Read on Kentucky Night at the Hungry Club, in New York City, February, 1908
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the simple life still gives
Its lazy, listless rapture
To the soul that truly lives,
And dispenses creature comforts
To the mortal here below
In a satisfying manner
That the strenuous never know.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the hospitable mind
Is bent on doing something
Of the good, old-fashioned kind,
For every man and woman
Who is stranger or is friend,
With a warm and willing welcome,
Which continues to the end.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the women are as fair
As the pink-and-white sun-kisses
That the rose and lily wear;
And we dream of love and music,
Of the moonlight and the flowers
That have touched the earth with beauty
In that lotus land of ours.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the amber Bourbon glows
In the clinking, crystal glasses
As the horn of plenty flows
In a golden stream of glory.
Bearing ever on its breast
The weary soul and body
To a topaz-tinted rest.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the horse is king, and stands
The model and the master
Of his kind in other lands;
And his hoof-beats strike the measure
Of the music that is known
To the simplest son of freedom
And the ruler on his throne.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the bluegrass grows knee-deep,
And the cattle in her pastures
Show the virtue of their keep;
Where the broad tobacco acres
Raise the sweet, narcotic weed
That solaces the millions.
In a world of strife and greed.
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
Where the fathers, through the years,
Hand down the courtly graces
To the sons of cavaliers;
Where the golden age is regnant,
And each succeeding morn
Finds "the corn is full of kernels.
And the Colonels full of corn."
Here's a health to old Kentucky,
To her sons and daughters here.
Who will think of old Kentucky
With a smile and with a tear;
They may talk of modern progress,
And the proper creed to hold,
But their hearts will beat the fondest
For Kentucky that is old.