Lester Leppert retold this lyric in “Memories”, an oral history published by the Dublin Historical Society”. It is from a medicine show that was an annual event, something like a summer carnival. Lester remembers watching and listening to a barker—a man advertising a show—plinking on a banjo and singing this lyric. He memorized the bawdy lyric and we knew we had to record it for posterity!
I’ll sing you a song of a burglar bold
Who went to rob a house.
He crept right in the window just as quiet as a mouse
Then under the bed the burglar crept
And lay there close to the wall.
He didn’t know it was an old maid’s room
Or he wouldn’t have had the gall.
At nine o’clock the old maid came in
I am so tired said she.
She took out her teeth and big glass eye
And the hair from the top of her head.
While the burglar had seventeen kinds of fits
As he peered from under the bed.
From under the bed the burglar crept
And looked a total wreck.
The old maid was onto him and
Grabbed him by the neck.
She didn’t scream or holler at all
But stood there meek as a lamb and said,
“My prayers have been answered now
And at last I’ve found a man”.
Then the old maid a revolver took
And unto the burglar said,
“If you don’t marry me young man
I’ll blow off the top of your head”.
The burglar looked for a place to escape
But found not where to scoot.
He looked at her teeth and big glass eye
And said, “For God’s sake shoot”.