A drunken man o’er all the world, has most of grief and woe, John.
Then on the land and on the sea,
In seasons hot and cold, John,
Keep the pledge when you are young,
And keep it when you’re old, John,
Let the people drink who will,
But when they come to you, John,
Boldly say, “I’ve signed the pledge,
and mean to keep it too, John.”
When Sir Thomas Brassey lost his seat in the House of Commons, he was promoted to a peerage for his services to his party. Some snobbish toadies immediately set to work to trace a pedigree for the new Baron, and asserted that one of his ancestors came over with the Duke William from Normandy. Whereas it was well known that the father of Sir Thomas was of very poor and humble origin, and made his money by honorable hard work as a Railway Contractor. Truth represented Sir Thomas, attired in a suit of mail as a Norman Knight, appearing to his father, who sits smoking a short pipe, in the loose and easy costume of his early calling, a “navvy,” or road excavator. The father thus addresses the newly made Baron:—