nner
of doubt.

"Free and equal?" Oh, NEBUCHADNEZZAR! how _can_ they talk sech tommy-rot?
Might as well say as Fiz and Four-Arf should be equally fourpence a pot.
Nice hidea, but _taint so_, that's the wust on it. There's where these
dreamers go wrong.
Ought's nothink, and that as is, _is_; all the rest isn't wuth a old
Song.

Bad as BUGGINS, the Radical Cobbler, these mugs are. Sez BUGGINS, sez he,
Wos it Nature give Mudford his millions, and three bob a day to poor me?
Not a bit on it. Nature's a mother, and meant all her gifts _for_ us all.
It's a Law as gives Mudford his Castle, and leaves me a poor Cobbler's
Stall.

All I've got to say, CHARLIE, is this. If so be Nature meant all that
there,
She must be a fair "J." as a mater. _I've_ bin bested out of _my_ share.
So has BUGGINS, and nine out o' ten on us. _If_ the few nobble the quids
Spite of Nature, wy Nature's a noodle as cannot purtect her own kids.

Poor BUGGINS! He's nuts upon HENERY GEORGE, WILLIAM MORRIS, and such.
He's got a white face, and is humpy, and lives in a sort of a hutch
Smellin' strong of wax-end and stale dubbin. _Him_ born free and equal?
Great Scott!
'Bout as free as a trained flea in harness, or sueties piled in a pot.

Nature's nothink, dear boy, simply nothink, and natural right don't
exist,
Unless it means natural flyness, or natural power of fist.
It's brains and big biceps, wot wins. _Is_ men equal in muscle and pith?
Arsk BISMARCK and DERBY, dear boy, or arsk JACKSON the Black and JEM
SMITH.

There'd be precious few larks if they wos, CHARLIE--where'd be the chance
of a spree
If every pious old pump or young mug was the equal of Me?
It's the up-and-down bizness of life, mate, as makes it such fun--for the
ups.
Equal? Yus, as old BARNUM and BUGGINS, or tigers and tarrier pups.

He's a long-winded lot, is BUCHANAN, slops over tremenjous, he do;
Kinder poet, dear boy, I believe, and they always do flop round a few,
Make a rare lot o' splash and no progress, like ducks in a tub, dontcher
know,
But cackle and splutter ain't swimming; so ROBERT, my nabs, it's no go.

Men ain't equal a mite, that's a moral, and patter won't level 'em up.
Wy yer might as well talk of a popgun a holding its own with a Krupp.
'Ow the brains and the ochre got fust ladled hout is a