosh! Blood-curdlin’ tales—He had ’em stacked ’round there in bales,With starvin’ children, murdered wives,And drunken males with guns and knives.The way Bill talked you would have thoughtOur Valley here had gone to potAnd ruin from the curse of drink.But what I thinkIs mostly wrong with this here placeIs just a simple caseOf scandal!Why, drinkin’ doesn’t hold a candleTo all the dirty mess that’s stirredWith every slanderous wordThat’s rolled along—and every timeIt’s shoved a bit, it gathers slime.When certain people get togetherIt ain’t the weatherWorries them! Not much! It’s who the heckDeserves it hardest in the neck!I’ve read somewhere how they could hearA little whisper ringin’ clearAcross the domeOf old St. Peter’s there in Rome.Well, I have heard a whisper goFrom Hillman’s ranch down there belowThe base-line road, to Eric Lane’sThen shoot across and hit MacGrain’s,From where it kept on bouncin’ tillIt struck the Hendricks on the hill,Then glanced and hit our house kerzip,Two days exactly on the trip!Though whisperin’s good down there in Rome,We’ve some acoustics here at home.Accordin’ to Amanda Higgins,Jim Gillan’s wild on Mrs. Wiggins;That’s why Jim’s wife goes ’round so whiteAnd frets her heart out day and night.Accordin’ to Matilda Blink“That teacher last year used to drink—She roamed at will with Ruf MacGrore,Who was immoral to the core;That car Zeb Brinker bought for BlancheMeant one more mortgage on their ranch,While Hiram Tyler, he sets backAnd drives the same old squeaky hackAnd makes his wife and daughters faceShame and disgrace—Old Hiram who has laid awayEnough to payFor twenty cars—My stars!”So runs the gospel link by linkAccordin’ to Matilda Blink.Of course you can’t gainsay the claimThat some small flameOf truth might beWhere gossip’s smoke blows ’round so free,But oh the misery that’s begunWhen each poor family skeletonIs wakened from its peaceful tranceAnd made to danceA shandigeeFor all the blame community.What’s wanted most around this placeIs supernatural grace.If we could findSome heavenly-antiseptic kindOf moral mouth-wash that would takeA slanderous tongue and makeIt CLEAN—and God knows thereWould have to be enough to spareFor all of us—both wives and men,To take a gargle now and then—If we could ever hopeTo find that kind of dope,Our little parson on the hillAs well as Bill,Could save a precious pileOf energy and rest a while.
You’venever heard Bill Sunday speak?No more had I until last week.Yes, every mother’s sonWas there—bar none,And women folks—the kids all cameJust like it was a baseball game!Up to the grove on Dobson’s Hill,And there was Bill—Thumpin’, jumpin’, hell-fire BillRight from his ranch to spillReligion till we’d drunk our fill.
Well say,Since Bill let loose that dayThere’s not a kid ’round here for milesBut what can juggle more new stylesOf double-jointed, back-talk stuffAnd compound cursin’ guffThan they’d have picked up with their earsIn twenty yearsFrom other folks. But to resume,Bill started on the temperance boom!Statistics? Gosh! Blood-curdlin’ tales—He had ’em stacked ’round there in bales,With starvin’ children, murdered wives,And drunken males with guns and knives.
The way Bill talked you would have thoughtOur Valley here had gone to potAnd ruin from the curse of drink.But what I thinkIs mostly wrong with this here placeIs just a simple caseOf scandal!Why, drinkin’ doesn’t hold a candleTo all the dirty mess that’s stirredWith every slanderous wordThat’s rolled along—and every timeIt’s shoved a bit, it gathers slime.When certain people get togetherIt ain’t the weatherWorries them! Not much! It’s who the heckDeserves it hardest in the neck!
I’ve read somewhere how they could hearA little whisper ringin’ clearAcross the domeOf old St. Peter’s there in Rome.Well, I have heard a whisper goFrom Hillman’s ranch down there belowThe base-line road, to Eric Lane’sThen shoot across and hit MacGrain’s,From where it kept on bouncin’ tillIt struck the Hendricks on the hill,Then glanced and hit our house kerzip,Two days exactly on the trip!Though whisperin’s good down there in Rome,We’ve some acoustics here at home.
Accordin’ to Amanda Higgins,Jim Gillan’s wild on Mrs. Wiggins;That’s why Jim’s wife goes ’round so whiteAnd frets her heart out day and night.Accordin’ to Matilda Blink“That teacher last year used to drink—She roamed at will with Ruf MacGrore,Who was immoral to the core;That car Zeb Brinker bought for BlancheMeant one more mortgage on their ranch,While Hiram Tyler, he sets backAnd drives the same old squeaky hackAnd makes his wife and daughters faceShame and disgrace—Old Hiram who has laid awayEnough to payFor twenty cars—My stars!”So runs the gospel link by linkAccordin’ to Matilda Blink.
Of course you can’t gainsay the claimThat some small flameOf truth might beWhere gossip’s smoke blows ’round so free,But oh the misery that’s begunWhen each poor family skeletonIs wakened from its peaceful tranceAnd made to danceA shandigeeFor all the blame community.
What’s wanted most around this placeIs supernatural grace.If we could findSome heavenly-antiseptic kindOf moral mouth-wash that would takeA slanderous tongue and makeIt CLEAN—and God knows thereWould have to be enough to spareFor all of us—both wives and men,To take a gargle now and then—If we could ever hopeTo find that kind of dope,Our little parson on the hillAs well as Bill,Could save a precious pileOf energy and rest a while.