The Morning.
For Ease and for Dispatch the Morning’s best:
No Tides of Passengers the Street molest.
You’ll see a draggleddraggled: soiled with dragging on the ground or through the mire.
Damsel, here and there,
From
Billingsgate her fishy Traffick bear;
On Doors the sallow Milk-maid chalks her Gains;
Ah! how unlike the Milk-maid of the Plains!the sallow Milk-maid… unlike the Milk-maid of the Plains: a contrast between the “sallow” health of life in the city versus the health and beauty
of agricultural life.Before proud Gates attending Asses bray,
Or arrogate with solemn Pace the Way;
These grave Physicians, with their milky Chear,
The Love-sick Maid and dwindling Beau repair;
Here Rows of Drummers stand in martial File,
And with their Vellom-ThunderVellom-Thunder: the sound made by a drum's parchment. shake the Pile,
To greet the new-made bride. Are sounds like these,
The proper Prelude to a State of Peace?
Now Industry awakes her busy Sons,
Full-charg’d with News the breathless HawkerHawker: a person who goes from place to place selling goods. The modern equivalent is a pedlar. runs:
Shops
Shops open, Coaches roll, Carts shake the Ground,
And all the Streets with passing Cries resound.
What Trades prejudicial to Walkers.
If cloth’d in Black you tread the busy town,
Or if distinguish’d by the rev’rend Gown,
Three Trades avoid; oft' in the mingling Press
The Barber’s Apron soils the sable Dress:
Shun the Perfumer’s touch with cautious Eye;
Nor let the Baker’s step advance too nigh.
Ye Walkers! too, that youthful Colours wear,
Three sullying Trades avoid with equal Care.—
The little Chimney-Sweeper skulks along,
And marks with sooty stains the heedless Throng:
When Small-coalSmall-coal: charcoal.
murmurs in the hoarser Throat,
From smuttysmutty: “black with smoke or coal” (Johnson). Dangers guard
thy threaten’d Coat:
The Dust-man’s CartDust-man’s Cart: the cart that is used to carry away dust and ashes.
offends thy Cloaths and Eyes,
When through the Street a Cloud of Ashes flies;
C 4
But