The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1901-01-03
BALLAD OF O. B. ORR.
ny HOLMAN r. DAY.


When Hoodoo had reckoned to do him
up brown.
II shows how Yankee alghts on his feet
When folks looking on have concluded he's
beat.
Now Ozy had money and owned a good
farm
And matters were working all right to
charm,
When he went on" some papers to helm
his son Bill
Who was all tangled up in a dowel.stock
~ mill.
y Now Bill was a gutter, and therefore one
day
/ Those notes became due and his dad had
~ to pay.
80 he slapped on a mortgage and then
buckled down
To pay up the int'rest and keep off the
town.
On that mortgage, it clung like a sheep.tick
in wool,
And the more she sagged back, harder Ozy
would pull
But mortgage can tucker the lkeiiest man,
AND Ozy he found himself fiat on hard pan.
lie dumped in his stock and his grain and
his hay,
He scrimped and he skived and endeavored
to pay;
He sold off his hay and his grain and his
~. stock
Till the ricky-tick-tack of the auctioneer'.
knock
Kept up such rapping on O2y's old farm
That the auctioneer nigh had kink in his
arm
Till it happened at last long o Christmas
time,
Old Ozy ws stripped to his very last
dime.V
And he said to his helpmect: "Poor mum.
my, | van
guess them ere critters have got all they
For they've sued off the stock till the barns
are all bare,
Cept the old turkey-gobbler, a-peckin' on
there
They "a lifted him, too, for those lawyer
are rough,
But they reckoned that gobbler was rather
too tough.
So they left us our dinner for Christmas
day;
just remember that mummy, tonight when
you pray.
Now chiri up your appetite, for, with Gods
grace
Well eat all at once all the stock on the
place"
But Ozy he was cheerful man,
A goodly man, Cody man
He didn't repine at Heavens plan, but he
took things as they came;
And cheerfully soon he whistled his tune
That he always whistied-twas Old Zip
Coon.
And he whistled it all the afternoon with
never word of blame.
While all unaware of his owners care,
The gobber pecked in the sunshine there,
With tip-toe, tip-toe Nancy air, and ruff
fled like dancing dame;
Til it seemed to Ozy, whistling still
To the ripity-rap of the turkeys bill,
That the prim old gobbler was keeping
time
To the sweep and the swing of the word.
less rhyme:
Pickety-peck,
With arching neck,
The turkey strutted with bow and beck.
And a Yankee notion was thereby born
To Ozy Orr ere another morn.
A practical fellow was Ozy B. Orr,
As keen an old Yankee as ever you saw.
A BIZ of platform he made out of tin,
With chance for kerosene lantern with
in;
He took his old fiddle and rosned the bow
And took the old turkey-and there was
his show
You don't understand? Well, I'll own up
The crowds that he gathered were mysti.
fed, too.
For he advertised there on his banner un-
furled
"a Jig-Dancing Turkey-Sole One in the
World"
And the more the folks saw it, the more
and the more
They focked with their quarters, and
jammed at the door;
For it really did seem that precocious old
bird
At sound of the fiddle was wondrously
stirred.
In stateliest fashion the dance would COM
mence,
Then faster and faster, with fervor intense,
Until, at one end, with a shrek of the
strings
And furious gobble and whrlwind Of
wings,
The turkey would side-step and two-step and
spin,
Then larrup with ardor that echoing tin,
And widely renowned, and regarded with
awe,
Was the Great Dancing Turkey of Ozy B.
Orr"
And the mortgage was paid by the old
gobbler's legs
Now Ozy is heading up money in kegs.
He would calmly tuck beneath his chin
The bulge of his cracked old violin,
He sawed while the turkey whacked the
tin, the people they paid and came;
For swift and soon to the lifting tune
When he fiddled the measure of Old Zip
Coon,
The gobbler would whir in rigadoon-or
something about the same!
While under the tin, tucked snugly in,
Was the worthless Bill, that brand of Sin;
And twas Bill that made the turkey spin
with the tip of the lantern flame;
For, as ever and ever the tin grew hot
The turkey made haste for to leave that
spot,
Till it seemed that the gobbler was keeping
time
To the sweep and the swing of the fddle's
rhyme.
Pickety peck,
With a swapping neck,
The gohhler QambOled with how and beckl