The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists
Dick Wantley, 'the man behind the moat,' sang 'Put me among the Girls' with many suggestive grimaces, after which Payne gave them 'I'm the Marquis of Camberwell Green.' He was ghastly pale and very nervous, but went through a lot of galvanic motions and gestures which were part of the business. During the song the audience maintained a frigid silence, which so disconcerted Payne that he stopped half-way and said he couldn't remember any more. But to atone for this failure he sang another called 'We all must die like the Fire in the Grate,' which annoyed the audience so much, that it was loudly suggested that if he couldn't do better than that the sooner he died the better.
This was followed by a Tory ballad with a chorus that all the men sang with great fervour:
'His clothes may be ragged, his 'and may be soiled,
But where's the disgrace if for bread he has toiled!
His 'art's in the right place, deny it who can
The back bone of England's the honest Working Man.'
After the concert the men strolled into the garden and some played skittles, some played quoits, some sat on the grass and watched the others, and some amused themselves drinking beer and playing shove ha'penny in the bar parlour. The time passed quickly enough and by half-past seven the brakes were loaded up again and a start made for the return journey.
They called at all the taverns on the road, and by the time they reached the 'Blue Lion' half of them were three sheets in the wind and five or six were very drunk, including the driver of Crass's brake and the man with the coach horn. The latter was so helpless that they had to let him lie down amongst their feet, where he fell fast asleep, while the others amused themselves by blowing weird sounds out of the horn.
There was an automatic penny-in-the-slot piano at the 'Blue Lion,' and as this was the last house on the road they made a rather long stay there, playing hooks and rings and shove ha'penny, drinking, singing, dancing and finally quarrelling.
Several of them seemed to fall foul of Newman. They made offensive remarks in his hearing, knocked his lemonade over, and a little later someone else collided violently with him just as he was in the act of drinking. Unfortunately most of the rowdy ones were his fellow-passengers in Crass's
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