Familiar Songs - Their Authors & Histories

300 traditional songs, inc sheet music with full piano accompaniment & lyrics.

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	r>32	OUR FAMILIAR SONGS.
	What a jolting, and creaking, and plashing, and din; The whip how it cracks! and the wheels how they spin! How the dirt, right and left, o'er the hedges is hurled! The pauper at length makes a noise in the world ! " Rattle his bones over the stones : He's only a pauper whom nobody owns ! " Poor pauper defunct! he has made some approach To gentility, now that he's stretehed in a coach! He's taking a drive in his carriage at last, But it will not be long, if he goes on so fast. M Rattle his bones over the stones ; He's only a pauper whom nobody owns.		But a truce to this strain; for my soul it is sad To think that a heart, in humanity clad, Should make, like the brute, such a desolate end, And depart from the light, without leaving a friend ! " Bear soft his bones over the stones; Though a pauper, he's one whom his Maker yet owns!" You bumpkins! who stare at your brother con­veyed — Behold what respect to a cloddy is paid! And be joyful to think, when by death you're laid low, You've a chance to the grave like a gemman to go! " Rattle his bones over the stones ; He's only a pauper whom nobody owns !"
	THE OLD SEXTON. Park Benjamin, author of the words of " The Old Sexton," was born in Demerara, British Guiana, August 14, 1809. His parents had removed there from New England, and. on account of illness in his infancy, which resulted in serious lameness, Park was sent to his father's home in Connecticut for medical treatment. He studied at Trinity and Harvard Colleges, and began to practice law in Boston. He soon left the profession, devoted him­self to literary pursuits, and became founder, editor, or contributor of several American magazines. His lyrics attained wide popularity, but have never been collected; some of them, it is said, have not even been in print, but have descended from school-boy to school-boy as declamations. Mr. Benjamin died in New York city, September 12, 1864. "The Old Sexton" was written expressly for Henry Russell, who composed the music.