s so deafening and the demands for
an encore so persistent that to satisfy them he sang another old
favourite--'Won't you buy my pretty flowers?'

'Ever coming, ever going,
Men and women hurry by,
Heedless of the tear-drops gleaming,
In her sad and wistful eye
How her little heart is sighing
Thro' the cold and dreary hours,
Only listen to her crying,
"Won't you buy my pretty flowers?"'

When the last verse of this sang had been sung five er six times,
Philpot exercised his right of nominating the next singer, and called
upon Dick Wantley, who with many suggestive gestures and grimaces sang
'Put me amongst the girls', and afterwards called upon Payne, the
foreman carpenter, who gave 'I'm the Marquis of Camberwell Green'.

There was a lot of what music-hall artists call 'business' attached to
his song, and as he proceeded, Payne, who was ghastly pale and very
nervous, went through a lot of galvanic motions and gestures, bowing
and scraping and sliding about and flourishing his handkerchief in
imitation of the courtly graces of the Marquis. During this
performance the audience maintained an appalling silence, which so
embarrassed Payne that before he was half-way through the song he had
to stop because he could not remember the rest. However, to make up
for this failure he sang another called 'We all must die, like the fire
in the grate'. This also was received in a very lukewarm manner by the
crowd, same of whom laughed and others suggested that if he couldn't
sing any better than that, the sooner HE was dead the better.

This was followed by another Tory ballad, the chorus being as follows:

His clothes may be ragged, his hands may be soiled.
But where's the disgrace if for bread he has toiled.
His 'art is in the right place, deny it no one can
The backbone of Old England is the honest workin' man.'

After a few more songs it was decided to adjourn to a field at the rear
of the tavern to have a game of cricket. Sides were formed, Rushton,
Didlum, Grinder, and the other gentlemen taking part just as if they
were only common people, and while the game was in progress the rest
played ring quoits or reclined on the grass watching the players,
whilst the remainder amused themselves drinking beer and playing cards
and shove-ha'penny in the bar parlour, or taking walks around the
village sampling the beer at the other pu