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Title: British Trade
Author: Harry Graham [
More Titles by Graham]
Oh, why was I born a English lad,
In a island all shut in by sea?
Wot a much better chance I might 'ave 'ad
If I'd only been 'made in Germanee'!
Oh, why was I thus unwilling 'urled
On the blooming 'dust-'eap o' the world.'
No doubt as the German artisan
Don't get very much in the matter o' pay;
But 'e works on the seven-days-weekly plan,
With a haverage thirteen hours a day.
An' 'e 'asn't no time for to sit an' think,
Nor money enough to take to drink!
Then give me a permanent German job,
With nothink at all but work to do;
With weekly wages o' sixteen bob,
For to keep myself an' the missus too;
A-makin' them gimcrack German toys
For poor little English gals an' boys.
To my London 'ome I'll say good-bye,
For I 'asn't no use for a open port,
Where the workin' wage is a deal too 'igh,
An' the workin' hours is far too short;
Where a workin'-man 'as time to sleep,
An' food's to be 'ad so rotten cheap.
A German factory's more my taste,
With none o' them lazy English ways,
Where there ain't no money or time to waste
On ridic'lous 'beanos' an' 'olidays;
An' the workin' classes can just contrive
To earn sufficient to keep alive.
When I slaves all day at a German trade,
A-makin' them goods as they dumps down 'ere,
When I'm overworked an' I'm underpaid,
Till I feels as weak as that German beer,
I'll think o' my English 'ome maybe,
Where everythink (but the drinks) is free!
When I gets back 'ome of a Sunday night,
With a supper o' nice black bread to eat,
I'll 'ave such a 'ealthy appetite,
I never won't need no butcher's meat;
For 'unger, o' course, is the finest sauce,
When you're swollerin' sausages made of 'orse!
An' I begs to state, when I comes 'ome late,
With a 'ungry kind of a look in my eye,
If I 'as to wait, with a hempty plate,
Till the blooming cat's-meat-man comes by,
I'll think wi' scorn o' the old 'dust-'eap,'
Where mutton an' beef's to be bought so cheap.
For we don't know nothink o' 'orse-flesh 'ere,
But Joe 'e'll learn us to eat it, when
'Is tariff makes British meat too dear
For the pockets o' British workin' men;
An' they're 'aving their Little Marys lined
With a diet o' maize an' bacon rind!
When the price goes up of our meat and bread,
By a grand Imperial scheme o' Joe's,
We'll get cheap sugar and tea instead,
An' we'll buy no food orf o' Britain's foes;
For we'll 'ave no need o' the furriner's crops
When we're living on sweets washed down wi' slops!
There's lessons to learn from German trade,
In spite o' this foolish fiscal fuss;
Tho' their peoples ain't no better paid,
Nor near as well orf for food as us;
For, wotever the German workman's lot,
'E knows 'ow to use wot brains 'e's got!
An' if our employers 'd only learn
A few o' they furrin commercial ways,
To make the business their first concern,
An' not be so set upon 'olidays,
They wouldn't be always a-'urrying orf,
For the sake of a afternoon at gorf!
With the wants o' the trade they'd keep in touch,
An' 'd sometimes stay at the orfice late;
If their business methods ain't up to much,
They, at any rate, could be up-to-date!
For there isn't no need of a fiscal fence,
If you've henergy coupled wi' common-sense!
We English ain't a-doing our best,
An' that's the reason we loses ground;
It's time as we took more interest,
An' the chance 'as come to buck-up all round.
No need for to put it in doggerel rhymes,
To see as we're right be'ind the times.
For it's Heducation we wants, that's all,
To make us the country we ought to be.
If we rides for a fall at a tariff wall,
We'll very soon find ourselves at sea.
(Which the simile's somewot mixed, you'll say,
But the meanin's clear as the open day!)
Then 'ere's a 'ealth to the Motherland,
For all as they says she's goin' to pot;
Ole England's 'wooden walls' 'll stand
When the fiscal fences is all forgot!
An' she'll 'old 'er own, by land or sea,
So long as 'er sons an' 'er trade is free!
[The end]
Harry Graham's poem: British Trade
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