CABBY; OR, REMINISCENCES OF THE RANK AND THE ROAD.
(By "Hansom Jack.")
No. 1.—MY MATES AND MY FARES.
"Me and my Fares!" There's a takingish title for one o' them books as they call "Rummynicences!"
Don't you imagine "Romance on the Rank" must mean dry-as-dust yarns about Strikes, Fares and Licences.
"Treacle," "Long Benjy," and "Pineapple Bob," "Old Curly," "The Countryman," "Ginger," and "Chicking,"
Not naming myself, if it comes to good stories, could give Sherlock 'Olmes arf a length and a licking.
Rum names? Lor! that's nothink! You look down a list, in the Sporting Snips say, of the 'orses in running,
And any cab-rank could knock 'oles in the lot, for sheer oddity, jumble-up, fancy and funning.
Many a nickname's a yarn in itself, or leastways suggests one to them in the know of it.
Cabby is like Sir George Lewis; 'e knows London's seamiest side, though 'e mayn't make no show of it.
Take "Coddy Cowslip," now! Meaningless muddle, that name, I've no doubt, to a fare trim and toffy.
But git old C. C. on the patter one mornin', say over a Billingsgate pheasant and coffee.
Twig 'is old countryfied dial a-wrinkle with sly, knowing wickedness! Lor! it's a beano!
And yet "Coddy"'s got such a chawbacon chuckle, 'e passes—with them as ain't fly—for a greeno.
What 'e don't know about cockney conniverings, and country collyfogs, isn't worth knowing.
Why, 'e's been everythink, ploughboy and street-preacher, betting-man, jock, "all-a-blowing-a-growing,"
Pedlar and poacher, 'orse-dealer, and 'earse-driver! Yes, and 'is name seems to tell the whole story
To us as 'ave 'eard it in "Cowslip's" soft snuffle, when over a toddy-tot, all in 'is glory.
What I say is this: If a Cabby can't see, and take stock of, the life of this wonderful City,
Perched 'igh on 'is box, with arf town for 'is fares, and 'is eye on the other arf, well, it's a pity.
I've drove Billy Shikspur's Seven Ages, I have, and a tidy lot more as the Swan never thought on;
For cabs wasn't up in the days of Queen Bess; though that Jaques as a Growler I think might 'ave caught on!