File:Chinatown ballads (1906) (14587535188).jpg

Identifier: chinatownballads00irwi (find matches)
Title: Chinatown ballads
Year: 1906 (1900s)
Authors: Irwin, Wallace, 1876-1959
Subjects: Chinese Americans
Publisher: New York, Duffield & Company
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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nds and knees,Smudgin incense and bangin gongsTo fumigate the Devil and please The Health Board. God, the dread o theTongs. 65 THE GRE,E,N RAT Somewheres down in the under side Tunnels and cellars and passageways,Where the pig-tailed coolies sleep and hide And never see daylight days and days,There the gray rats take what the gods pro-vide—But the Green Rat takes what the Devilpays.• • • • • Old Wang Too in is fiftieth year Up and married a butterfly,Girl o the teahouse—case was clear, Wang Too bein a soft old guy,That the day o ther marriage the joss wentqueer And the punk smoke got in the Idols eye. Mrs. Wang, like a ruther neat Little wax doll, had a way wit her. Kep old Wang on the anxious seat And the slant-eyed dudes in a constant stir, When she pegged along on er bandaged feet,Off fer the Chinee Theater. Poor old gent! he was human, I guess.Longed fer a wife instid of a toy; But is joss was good to im, I cornfess And the ghosts of is grand-dads wished im . JOY) 66
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THE GKEE-N RAT (Thousand and one of *em, more or less)When the Firstborn squalled in is house—a boy. Little Wang Too in is grandmas lapGrowed and flourished a year or so, Little blue coat and long-eared cap,( Fixed so the Devil he wouldnt know And bring the child to a strange mishap)Old Wang smiled as he watched im grow. (Chinytown babes, have ye seen em playHere in the streets that has sickened men, Jest as happy and jest as gay As fairies dancin on flowers—and then Trottin at night to ther beds, away Under the reek o some dragons den?) Bout this time a bubonic scare Started the Health Board lookin wise. Case reported off Portsmouth Square;Lottery agent ups and dies, Chinytown, tryin to hush the affair,Quietly buries the dead—and lies. Old Wang Too one night, as he sat Stringin is cash beads back of a screen, Suddently stopped and looked—whats that?Sneakin along a shelf he seen(^7 THE GKIIEN RAT The strangest, devllest lookin* rat— And sure as yer eyes, it was green, bright

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