THE UNEMPLOYED.
Plumber Joe loquitur:—
Oh, bust it! Or, rayther, bust them! I've my eye on the pipes o' this House,
As might give me the chanst as I wants, but, by gob, it's a regular chouse.
Nary bust in 'em yet, as I sees! I ain't none o' yer ornary hands,
There isn't a task in my trade but wot smart Plumber Joe understands,
And at making a jint I'm daisy. Our trade is a topper, it is,
But one arf of the pottrers called plumbers ain't nothink like up to their biz—
Mere poor paltryfoggers, most on 'em, as boggle, and bungle, and botch.
'Tain't bizness the beggars are arter, but more speshul Irish—or Scotch!
A copper-bit jint is their utmost, but wot they like most is a splodge
Of canvas and white-lead or putty; their work is all fakement and dodge,
As won't last a fortnit, not watertight. As to a blow-jint, well did,
They jest couldn't take it on nohow—no, not if you tipped 'em a quid.
But I'm a certif'cated plumber, a master of shave-hook and solder,
Of turn-pin, and mallet, and fire-devil. Plumber who's smarter and bolder
With blow-pipe, and lamp-black, and size, you won't find London through if yer try;
And at "wiping a jint"—ah!—a pickter—there's none as can wipe Joey's eye.
Then at sanitry work! Bless yer buttons, yer dashed County Council ain't in it;
And as to that there Wallace Bruce, wy, I'll jist wipe him up in a minit,
Though he has a good fighting name on 'im. Calls me a quack, too, does Bill,
And 'ints I dunno my own trade! Wait a bit, and I'll give him a pill.
Insanitry aireys, indeed! As a judge of a rookery or slum
There ain't ne'er a Cockney C. C. as can sideup with Joey the Brum;
Wot 'e doesn't know 'aint wuth knowing. I'll set 'em all right, though,—in time.
When England's all Brummagemised, and I'm boss of it, won't it be prime?
Meanwhile, I'm a bit out-of-work. Unemployed, so to speak, like a lot,
Although I ain't no "Unskilled Labourer." Hardie talks thunderin' rot,
But I thought 'e might make me a hopening. Somehow the fakement was lost.
And yet I should be flush o' work, for we've had a unusual frost,
As this House, like the rest, must have felt. Wy, I thought they'd ha' bust long ago,
Them Guverment pipes, and be blowed to 'em. 'Ere in the sludge and the snow
I've bin waiting a tidy long spell, till my toes 'ave like icicles grown.
I've bin journeyman quite long enough, and I want to set up "on my own."
Pal Arthur is all very well, but at bossing a bit of a slob.
And when these big pipes do a bust, well—I see a rare charnce of a job!
Fin de Siècle.—"New men, new manners." "New women—no manners."