[Figure 2]

    In Westminster, not long ago,
    There lived a ratcatcher’s daughter;
    She was not born in Westminster
    But on t’other side of the water.

Some Singers

In the Pickwick Papers we have at least three original poems.  Wardle’s carol—­

    I care not for Spring; on his fickle wing
    Let the blossoms and buds be borne—­

has been set to music, but Dickens always preferred that it should be sung to the tune of ‘Old King Cole,’ though a little ingenuity is required to make it fit in.  The ’wild and beautiful legend,’

    Bold Turpin vunce, on Hounslow Heath
    His bold mare Bess bestrode—­er,

with which Sam Weller favoured a small but select company on a memorable occasion appears to have been overlooked by composers until Sir Frederick Bridge set it to excellent music.  It will be remembered that Sam intimated that he was not

    wery much in the habit o’ singin’ without the
    instrument; but anythin’ for a quiet life, as the man
    said wen he took the sitivation at the lighthouse.

Sam was certainly more obliging than another member of the company, the ‘mottled-faced’ gentleman, who, when asked to sing, sturdily and somewhat offensively declined to do so.  We also find references to other crusty individuals who flatly refuse to exercise their talents, as, for instance, after the accident to the coach which was conveying Nicholas Nickleby and Squeers to Yorkshire.  In response to the call for a song to pass the time away, some protest they cannot, others wish they could, others can do nothing without the book, while the ’very fastidious lady entirely ignored the invitation to give them some little Italian thing out of the last opera.’  A somewhat original plea for refusing to sing when asked is given by the chairman of the musical gathering at the Magpie and Stump (P.P.).  When asked why he won’t enliven the company he replies, ’I only know one song, and I have sung it already, and it’s a fine of glasses round to sing the same song twice in one night.’  Doubtless he was deeply thankful to Mr. Pickwick for changing the subject.  At another gathering of a similar nature, we are told about a man who knew a song of seven verses, but he couldn’t recall them at the moment, so he sang the first verse seven times.

There is no record as to what the comic duets were that Sam Weller and Bob Sawyer sang in the dickey of the coach that was taking the party to Birmingham, and this suggests what a number of singers of all kinds are referred to, though no mention is made of their songs.  What was Little Nell’s repertoire?  It must have been an extensive one according to the man in the boat (O.C.S. 43).

    ‘You’ve got a very pretty voice’ ... said this
    gentleman ...  ‘Let me hear a song this minute.’

    ‘I don’t think I know one, sir,’ returned Nell.