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- I wish I was in the land of cotton,
- Old times they are not forgotten;
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
- In Dixie Land where I was born,
- Early on one frosty mornin,
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
The remaining verses drift into the common minstrel idiom of a comical plantation scenario, "supposedly [depicting] the gayer side of life for slaves on Southern plantations":[14]
- Old Missus marry "Will-de-weaber,"
- Willium was a gay deceaber;
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
- But when he put his arm around'er,
- He smiled as fierce as a forty-pound'er,
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
The final verse mixes nonsense and dance steps with the freed-slave scenario:
- Dar's buck-wheat cakes an 'Ingen' batter,
- Makes you fat or a little fatter;
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.
- Den hoe it down an scratch your grabble,
- To Dixie land I'm bound to trabble.
- Look away! Look away! Look away! Dixie Land.[15]
The lyrics use many common phrases found in minstrel tunes of the day—"I wish I was in . . ." dates to at least "Clare de Kitchen" (early 1830s), and "Away down south in . . ." appears in many more songs, including Emmett's "I'm Gwine ober de Mountain" (1843). The second stanza clearly echoes "Gumbo Chaff" from the 1830s: "Den Missus she did marry Big Bill de weaver / Soon she found out he was a gay deceiver".[16] The final stanza rewords portions of Emmett's own "De Wild Goose-Nation": "De tarapin he thot it was time for to trabble / He screw aron his tail and begin to scratch grabble."[17] Even the phrase "Dixie's land" had been used in Emmett's "Johnny Roach" and "I Ain't Got Time to Tarry", both first performed earlier in 1859.
As with other minstrel material, "Dixie" entered common circulation among blackface performers, and many of them added their own verses or altered the song in other ways. Emmett himself adopted the tune for a pseudo-African American spiritual in the 1870s or 1880s. The chorus changed to:
- I wish I was in Canaan
- Oaber dar—Oaber dar,
- In Canaan's lann de color'd man
- Can lib an die in cloaber
- Oaber dar—Oaber dar,
- Oaber dar in de lann ob Canaan.[18]
Both Union and Confederate composers produced war versions of the song during the American Civil War. These variants standardized the spelling and made the song more militant, replacing the slave scenario with specific references to the conflict or to Northern or Southern pride. This Confederate verse by Albert Pike is representative:
- Southrons! hear your country call you!
- Up! lest worse than death befall you! . . .
- Hear the Northern thunders mutter! . . .
- Northern flags in South wind flutter; . . .
- Send them back your fierce defiance!
- Stamp upon the cursed alliance![19]
Compare Frances J. Crosby's Union lyrics:
- On! ye patriots to the battle,
- Hear Fort Moultrie's cannon rattle!
- Then away, then away, then away to the fight!
- Go meet those Southern traitors,
- With iron will.
- And should your courage falter, boys,
- Remember Bunker Hill.
- Hurrah! Hurrah! The Stars and Stripes forever!
- Hurrah! Hurrah! Our Union shall not sever![20]