/ · John S. Farmer’s Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes
On the Prigging Lay
On the Prigging Lay
1829
By H. T. R....: a translation of a French Slang song (“Un jour à la Croix Rouge”)
in Vidocq’s Memoirs, 1828-9, 4 vols..
I
Ten or a dozen “cocks of the game,”
1 pickpockets
On the prigging lay to the flash-house came,
2 thieving game; thieves’ rendezvous
Lushing blue ruin and heavy wet
3 drinking gin; porter
Till the darkey, when the downy set.
4 evening; sun
All toddled and begun the hunt
For readers, tattlers, fogies, or blunt.
5 pocket-books; watches; handkerchiefs; money
II
Whatever swag we chance for to get,
6 plunder
All is fish that comes to net:
Mind your eye, and draw the yokel,
Don’t disturb or use the folk ill.
Keep a look out, if the beaks are nigh,
7 police
And cut your stick, before they’re fly.
8 run; before they see you
III
As I vas a crossing St James’s Park
I met a swell, a well-togg’d spark.
9 well-dressed
I stops a bit: then toddled quicker,
For I’d prigged his reader, drawn his ticker;
10 stolen his pocketbook and watch
Then he calls—“Stop thief!” thinks I, my master,
That’s a hint to me to mizzle faster.
11 run
IV
When twelve bells chimed, the prigs returned,
12 thieves
And rapped at the ken of Uncle ----:
13 house
“Uncle, open the door of your crib
If you’d share the swag, or have one dib.
14 plunder; coin
Quickly draw the bolt of your ken,
Or we’ll not shell out a mag, old ----.”
15 give you a half-penny
V
Then says Uncle, says he, to his blowen,
16 woman
“D’ye twig these coves, my mot so knowing?
17 known; men; mistress
Are they out-and-outers, dearie?
18 safe to trust
Are they fogle-hunters, or cracksmen leary?
19 pickpockets; burglers
Are they coves of the ken, d’ye know?
20 of our band
Shall I let ’em in, or tell ’em to go?”
VI
“Oh! I knows ’em now; hand over my breeches—
I always look out for business—vich is
A reason vy a man should rouse
At any hour for the good of his house,
The top o’ the morning, gemmen all,
21 a cheery greeting
And for vot you vants, I begs you’ll call.”
VII
But now the beaks are on the scene,
22 police
And watched by moonlight where we went:—
Stagged us a toddling into the ken,
23 saw us going
And were down upon us all; and then
Who should I spy but the slap-up spark
24 dandy
What I eased of the swag in St James’s Park.
25 robbed of the plunder
VIII
There’s a time, says King Sol, to dance and sing;
I know there’s a time for another thing:
There’s a time to pipe, and a time to snivel—
I wish all Charlies and beaks at the divel:
26 police and magistrates
For they grabbed me on the prigging lay,
And I know I’m booked for Bot’ny Bay.
27 transported
Taken from
Musa Pedestris,
Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes
[1536―1896], collected and annotated by John S. Farmer.
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