, San Antonio; Mrs. M.B. Wight, of Ft. Thomas, Arizona; Dr.
L.W. Payne, Jr., and Dr. Morgan Callaway, Jr., of the University of
Texas; and my brother, R.C. Lomax, Austin;--have rendered me
especially helpful service in furnishing material, for which I also
render grateful thanks.

Among the negroes, rivermen, miners, soldiers, seamen, lumbermen,
railroad men, and ranchmen of the United States and Canada there are
many indigenous folk-songs not included in this volume. Of some
of them I have traces, and I shall surely run them down. I beg
the co-operation of all who are interested in this vital, however
humble, expression of American literature.

J.A.L.
Deming, New Mexico,
August 8, 1910.

COWBOY SONGS

AND OTHER FRONTIER BALLADS

THE DYING COWBOY[1]

"O bury me not on the lone prairie,"
These words came low and mournfully
From the pallid lips of a youth who lay
On his dying bed at the close of day.

He had wailed in pain till o'er his brow
Death's shadows fast were gathering now;
He thought of his home and his loved ones nigh
As the cowboys gathered to see him die.

"O bury me not on the lone prairie
Where the wild cayotes will howl o'er me,
In a narrow grave just six by three,
O bury me not on the lone prairie.

"In fancy I listen to the well known words
Of the free, wild winds and the song of the birds;
I think of home and the cottage in the bower
And the scenes I loved in my childhood's hour.

"It matters not, I've oft been told,
Where the body lies when the heart grows cold;
Yet grant, Oh grant this wish to me,
O bury me not on the lone prairie.

"O then bury me not on the lone prairie,
In a narrow grave six foot by three,
Where the buffalo paws o'er a prairie sea,
O bury me not on the lone prairie.

"I've always wished to be laid when I died
In the little churchyard on the green hillside;
By my father's grave, there let mine be,
And bury me not on the lone prairie.

"Let my death slumber be where my mother's prayer
And a sister's tear will mingle there,
Where my friends can come and weep o'er me;
O bury me not on the lone prairie.

"O bury me not on the lone prairie
In a narrow grave just six by three,
Where the buzzard waits and the wind blows free;
Then bury me not on the lone prairie.

"There is another whose tears may be shed