I had a paying little refinery And all was well with me, and then The Trust edged up to me and wiped me out. So much for northern tariff, freedom Of niggers and New England rule. Praise God for sponging slavery from the Slate! Well, then I was without a cent again, What should I do? I wanted first a change, And rest in the use of other faculties, So I went out and took a farm. One thing leads to another. I wake up one morning And find a man from Illinois Become my neighbor on the adjoining farm. It’s your John Cogdall, once of Petersburg, County of Menard, in Illinois, Precinct Indian Point, he said to me. We’re friends at once, and visit back and forth. Two months ago I saw upon his table A copy of the _Petersburg Observer_-- John likes to hear the home-town news-- I pick it up and scan it through to see What a country paper is in Illinois. And there I read this notice of “Old Piery,” Real name Cordelia Stacke, dead thirty years, Whose money in the county treasury Is to be made escheat. So here I am Maneuvering for this money, rather shabby If I was not so devilish poor and pressed; If letting Menard County have the prize Would profit any one, when I can prove Old Piery was my great aunt, Her father and my grandfather brothers, When I can prove that I’m her only heir. Yes, but not as pure of blood. Her father was a judge in South Carolina, Her mother was a belle of New Orleans, My father told me so. Cordelia Stacke, “Old Piery,” as you called her, was a story We heard as children sitting on his knee. I know to prove my name is Stacke, And then because her name was Stacke Won’t draw this money from your treasury, But wait Go to your vault and get that ring she wore, Slipped from her dead hand when you found her body Dead for a week amid her rags and stuff. Go get that ring, Mr. Treasurer of Menard, If I don’t describe it Down to the finest point, Just as I heard my father say The night she disappeared she wore a ring Of such and such, I’ll go back to my farm In Mississippi. But I’ll do much more I’ll trace her from Columbia to Old Salem; I’ll show her crazed brain luring her along To find the spot where Lincoln kept the store Two miles from where we sit. She must have walked Across Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, or perhaps She footed it through Tennessee, Kentucky.