But the best specimens were the street singers, that ragged, squalling
class. A dirty tattered, coarse-featured wench whose visits from the
cadging house could only be varied to the gin shop and pawn shop, came
singing and dancing in rocking her body to and fro. She was saluted by
the name, of "Bristol Bet," and "Give us the sergeant;" but Bet had
tasted too much of the inspiring liquid, to answer their calls with
promptitude. She footed away vigorously, to drive away care, seconding
every caper with a shout, and "Jack's the lad," and slapping her body,
and heel, in rather an unlady-like style.

After giving her legs a proper shaking, she laid her head a little on
one side, and moving it, with her foot to keep time, screamed out, in
notes both loud and shrill,

"One lovely morning as I was walking,
In the merry month of May,
Alone a smart young pair were talking,
And I overheard what they did say.
The one appeared a lovely maiden,
Seemingly in grief and pain,
The other was a gay young soldier,
A sergeant in the waggon train."

This appeared to be a real "Sweet Home" song; it went to the heart of
every one in the room, who roared and bellowed applause, and thumped
away with their hands and feet on the floor and tables. Bet never
stopped until she had given the whole history of the Sergeant and his
dearest Nancy. This poetry and music was too congenial to be easily
set aside.

One of the same sex, and certainly one of the same family, a low,
squat, scowling, weather-beaten looking hussey, a cadger born and
bred, whose shoulders seemed as if they had been squared and rounded
by a child continually laying upon them. She was the real songstress
of low life; Vulgarity might have taken her by the hand. Throwing up
her face which was the very symbol of bad weather and an easterly
wind, doled out.

"It was down in the lowlands a poor boy did wander,
It was down in the lowlands a poor boy did roam;
By his friends he was neglected, he looked so dejected,
A poor little fisherman's boy so far away from home."

This dismal ditty, although it brought down thunders of applause, made
our very flesh to creep, as it brought to our mind cauld rainy nights,
starving times, Ratcliff Highway, and Whitechapel, as the other had
street mobs and lads whistling and singing the popular sergeant, as
they trudged home from their work at night.

They were all now in the piping