The Arkansas Boys

 Notation: traditional
PDF Files: song

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available 		Transcription: by Darryl D. Bush  
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Lyrics:

Come all you Missouri gals, and listen to my noise.
Never you marry an Arkansas boy.
If you do, I'll tell you what it'll be:
Cold cornbread, molasses, and sassafras tea.

When you go a-courting, I'll tell you how to dress:
A buckskin hunting shirt, and this is the best:
An old flop hat with more brim than crown,
An old pair of shoes with the heels run down.

The first thing he does whenever he goes in,
He takes a chew of tobacco and he slobbers on his chin.
The first thing he says whenever he sits down,
"Madam, ain't your johnny-cake a-baking too brown?"

They milk a little brindle cow and sling it in a gourd.
They put it in a corner and cover with a board.
Some gets little and some gets none,
And this is the way that the Arkansas is run.

An old board roof and a puncheon floor,
And old pole bedstead, and oak-board door.
Sleeping on the slats with a handful of straw,
Trying to get along with my mother-in-law.

An old blind mule and an old milk cow,
A razorback hog and a bull-tongue plow.
He had his poke salad and his sassafras tea,
But the Arkansas Sheik is a mystery to me.

Now I've sung you all my song and I guess you're glad it's through.
The Arkansas Sheik is a-feeling kind of blue.
He got drunk and he took him to town,
Cause the Arkansas girls turned his damper down.

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