قراءة كتاب Right off the Bat: Baseball Ballads

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‏اللغة: English

Right off the Bat: Baseball Ballads

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المؤلف:

Kirk William Frederick

دار النشر: Project Gutenberg

الصفحة رقم: 5

THE LEAGUE OF LONG AGO

They’ve got me sitting on the bench—I knew it had to come—
Kid Casey subbed for me at third the day I broke my thumb;
My thumb got better fast enough, but when I wanted back,
“The Kid is stinging them a mile,” says good old Captain Mack.
“The Kid is running bases like a Murray or a Cobb,
The Kid does this, the Kid does that, the Kid is on the job.”
And so I’m sitting on the bench, my spirits sort o’ low,
And playing memory ball games in the League of Long Ago.

I’m pulling for Kid Casey, and I hope he makes a mint,
I help him every way I can, from cussword down to hint;
He knows that I am for him, too—’twas only yesterday
He says to me, “Old leaguer, you’ve got ten more years to play.”
But I know that he knows better, and I know just what I’m worth—
A man can’t last forever in the swiftest game on earth.
And so I’m sitting on the bench, my spirits sort o’ low,
And playing memory ball games in the League of Long Ago.

I played with Old Buck Ewing just before Buck blew the game,
I played with Jimmy Ryan in the days of Anson’s fame.
Then I was just a fresh young kid, and they were getting old,
But not one slur they gave me when I broke into the fold.
That’s why I like Kid Casey, and I’ll plug like sin for him,
I told Mack only yesterday my eyes were getting dim.
And so I’m sitting on the bench, my spirits sort o’ low,
And playing memory ball games in the League of Long Ago.

THE LONGEST HIT ON RECORD

I’ve heard of hits by Wagner, hits that scaled the left field fence,
I’ve read about full many a clout tremendous and immense;
I know about that old time wheeze where Ryan hit a ball
That lit upon a steamer due in London late that Fall.
But the longest hit on record was a hit by Dan O’Shay
When the Bankers played the Brokers just five years ago to-day.

Dan played left field or right field, I can’t remember which,
But when it came to batting—well, Dan had the batter’s itch.
His fellow brokers often said—perhaps they did but joke—
They spent their all repairing baseball fences Danny broke.
But the longest hit Dan ever made, as I set out to say,
Was made against the Bankers just five years ago to-day.

A banker named O’Connor waited out in centre field
When Dan O’Shay came to the plate, his nerves all calm and steeled.
Dan hit the ball an awful soak, O’Connor clenched his teeth,
And after quite a fearsome sprint, the ball he got beneath.
Just as he caught the pellet two detectives hove in sight;
He put the ball inside his shirt and told the gang “GOOD NIGHT!”

He ran to far-off Labrador, the land of ice and snow,
And everywhere O’Connor went the ball was sure to go.
From there he went to Canada, from there he made Bengal,
Then journeyed he to Mandalay, accompanied by that ball.
And then he tried Australia, seeking diamonds in the dirt,
But all the time he kept that ball he’d hidden in his shirt.

He didn’t like Australia, so he trekked to many a land,
From Greenland’s icy mountains clear to India’s coral strand.
He sweltered in strange deserts, onward, onward, day by day,
But always kept that baseball hit so hard by Dan O’Shay.
If you ever go to Sing Sing, which I hope you never will,
You’ll find O’Connor in a cell with that same horsehide pill.

* * *

Yes, the longest hit on record was a hit by Dan O’Shay,
When the Bankers played the Brokers, just five years ago to-day.

THE UMPIRE’S HOME

Where does an umpire live? You ask me that?
Come, I will take you to an umpire’s flat.
Ah! Here we are! ’Tis five flights up, behind;
Umpires are used to hiding—they don’t mind.
This is the entrance. It’s a bachelor’s den,
For umpires aren’t often married men.
The owner’s not at home, but come with me;
I know him well and have an extra key.

This is the library; note well the books,
Dingy and dismal, like the umpire’s looks.
“Lives of the Martyrs,” “The Deserted Home,”
“Dante’s Inferno,” “Rise and Fall of Rome.”
“Paradise Lost,” “The Sinking of the Maine,”
“Ballad of Reading Gaol,” and “Souls in Pain.”
“The Death of Joan of Arc,” “The Convict’s Woe,”
And all the works of Edgar Allen Poe.

This is the dining room, all done in black,
With rugs of drab and tapestries of sack
Notice the mottoes on the gloomy walls:
“Drink to the countless strikes that I called balls,”
“A toast to all the close ones that I miss,”
“A curse upon the man who loves to hiss!”
Where does an umpire live? You ask me that?
Well, I have shown you through an umpire’s flat.

“YELLOW”

He wasn’t a strong looking fellow,
And roughnecks played ball in those days;
The ballgamers christened him “Yellow”
Because of his mild, timid ways.
Red Flynn slapped his face to a whisper
One day when he missed a fly ball,
And his jaw almost broke when he got a swell soak
From the fist of Outfielder McCall.

I used to feel sorry for “Yellow,”
The gang made his life one long moan.
He wasn’t a strong looking fellow,
They ought to have let him alone.
I’ve found, in my baseball excursions,
From Maine to the parks way out West,
That the players who win and draw down the tin,
Are the players who throw out the chest.

But courage is courage, I reckon;
It’s hard to explain, but it’s true;
And sometimes a fellow that people call yellow
Turns out to be brave and true blue.
One day when a hit meant a pennant
Our “Yellow” came up to the bat;
Did he quit in the pinch? Did he falter and flinch?
Sure he

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