Ten Little Words

DESCRIPTION: "Ten little words was all it said, It's on their way they hum. 'Kiss Mother for me,' it singing says, 'For I'm too poor to come.'" The members of the (logging?) crew join together to raise the money to send the man home to see his dying mother
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1956 (Beck-TheyKnewPaulBunyan)
KEYWORDS: mother death money travel technology
FOUND IN: US(MW)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Beck-TheyKnewPaulBunyan, p. 151, "Ten Little Words" (1 text)
Roud #6510
NOTES [85 words]: Why do I have a feeling that there is a missing verse of this in which the young man dies on his way home?
The song does not mention the telegraph, but I strongly suspect that that is what is happening here. This would explain the use of exactly ten words. It was typical of telegrams to have a flat fee for the first ten words, then a per-word charge for each word over ten. So there was a strong tendency to write messages that were exactly ten words. On that basis, I've added the keyword "technology." - RBW
Last updated in version 5.0
File: BBun151

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