This tear-jerker made people cry in its day, 1900.
words by Arthur J. Lamb
music by Harry Von Tilzer
The sheet music:
Accompaniment track:
Lyrics
- The ballroom was filled with fashions throng
It shone with a thousand lights
And there was a woman who passed along
The fairest of all the sights
A girl to her lover then softly sighed
“There’s riches at her command”
“But she married for wealth, not for love” he cried
Though she lives in a mansion grand
Chorus
She’s only a bird in a gilded cage
A beautiful sight to see
You may think she’s happy and free from care
She’s not, though she seems to be
‘Tis sad when you think of her wasted life
For youth cannot mate with age
And her beauty was sold, for an old man’s gold
She’s a bird in a gilded cage
- I stood in a church yard just at eve’
When sunset adorned the west
And looked at the people who’d come to grieve
For loved ones now laid at rest
A tall marble monument marked the grave
Of one who’d been fashions queen
And I thought she is happier here at rest
Than to have people say when seen
Sung here by Fred Feild: