By L. Frank Baum
Author of The Emerald City of Oz, The Boy Fortune Hunters in the Yucatan, Daughters of Destiny, etc.
Hungry Tiger Press celebrates twenty years of bringing you short works by the Royal Historians of Oz with the following song lyric, likely intended for the unproduced stage show The Octopus, circa 1901, and subsequently inserted into an early draft of the stage show The Wizard of Oz.
Courtesy of Robert A. Baum
If a girl declares she loves you and forever will be true—
Think it over! Think it over!
If you’re living up your income how can you provide for two?
Think it over care-ful-ly!
It’s nice to have a little wife to cook and pour your tea;
It’s nice to have some little ones to clamber on your knee,
But you can’t afford the luxury on ten a week, you see—
Think it over! Think it over!
If you run across a slot-machine that promises you wealth—
Think it over! Think it over!
Perhaps the thing is standing there to benefit its health—
Think it over care-ful-ly!
Also the man who wants to sell you gold-mines mighty cheap
Is either a philanthropist or thinks you’re sound asleep;
Perhaps he needs the money or the gold he’d surely keep—
Think it over! Think it over!
When you breakfast at your boarding-house and find the dish is hash—
Think it over! Think it over!
Perhaps it’s mixed with buttons or the darky cook’s mustache—
Think it over care-ful-ly!
Or when a friend relates to you the well-known tale of woe:
Just changed his trousers but forgot to change his purse, you know:
Perhaps he’s gently stringing you, and yet perhaps ’tis so—
Think it over! Think it over!
When a politician claims he’s fighting for the peoples’ right—
Think it over! Think it over!
Perhaps some corporation will his services requite—
Think it over carefully!
Likewise restrain your envy when you find your neighbor man
Is riding in a yellow Auto., new and spick and span:
Perhaps he’s paying for it on the new installment plan—
Think it over! Think it over!
Hunting Season in Supposyville
Season is at hand; one hears
The sound of popping guns;
And in Supposyville, my dears,
With horns and hounds and revelry
The season is acclaimed.
Oh, indeedy, for festivities
This season is far-famed.
And what do you suppose they hunt?
Big game? The fox or hares?
Upon my word ’tis none of these;
Nor lions, no; nor bears.
A-riding down the lanes and streets
All merrily they canter,
And in the courtyard all dismount
With jollity and banter;
And there are posted high the lists
Of game, dears, and next minute
Away they go, and high and low
They hunt when they begin it.
They rummage through the cellars,
And they scurry through the halls;
And in their haste, I tell you now,
They take some pretty falls;
But long about threeteen o’clock
(Supposyville for four)
A great bell sounds and men and hounds
Crowd ’round the castle door;
And hanging to their saddles
And around their necks they bring
The game. Ha! Ho! ’Tis funny. Oh,
They’ve hunted everything!
Yes, everything that has been lost
For months back; books and purses,
Umbrellas, dogs and overshoes;
Well, really, dears, these verses
Could hardly tell the list of them;
And all the lovely prizes
The King and Queen award the huntsmen.
But how very wise is
This hunting business; oh, I wish
We’d have one, too, and find
Just all the lost belongings
That have strayed or stayed behind.
