Hank Snow - Spell of the Yukon lyrics

I wanted the gold and I sought it I scrabbled and mucked like a slave Was it famine or scurvy I fought it I hurled my youth into a grave I wanted the gold and I got it came out with a fortune last fall Yet somehow life's not what I thought it and somehow the gold isn't all No there's the land have you seen it it's the cussedest land that I know From the big dizzy mountains that screen it to the deep d**h-like valleys below Some say God was tired when he made it some say it's a fine land to shun Maybe but there's some that would trade it for no land owner and I'm one You come to get rich that's a good reason you feel like an exile at first You hate it like hell for a season and then you're worse than the worst It grips you like some kinds of sinning it twists you from foe to a friend It seems it's been since the beginning it seems it will be to the end I've stood in some mighty mouthed-hollow that's plumb full of hush to the brim I've watched the big husky sun wallow in crimson and gold and grow dim Till the moon set the pearly peaks gleaming and the stars tumbled out neck and crop And I thought that I surely was dreaming with the peace of the world piled on top The summer no sweeter was ever the sunshiny woods all a thrill The grayling a leap in the river the bighorn asleep on a hill The strong life that never knows harness the wilds where the caribou call The freshness the freedom the farness oh God how I'm stuck on it all The winter the brightness that blinds you the white land locked tight as a drum The cold fear that follows and finds you the silence that bludgeons you dumb The snows that are older than history the woods where the weird shadows slant The stillness the moonlight the myst'ry I'd bade them goodbye but I can't There's a land where the mountains are nameless And the rivers all run God knows where There are lives that are erring and aimless and d**hs that just hang by a hair There are hardships that nobody reckons there are valleys unpeopled and still There's a land oh how it beckons and beckons and I want to go back and I will They're making my money diminish I'm sick of the taste of champagne Thank God when I'm skinned to a finish I'll pike to the Yukon again I'll fight and you bet it's no sham fight it's hell but I've been there before And it's better than this by a damn sight so me for the Yukon once more There's gold and its haunting and haunting it's luring me on as of old Yet it isn't the gold that I'm wanting so much as just finding the gold It's the great big broadland way up yonder it's the forest where silence has lease It's the beauty that thrills me with wonder it's the stillness that fills me with peace