lock up your horses and get your guns Batch Baxter’s back again!
ridin’ in the moonlight like a devil in the wind
Batch Baxter is a thieving cuss a terrorizin’ folks
stealing all their horses and leavin’ dumbass jokes
Silas Jones got up this morning went out to the barn
tossed his saddle toward the sun and on the back of his new roan
but it dropped down to the dirt kickin’ a dust storm in the air
then Silas rubbed his eyes to see his horse not standing there!
he staggered back scratched his head began to look around
nary a horse was to be seen just a note upon the ground
he picked it up and it did read “horse walks in a saloon
barkeep goes up to him says why the long face buckaroon?”
Hans Gunnar road his prize ol’ paint down the main street of the town
he hitched it up and went inside to buy the boys a round
well he staggered out after a spell untied the reins somehow
but at the other end there was no paint just Willie Johnson’s cow
tacked up to the hitchin’ post a note was hanging there
it was blowin like a ragged flag in the dusty prairie air
it read “a duck walked in a store one day put some lipstick by the till
the clerk said sir will this be cash the duck said put it on my bill”
Amy Gelton was the sweet school marm drove her buggy to the school
it was drawn by holy moses a lovely appalool
well she taught the three r’s all day long then climbed in the buggy seat
but she dropped her jaw when she saw Hans Gunnar where the appalool should be
a note was stuck on his forehead clear as the light of day
she pulled it off Hans said ouch and the note went on to say
“a man did love his banjo kept it locked inside the shed
the mornin’ found the lock was broke and three banjos there instead”
they finally caught Batch Baxter said from a tree you’re gonna swing
Batch said boys i’ll stick my neck out but please do for me one thing
please hang me over yonder there’s a tree will do just fine
they said you gave us some good laughs Batch so that’s where we’ll string the line
they stuck him in the saddle and the noose began to choke
they fired their guns to spook the horse and the air filled with black smoke
they heard the horse take off a runnin’ though they couldn’t see a thing
but when the gun smoke finally settled Batch was nowhere to be seen
the empty noose was swingin’ with a joke tied up inside
it read “how many dirty dogs does it take to hang my hide?
is it one ten or twenty or every dude throughout the land
you’ll never know the punchline boys cause you’re standin’ in quicksand”
Don Sparks is an American character actor and performing songwriter living the the Hudson Valley, New York.