I’m like a scarlet runner that has lost its stick,
Or a cherry that’s left for the dickey to pick,
Like a waterpot, I weep, like a paviour I sigh,
Like a mushroom I’ll wither, like a cucumber, die.
I’m like a humble bee that doesn’t know where to settle,
And she’s a dandelion, and a stinging nettle,
My heart’s like a beet root choked with chickweed,
And my head’s like a pumpkin running to seed.
I’m a great mind to make myself a felo-de-se,
And finish all my woes on the branch of a tree:
But I won’t, for I know at my kicking, you’d roar,
And honour my death with a double encore.
BOXING DAY IN 1847.
Of all the days throughout the year,
There was never one, I say,
That could come up in former times,
At all to Boxing Day.
But in the windows now you’ll see,
How shocking, I declare,
Notice! recollect, no Christmas Boxes
Will be given here.
Chorus.
In former times, how folks would spree,
So lively, brisk and gay,
Such jolly games there used to be
Upon a Boxing Day.
Some folks are mean, as may be seen,
Who plenty have in store,
And strive outright, with all their might,
To trample on the poor.
It was not so in former times,
For every class together,
Stroll to the Play, on Boxing Day,
Like Birds of every feather.
The beadles out a boxing went,
So did old women too,
The dustman out a boxing went,
A whistling—Dust O!
Some would dance, and some would sing,
And some a noise would keep,
And some would in the watch house go,
To get a lodging cheap.
In grandfather’s and grandmother’s days,
Folks through the streets were led,
There were no police with rolling pins,
To break the people’s heads;
They did not Polka dresses wear,
Or bustles on their rumps,
And shop boys did not smoke cigars,
Made out of Cabbage Stumps.