THE PANTS JEMIMY MADE
Aunt Brown—Jemimy Brown—
Was a spinster, spinner-weaver of merited re-
nown;
Our town set it down
As a fact beyond disputing there was never
any suiting
Like the suiting that was made by Spinster
Brown.
She raised the wool she made it of, she even
raised the sheep,
She fed ’em on the toughest straw the hired
man could reap
She spun the thread with double-twist and
made a warp and woof
So tarnal tough it really seemed’twas almost
bullet-proof.
And when the cloth was shrunk and dyed and
ready for a suit
The men in town would almost fight, they’d
get in such dispute
Concerning who had spoken first—the farthest
in advance—
And therefore had the prior claim on Aunt
Jemimy’s pants.
The cloth that folks make nowadays is slimpsy,
sleazy stuff;
It’s colored up in fairish style and fashionable
enough!
But blame the goods! It’s made to sell—it
isn’t made to wear—
These trousers here I’ve worn five year, and
that is merely fair.
But when you bought a cut of cloth of Aunt
Jemimy’s weave,
You got some stuff to last you through, you’d
better just believe!
Why, ’bout the time that modern pants are get-
ting worn and thin
A pair of Aunt Jemimy’s pants were scarcely
broken in.
I’ve got a pair up attic now, made forty years
ago
They’re just as tough as iron still and Time
has made no show.
They’ve stood the brunt of honest work and
dulled the tooth of moth,
And there they stand, as stiff’s a slab, good,
plain, old-fashioned cloth.
And so I think it’s only right that tribute
should be paid
To those old sturdy pioneers—the pants Je-
mimy made.
The day I first put on those pants I held a
break-up plough—
The farmers of these later days don’t have
such wrassles now;
I drove six oxen on ahead, a pretty hefty team,
For farming in those old, old days took mus-
cle, grit and steam;
You didn’t stop for rocks and stumps, nor
dodge and skive and skip,
Or else you’d have to lug your meals on ev’ry
furrow’s trip,
And so the only thing to do was make the oxen
tread
And hold the ploughshare deep and true, and
plunk ’er straight ahead.
So back and forth and back and forth I
ploughed and ploughed that day;
I tackled ev’ry rock and snag that dared dispute
my way,
Until the only critter left was one old maple
stump,
And I?—I gave the team the gad—and took
’er on the jump!
She split in halves and through I went, but
back she slapped, ker-whack,
And gripped Jemimy’s pantaloons right where
she’d left the slack.
The team was going double-quick—the oxen
plunged along—
I held the old oak handle-bars, I gripped ’em
good and strong—
And there I was, the living link’twixt stump
and plough, because
The cloth it stuck there good and tight between
those maple jaws.
Jemimy never planned on that, in making pants
for me;
She made ’em solid, yet of course she gave no
guarantee
That they would stand a yank like that—but
still I clung and yelled,
Those oxen plunged and tussled and—Je-
mimy’s pants, they held!
And the stump came out a-kicking, roots and
dirt and stones and all,
But those pants weren’t even started by that
most tremendous haul,
And to prove this ’ere is truthful, should some
scoffer cast a doubt,
I have saved the chips and hewings where they
came and chopped me out.
Aunt Brown—Jemimy Brown—
Was a spinster, spinner-weaver of merited re-
nown;
Our town set it down
As a fact beyond disputing there was never
any suiting
Like the suiting that was made by Spinster
Brown.