Strike of the Journeymen Tailors
Oh have you heard the jolly row,
In London all around, just now,
If not, I’ll tell you all, I vow,
It is the strike of the Journeymen Tailors
The masters and the men you see,
They cannot very well agree,
The masters they won’t alter the log,
The men say they shall, so help their bob;
The masters say the men are wrong,
But the men say they are too strong,
So I suppose they must settle it themselves among,
This strike of the journeymen Tailors,
The sleeveboard and goose may idle lay,
The needle and bobkin is stowed away,
Oh, is there not the devil to pay,
Thro’ the strike of the Journeyman Tailors
Now ever since the world began,
They say nine tailors makes a man,
But do without them they never can,
The host of the Journeymen Tailors.
For indebted to their work ’tis clear,
Is kings and dukes, and lords and peers,
They are wanted here, and wanted there,
And all they want is to play fair.
And they must get it, these men of stitches,
Or what shall we do for coats and breeches,
We must black and go naked, or hide in ditches
Thro’ the strike of the Journeymen Tailors.
Now the tailors are of ancient date,
Believe it’s true, what I now state,
And I’ll tell you the time if you’ll only wait
When the world was first blessed with a tailor
The first there was, tho’ I never see’d him,
Had his workshop in the garden of Eden,
And I tell you he was not a green ’un,
Tho’ he grew lots of cabbage to feed on;
He stitched away when the world began,
And made fig leaf togs, A No. 1,
He was a regular Flint, and never a Dung,
It was Adam, the first of the tailors.
What we shall do, I do not know,
If the men to work they will not go,
We shall walk about just like scarecrows,
Thro’ the strike of the Journeymen Tailors.
We shall be all rags and jags,
And only fit for the ragman’s bags,
Or to make a sign for some rag shop,
With just enough left to make a mop;
Oh wont it be a funny go,
To see the swells in Rotton Row,
With their shirt tails flying in the wind, as they go,
Thro’ the strike of the Journeymen Tailors.
An old lady the other day did run,
Into the shop of Moses and Son,
Saying, please Mr Mo, are you a Dung;
Don’t you know there’s a strike with the tailors!
Then round the corner she did pop,
Saying, is this not a sweating shop,
Then he holloa’d police, but it was no use,
For she flattened his nose with a ten pound goose,
Now they tell me the sleeveboards looked quite big,
And round old ———— they danced a jig,
Saying, we shall have a rest, so please the pigs
Thro’ the strike of the Journeymen Tailors.
Now let us hope we soon shall see,
The masters and the men agree,
For fair play is the style for me,
With all classes, as well as the tailors.
If they don’t go in, I do declare,
We soon shall have no breeches to wear,
But that my friend is only a joke,
So, if I offend, I am sorry I spoke.
We all for the biggest shilling fight,
And I think you will own that I am right,
But jolly good luck I say, blow me tight,
To the whole of the Journeymen Tailors.
H. Disley, Printer, 57, High street, St. Giles.