Genre:

Song, Drollery

Subjects:

Time, Progress, Transport, Railways, Accidents, Medical Practitioners, Telegraphy, Political Economy

    Compares the 'old days' of England to the present, noting that ''Tis true no railways then we had', it was a time when people travelled by coach or on horseback and when 'surgeons had some work to do / On them that were upset, or flung [from horses and carriages]', but that 'monster accidents we knew / Not'. Adds that in his youth there were no telegrams or India-rubber, which he regards as the 'chief good Free Trade has done'. (236)