While a fact is a fact 'twill do no good to blink it,
Put up with the shadows Tom Brown dares to show,
Your face may be darker than you like to think it,
If the shadows ain't fast, wash, and let's see them go.
While your Union pickets still waylay and "ratten"
The knob-sticks, who work on their own honest hook,
While on your hard earnings strike-delegates batten,
And machines and machine-work are in your black book;
While men who earn more by the week than their curate
Are content in one room of a hovel to pig;