Chorus.
Hurrah for old England and liberty sweet,
The land that we live in and plenty to eat,
We shall ever remember this wonderful day,
See the Chartists are coming, get out of the way.
Such a number together was never yet seen,
Hurrah for the Charter, and God save the Queen!
And when that the Charter, Old England has got,
We’ll have stunning good beer at three halfpence a pot:
A loaf for a penny, a pig for a crown,
And gunpowder tea at five farthings a pound:
Instead of red herrings, we’ll live on fat geese,
And lots of young women at two pence a piece.
The bakers and grocers, look how they do laugh,
With dustmen and coal heavers armed with a staff.
Five thousand old women, oh, how they do sing,
With frying pans, fenders, and big rolling pins.
There’s Russell, and Bobby, old Nosey, and Hume,
With pistols and bayonets, muskets and brooms,
Load away, fire away, chatter and jaw,
Shoot at a donkey and knock down a crow.
See the lads of old Erin for liberty crow,
Repeal of the Union and Erin-go-bragh!
Peace and contentment, then none can we blame,
Plenty of labour, and paid for the same;
Some are rolling in riches, and luxury, too,
While millions are starving with nothing to do;
Through the Nation prosperity soon will be seen,
Hurrah for the Charter, and God save the Queen!
Such constables there are in London, now mark,
Tailors and shoemakers, labourers and clerks,
Gas light men, pick pockets, firemen too,
Green grocers, hatters, pork butchers, and Jews:
Lollipop merchants, and masons a lot,
And the covey what hollows “Baked taters all hot.”
They are sworn to protect us, and keep well the peace,
To frighten the Chartists and help the police.
This is the sort of stuff that was disseminated among the people at the time of the agitation for “the Charter,” and, looking at the convulsion of 1848, which shook Europe to its centre, it speaks volumes for the good sense of the lower classes that they were not stirred up to acts of violence by such inflammatory rubbish as the following.