Body Snatching.

                          New Song.

COME mother, father, daughter, son,
Come, haste ye neighbours, every one,
There's dreadful business hatching ;
For having nothing else to do,
Old Chadw—k thinks he'll prey on you,
And turns to body snatching.

Pretending that he loves you well,
He'll send his harpies where you dwell,
To you no worth attaching ;
They'll drive you from beside your dead,
From those who shared your daily bread,
'Tis Chadw—k's body snatching.

To gaze again upon the brow
So radiant once, so darkened now,
Ye must, his fortune patching,
Through hail and rain, through frost & snow,
To yonder dreary dead-house go,
Through Chadw—k's body snatching.

There, hunting o'er a heap of dead,
By some low, vulgar, monster led,
And vile deseases catching,
You'll stand, all shivering with the cold,
To weep o'er those you loved of old,
Through Chadw—k's body snatching.

But if you cherish love for those
Who shared your joys, who shared your woes
Your doorway safely latching,
Let not the foot profane and rude,
Within your little home intrude,
For Chadw—k's body snatching.

Why, if they want to do us good,
Tex light and air, and clothes and food,
Our timber, walls, and thatching ?
A wholesome house and water pure,
Are far more needed by the poor
Than Chadw—k's body snatching.

Carlisle and Smith, and all the rest,
Do only what he says is best,
Their sapient sconces scratching,
They're only servants in his eyes,
But think themselves most wonderous wise,
With Chadw—k's body snatching.

To him like animals they're dumb,
He makes them go, or makes them come,
Their ready footsteps matching.
But, Britons, bid them stand aloof,
Nor let them dare beneath your roof,
To practise body snatching.

                        New Song.

HER Gracious Majesty, they say,
Has got it in her head
That people do not know the way
To bury their own dead ;
That if we're poor we do not fret
For dear ones we have lost ;
That we so easily forget,
We don't care where they're toss'd.

So Chadw—k makes a mighty fuss
Of sickness aud disease,
And thinks that he can frighten us
By bugbears such as these.
He thinks that we shall lightly part
With those whom we have loved ,
That we've no feeling in the heart,
And don't care where they're shoved.

So then the Chad'ickers will smell
When wife or husband dies,
And seize the form you loved so well
Beneath your weeping eyes.
All soon they'll hurry it away,
(This body snatching crew),
And in the common dead-house lay,
That dear one far from you.

Then day by day, when you would go
To gaze upon that face,
You'd have to bear a load of wo
Unto that loathsome place,
Yes, bent with grief you'd have to tread
Through many a weary street,
To print a kiss upon the dead,
Where all the paupers meet.

Thus day by day through frost and snow,
Or through the pelting storm,
Or faint with heat, you'd have to go,
To seek that cherished form.
But is it for the poor man's sake
That Chadw—k fusses here ?
O, no ! it is that he may take
His THOUSAND POUNDS A YEAR.

He and his willing tools have said
That with the poorer kind
The sacred presence of the dead
Will brutalize the mind.
The sight of death destroys, they say,
The sacredness of life,
That all we learn from silent clay
Is violence and strife.

But ah, they lie whoever say
That poor men have no hearts,
Or that they'd like to send away,
Their dead in body-carts.
My room's my castle, though I'm poor ;
Let none approach the spot,
I'll watch my dead, and guard the door,
And keep the poker hor.