American Old Time Song Lyrics: 32 Pleasures Of Boarding

Theater, Music-Hall, Nostalgic, Irish & Historic Old Songs, Volume 32

PLEASURES OF BOARDING

I rented a room in a boarding home, it's a shame and a disgrace;
I'll pack my trunk and leave when I can find another place;
I never saw such sights since the day that I was born;
A lot of tramps came yesterday, and more would come this morn.
There's an old maid lives up stairs, and a dude that puts on airs,
Next door there's two that light like cat and dog.
The next room to me, but one, there's a fiddler and his son,
They're teaching two old maids to dance a clog.

One cold, cold night, while sound asleep and dreaming of a dance,
They broke into my room and stole my only coat and pants;
They even took the bed clothes, and crept away like mice,
When I woke I thought I was a cake of manufactured ice.
I called for help in vain, I was full of aches and paint;
Some one who heard me, said there was a fight;
They crowded in the door and the carpet up they tore,
In the dog-house with the cats I slept that night.

I was almost starved to death one day, and tempted was to steal,
I went and asked the landlord for enough to buy a meal;
he sent me to the kitchen, said he thought I was a beat.
And I sat down to have a feed, but blamed if I could eat.
There was two tramps on the floor, and a pig behind the door,
In the corner was a dirty chicken-coop;
There was insects in the air, in the butter all red hair,
And the baby had both feet in the soup.

The alley's full of cats and dogs, and all the neighbors say
They'd throw Maria in the fire :f they could have their way;
The yard Is full of brick-bats, old shoes and water-pails.
And every day the dogs come home with tin pans on their tails;
There's the landlord's daughter, Hannah, thumps on the Chickering piano:
To hear "Barney McCoy" you'd want to die;
And you'd surely suffocate to hear her articulate:
"Wait till the clouds roll by."