The Tale The Bottle Told
This is a copy of my Grandfather’s poem I copied word for word as he had written it on a piece of stationary from the Queally Land and Livestock Company. One of my cousins have previously had it published in Laramie Wyoming by a local company.
Queally Land and Live Stock Company
Stock Raising
The Tale The Bottle Told
By Jay L. Johnson
A drink. No thank you pard
Though to refuse comes pretty hard
For I have been in the toils of Demon Rum
And to answer no bothers me some
I will tell you a story, this a tale a bottle told
Of an old range pal, who has passed into the fold
We were riders, and he and I
Were punching cows for the lazy Y
The boys all called him Sunny Jim
I go by the name of Rawhide Slim
When we all got peeved, sore and riled
He took things cool and I joked and smiled
Out on the round-up when it rained a spell
And we all rolled out at the daylight yell
Grumbling and cussing a puncher’s life
Jim would be cheerful mid all the strife
But Jim must have his periodical
And that no doubt made him a prodigal
For all of us boys could tell by his ways
That in his past he had seen better days
After the fall round-up and the beef were in
Winter settled down and it snowed like sin
Out to the line camp at Teepee Ring
Went Jim and I to ride fence till spring
The nights were long, the days passed slow
And Jim began to talk of the Bow
I could tell by that and other sign
That he was hearing the call of the wine
We rolled out one morning, twas cold and bright
And Jim allowed he would go to town and stay oer night
He saddled up his black horse Joe
And hit the trail for Medicine Bow
Along in the night it began to blow
And soon the air was filled with drifting snow
Blast after blast came swooping along
And the wind kept howling its dismal song
The second morning dawned calm and clear
And I kept watching the trail for Jim to appear
And when by noon he did not show
I saddled up and pulled for the Bow
Twas mighty hard going the drifts belly deep
No sign of a trail for the horse to keep
And where the trail joins the road for the stage
I found Jim’s horse, reins caught on a sage
And as my gaze swept oer the broad field of white
I knew that Jim had become lost in the night
Then I rode round in circles and covered the ground
Until at last poor Jim’s body I found
As I sadly looked on his cold white face
I fancied I could see of his old smile a trace
An empty bottle he held in an icy clutch
Lying there dead still in youth it was too much
And as I turned away my heart filled with pain
I swore to never touch liquor again
For an empty bottle, stranger told the tale
Of a true friend and pal lost on the trail
It was just another tragedy of this life we live
Just another case of weakness and the price we give
And as I live through the years and grow old
I will never forget the tale that empty bottle told
Jay L. Johnson