i wonder what he ll think of me i guess he ll call me the old man i guess he ll think i can lick ev ry other feller s father well i can i bet that he ll turn out to be the spittin image of his dad but he ll have more common sense than his puddin headed father ever had i ll teach him to wrassle and dive through a wave when we go in the mornin s for our swim his mother can teach him the way to behave but she won t make a sissy out o him not him not my boy not bill bill i will see that he is named after me i will my boy bill he ll be tall and tough as a tree will bill like a tree he ll grow with his head held high and his feet planted firm on the ground and you won t see nobody dare to try to boss or toss him around no pot bellied baggy eyed bully ll toss him around i don t give a damn what he does as long as he does what he likes he can sit on his tail or work on a rail with a hammer hammering spikes he can ferry a boat on a river or peddle a pack on his back or work up and down the streets of a town with a whip and a horse and a hack he can haul a scow along a canal run a cow around a corral or maybe bark for a carousel of course it takes talent to do that well he might be a champ of theheavyweights or a feller that sells you glue or president of the united states that d be all right too his mother would like that but he wouldn t be president unless he wanted to be not bill my boy bill he ll be tall and as tough as a tree will bill like a tree he ll grow with his head held high and his feet planted firm on the ground and you won t see nobody dare to try to boss or toss him around no fat bottomed flabby faced pot bellied baggy eyed bastard ll boss him around and i ll be damned if he ll marry the boss daughter a skinny lipped virgin with blood like water who ll give him a peck and call it a kiss and look in his eyes through a lorgnet say why am i talkin on like this my kid ain t even been born yet i can see him when he s seventeen or so and startin to go with a girl i can give him lots of pointers very sound on the way to get round any girl i can tell him wait a minute could it be what the hell what if he is a girl what would i do with her what could i do for her a bum with no money you can have fun with a son but you got to be a father to a girl she mighn t be so bad at that a kid with ribbons in her hair a kind o neat and petite little tin type of her mother what a pair i can just hear myself bragging about her my little girl pink and white as peaches and cream is she my little girl is half again as bright as girls are meant to be dozens of boys pursue her many a likely lad does what he can to woo her from her faithful dad she has a few pink and white young fellers of two and three but my little girl gets hungry ev ry night and she come home to me my little girl my little girl i got to get ready before she comes i got to make certain that she won t be dragged up in slums with a lot o bums like me she s got to be sheltered and be dressed in the best money can buy i never knew how to get money but i ll try by god i ll try i ll go out and make it or steal it or take it or die 