The Echo. July 17, 1878.
THE DREAM OF
THE BILIOUS BEADLE.
——:o:——
So many subscribers have asked for a copy of this clever parody of Thomas Hood’s Dream of Eugene Aram that it is given here, although it somewhat interferes with the arrangement of the Song Parodies. “The Bilious Beadle” is admirably adapted for public recitation. The author, Mr. Arthur Shirley, is a well-known dramatist.
T’was in the grimy winter time, an evening cold and damp,
And four and twenty work’us boys, all of one ill-fed stamp,
Were blowing on blue finger tips, bent double with the cramp;
And when the skilly poured out fell into each urchin’s pan
They swallowed it at such a pace as only boyhood can.
But the Beadle sat remote from all, a bilious-looking man—