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A Loyal Address |
by Mike Yorke |
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May it please Your Gracious Majesty to know that your loyal subjects in the town of Blyth agree with recent sentiments of yours (so perfectly expressed for all to hear) that you were not amused. For we too, humble as we are, are not amused by much that we endure: the sixty hours a week of heavy work in industries both dangerous and grim our children in the mine’s unhealthy dark. We also find it hard to raise a smile at constant hunger, vermin, lice and filth in overcrowded slums of grimy streets, starvation wages, lock-outs and disputes to try to earn enough to make ends meet. And mirth seems strangely absent when we think of tropical diseases and the Raj, the Crimean war and other kinds of strife for charging into cannon-fire and hell so Tommy Atkins can lay down his life. We also see no reason to enjoy the spectre of the workhouse when we’re old, the pompous, well-fed faces in command give pious platitudes instead of help. Such arrogance we cannot understand. So please excuse our lack of merriment, forgive, we beg, our dour, unsmiling mien. Your Jubilee will cheer us up no end and prompt us to declare “God Save the Queen!” |
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