ld Kent Road. Yah, ah, knocked 'em in the Old
Kent Road!'

'Oo, Liza!' they shouted; the whole street joined in, and they gave
long, shrill, ear-piercing shrieks and strange calls, that rung down
the street and echoed back again.

'Hextra special!' called out a wag.

'Oh, Liza! Oo! Ooo!' yells and whistles, and then it thundered forth
again:

'Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road!'

Liza put on the air of a conquering hero, and sauntered on, enchanted
at the uproar. She stuck out her elbows and jerked her head on one
side, and said to herself as she passed through the bellowing crowd:

'This is jam!'

'Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road!'

When she came to the group round the barrel-organ, one of the girls
cried out to her:

'Is that yer new dress, Liza?'

'Well, it don't look like my old one, do it?' said Liza.

'Where did yer git it?' asked another friend, rather enviously.

'Picked it up in the street, of course,' scornfully answered Liza.

'I believe it's the same one as I saw in the pawnbroker's dahn the
road,' said one of the men, to tease her.

'Thet's it; but wot was you doin' in there? Pledgin' yer shirt, or was
it yer trousers?'

'Yah, I wouldn't git a second-'and dress at a pawnbroker's!'

'Garn!' said Liza indignantly. 'I'll swipe yer over the snitch if yer
talk ter me. I got the mayterials in the West Hend, didn't I? And I
'ad it mide up by my Court Dressmiker, so you jolly well dry up, old
jellybelly.'

'Garn!' was the reply.

Liza had been so intent on her new dress and the comment it was
exciting that she had not noticed the organ.

'Oo, I say, let's 'ave some dancin',' she said as soon as she saw it.
'Come on, Sally,' she added, to one of the girls, 'you an' me'll dance
togither. Grind away, old cock!'

The man turned on a new tune, and the organ began to play the
Intermezzo from the 'Cavalleria'; other couples quickly followed
Liza's example, and they began to waltz round with the same solemnity
as before; but Liza outdid them all; if the others were as stately as
queens, she was as stately as an empress; the gravity and dignity with
which she waltzed were something appalling, you felt that the minuet
was a frolic in comparison; it would have been a fitting measure to
tread round the grave of a _premiere danseuse_, or at the funeral of a
professional humorist. And the graces she put on, the languor of the
eyes, the contemptuous curl of the lips, the exquisite turn of the
hand, the