llanyum wuz a-comin';
Wen all on us gots suits (darned like them wore in the state prison),
An' every feller felt ez though all Mexico was hisn.
This 'ere's about the meanest place a skunk could wal diskiver
(Saltillo's Mexican, I b'lieve, fer wut we call Salt river).
The sort o' trash a feller gits to eat doos beat all nater,
I'd give a year's pay fer a smell o' one good blue-nose tater;
The country here thet Mister Bolles declared to be so charmin'
Throughout is swarmin' with the most alarmin' kind o' varmin'.
He talked about delishes froots, but then it was a wopper all,
The holl on't 's mud an' prickly pears, with here an' there a chapparal;
You see a feller peekin' out, an', fust you know, a lariat
Is round your throat an' you a copse, 'fore you can say, "Wut air ye at?"
You never see sech darned gret bugs (it may not be irrelevant
To say I've seen a _scarabaeus pilularius_[A] big ez a year old elephant),
The rigiment come up one day in time to stop a red bug
From runnin' off with Cunnle Wright--'twuz jest a common
_cimex lectularius_.
One night I started up on eend an thought I wuz to hum agin,
I heern a horn, thinks I it's Sol the fisherman hez come agin,
_His_ bellowses is sound enough--ez I'm a livin' creeter,
I felt a thing go thru my leg--'twuz nothin' more 'n a skeeter!
Then there's the yeller fever, tu, they call it here _el vomito_--
(Come, thet wun't du, you landcrab there, I tell ye to le' go my toe!
My gracious! it's a scorpion thet's took a shine to play with 't,
I darsn't skeer the tarnel thing fer fear he'd run away with 't).
Afore I came away from hum I hed a strong persuasion
Thet Mexicans worn't human beans--an ourang outang nation,
A sort o' folks a chap could kill an' never dream on't arter,
No more'n a feller'd dream o' pigs thet he had hed to slarter;
I'd an idee thet they were built arter the darkie fashion all,
And kickin' colored folks about, you know, 's a kind o' national;
But wen I jined I won't so wise ez thet air queen o' Sheby,
Fer, come to look at 'em, they aint much diff'rent from wut we be,
An' here we air ascrougin' 'em out o' thir own dominions,
Ashelterin' 'em, ez Caleb sez, under our eagle's pinions,
Wich means to take a feller up jest by the slack o' 's trowsis
An' walk him Spanish clean right out o' all his homes and houses;
Wal, it does seem a curus way, but then hooraw fer Jackson!
It must be