HIRAM'S FAMILY TREE


I recollek when I wus young
I clum a apple tree
An' all to wunce a lim' cracked off
An' fell, ker smak!!! with me.
One minit I wuz feelin' smart
Away up in the air;
The nex', I dropped, I swan! I felt
Rite foolish lyin' there.

Well, when Hi Muggins' cousin Tom,
Down York way, struk it rich,
And went to wed a city gal
With ancestors an' sich,
Hi Muggins sez, dum blaze my hide!
Her folks can't outdo me;
Ef they can sport a coat o' arms
I'll have a family tree!

So Hiram, he began to climb
An' sort of razed the ded
A-nosin' roun' in dockyments
An' grave yards, fer, he sed,
"That's wher a feller's got ter hunt
To fin' his pedigree
They is sort o' branches
Thet you use to clim' yer family tree."

The more thet Hiram hunted out
O' them ded kin o' his
The more Hi's notion riz;
An' when he foun' thet his
Great, great, gran'dad
Crossed the sea,
In seventeen-ten, he sot an' crowed
Up in his family tree.

Et galled me some, ter see his airs,
But all I sed wuz, "Hi,
I recon' she's a good stout tree.
But don't you clim' too high."
But Hi sez, "Shucks, these I've found
Ain't none too high a degree
I've got an idee there's a king
A-top my family tree."

Well, Hi, he writ to England where
His grandad's grandad's pa
Hed lived, an' when his letter went
He most talked off his jaw,
A-tellin' us pore common folks
How happy he wud be
When he got word some earl or dook
Wuz on his family tree

Hi, he hed clum plum out o' sight
An' then there come one day
A letter, an' et sez, "We've looked,
An' we regret to say . . .
Thet Obediah Muggins wuz,
In sixteen ninety-three,
A-caught a-stealin' money,
An' hung up on tyburn tree."

So thet's how come thet Hiram is
So meek an' lowly now;
Becuz he kep a clim'in
Til' he struk a rottin' bough,
An' fell so hard et mashed him flat;
Thet's why et seems ter me
Et's risky fer us common folks
Ter clim' a family tree.
--Author Unknown

Provided to me by T. Weathers - A Hurst descendent

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