THE TUCKVILLE GRAND BALL
Origen Dickerson called the figgers
With a voice like a cart ex that needed some
grease.
He and his partner would fiddle like niggers
For supper an’ dollar an’ fifty apiece.
With forty couple upon the floor—
There wasn’t an inch for no one more,
We done the honors for all three towns
At the high, old Tuckville spanker-downs.
Yeak, yawk,
Grab for your pardners!
Yawk, yawk,
Wo’ hi-i-ish inter line!
Yankity, yump-de,
Yankity, yah-h de!
—For a fife and two fiddles that music was
fine.
And we pelted the floor and sashayed through
the door,
And balanced to pardners and sashayed some
more.
And when we got orders to “all hands
around!”
Warn’t half of the girls that could stay on the
ground.
For-rud and back! Wo’ haw, there, to Ella.
Wo’ buck inter line and balance to Grace.
Grab holt o’ hands, there, and swing by yer
feller,
Clek—clek, gid-dap-along, git inter place.
And the dust would rise and the lamps would
shake
Till ye’d think their chimblys was goin’ to
break.
For we’tended to dancin’ right up brown
At a high old Tuckville spanker-down.
Squeak, squawk,
Pick out yer feller!
Raw-w-wk, raw-w-wk,
Form on your set!
High-deedle, do-o-o de,
High-deedle, dah-h-h-de!
We swung by the waist in them dances, you
bet.
There wasn’t kid slippers, there wasn’t tight
boots,
There wasn’t silk dresses, there wasn’t dude
suits,
There wasn’t no banquet—ten dollars for two—
But a good brimmin’ bowlful of hot oyster
stew.
We’d darnce twenty numbers and all the en-
cores,
—Get home in the mornin’ ’bout time for the
chores—
And all the next day the work was like play,
The girls doin’ housework would waltz and
sashay;
The boys would astonish the stock in the yard
By forgettin’ and yellin’, “Hi, all promunard!”
Hi-i-i, yah-h-h!
Ladies to center, there!
Hi-i-i, yah-h-h!
Balance ye all!
Wo’ hi-ish up the middle, bear down on the
fiddle,
By ginger,’twas fun at the Tuckville Grand
Ball.