And his bishop cardinal Wiseman.’
“Then there was another, sir. ‘The Pope he is coming; oh, crikey, oh dear!’ to the tune of the ‘Camels are coming.’ There was one bit that used to tickle them. I mayn’t exactly remember it, for I didn’t do anything beyond a spurt in it, and haven’t a copy for you, but it tickled ’em with others. This was the bit:—
‘I’ve heard my old grandmother’s grandmother say,
They burnt us in Smithfield full ten every day.
O, what shall I do, for I feel very queer,
The Pope he’s a-coming, oh! crikey, oh, dear!’
“Bless you, sir, if I see a smart dressed servant girl looking shyly out of the street-door at us, or through the area railings, and I can get a respectful word in and say, ‘My good young lady, do buy of a poor fellow, we haven’t said a word to your servants, we hasn’t seen any on ’em,’ then she’s had, sir, for 1d. at least, and twice out of thrice; that ‘good young lady’ chloroforms her.
“Then this one, now, is stunning. It’s part of what the Queen was a going to sing at the opening of the parliament, but she changed her mind, and more’s the pity, for it would have had a grand effect. It’s called ‘The Queen, the Pope, and the Parliament,’ and these is the best of the stanzas; I calls them werses in common, but stanzas for Wick:
‘My lords and my gentlemen all,
The bishops and great house of commons