I would early rise,
  Health and wealth are common virtues—­dawn will brand me both, and wise. 
  Bunkie, I’ll be boss tomorrow, uniformed in blue and white,
  Knew I’d get it, if the captain only did what’s square and right. 
  But I will not chastise the comrades who may doubt my word is law,
  I’ll be easy with them, bunkie, patient, ’tho they feel no awe. 
  Bunkie, I’m growing sleepy; wake me when the morning breaks;
  For upon the track of merit, I will land the non-com. stakes. 
  Let me hear the joyful clamor when I wake from pleasant dreams
  That the fellows rise when greeting a noncom., who is what he seems. 
  Wake me early, bunkie, comrade, tell the fellows who I am,
  Not forgetting all the favors I will do you when I can. 
  Tell them that I wouldn’t have it, if it sacrificed their love,
  Tell them that I’m the same as ever, though they think me far above. 
  Bunkie, I have dreamed so often of the buff that I shall wear,
  That I feel the honor greater than a man like me can bear. 
  Long I’ve waited; long I’ve cherished thoughts of how I’d look and feel
  When the captain said:  Howard, here’s a stripe to aid your zeal. 
  Then I’d be a non-com., bunkies, then I’d write to dad and say,
  Modest-like:  “A Corporal’s greetings to his folks so far away!”

A YOUNG ROOKIE’S LAMENT

  As I sit in the gleam of the camp fire,
  ’Neath the Oriental skies,
  In fancy I picture the homeland shore
  And a town I highly prize;
  It’s Gardner, dear old Gardner,
  A town so dear to me,
  But I’m many miles away
  Across an endless sea.

  I at the age of 17 was—­
  Fickle as a clam
  I took a train for Fitchburg
  And joined old Uncle Sam. 
  They sent me on to Slocum,
  And filled me up on beans. 
  They made me take a rifle
  And a pair of khaki jeans.

  They sent me to the Philippines,
  We call it no man’s land. 
  We never see a flake of snow,
  We bake our eggs in sand,
  We hike o’er burning mountains
  ’Til it drives us near insane,
  We pitch our camp in a rice field
  In a storm of drizzling rain.

  At night we walk our outpost
  With a great big heavy gun
  And 90 Dum-Dum bullets
  To make the Moros run. 
  They’re accurate as a weasel
  And, boys, they never fan,
  You have to keep your ears pricked up,
  For they’ll get you if they can.

  Now, boys, you may think Gardner slow,
  But that notion you’ll destroy
  If you ever hold your hand up
  To be a soldier boy. 
  You have no dear old Mother. 
  To mend your tattered pants,
  When you stick yourself with a needle,
  With rage you’ll fairly prance.

  So, boys, I found my big mistake,
  I was altogether wrong,
  And that’s the simple reason
  I sing this little song. 
  So take a piece of fool’s advice,
  And never run away,
  Just stay in dear old Gardner
  Where life is bright and gay.