When the Minister Calls

My Paw says that it used to be,

Whenever the minister came for tea,

‘ At they sat up straight in their chairs at night

An’ put all their common things out o’ sight,

An’ nobody cracked a joke or grinned,

But they talked o’ the way that people sinned,

An’ the burnin’ fires that would cook you sure

When you came to die, if you was n't pure —

Such a gloomy affair it used to be

Whenever the minister came for tea.

But now when the minister comes to call

I get him out for a game of ball,

And you'd never know if you'd see him bat,

Without any coat or vest or hat,

That he is a minister, no, siree!

He looks like a regular man to me.

An’ he knows just how to go down to the dirt

For the grounders hot without gettin’ hurt —

An’ when they call us, both him an’ me

Have to git washed up again for tea.

Our minister says if you'll just play fair

You'll be fit for heaven or anywhere;

An’ fun's all right if your hands are clean

An’ you never cheat an’ you do n't get mean.

He says that he never has understood

Why a feller can n't play an’ still be good.

An’ my Paw says that he's just the kind

Of a minister that he likes to find —

So I'm always tickled as I can be

Whenever our minister comes for tea.