Temperance & various vices

                        THE

TEE-TOTAL SOCIETY LEADERS.

  TUNE.—THE DANDY FIDDLER.

Good friends I have penned a few lines,
    Concerning a tale of sobriety ;
A number of selfish divines
    Have started a Total Society.
They lecture with faces so grave,
    As if they were all 'dowed with piety ;
But believe me the most of them's knaves,
    That belong the Total Society.

There is one that is very well known,
    In S—— Lane once had a brewery ;
It's known by the folks of the town,
    He carried it on with great fury.
He thirsted for riches His true,
    To gain gold he strove with anxiety;
He got it, and what think you now ?
    He's a prop to the Total Society.

There's another sly snake in the grass,
    Who boasts of his courage and bravery ;
He meets in the Tea Total Class,
    But hark ye my friends of his knavery.
He prints for this ambitious crew,
    But he does not act with propriety ;
For he sells old tickets for new,
    And is praised by the Total Society.

And there's Mr. Tallow for wit,
    He preaches the truth in reality ;
All day in his shop he will sit,
    And say his old meat's the best quality.
He says you must drink no strong beer,
    But eat you may beyond satiety ;
So friends you may see very clear,
    What a set there is in their Society,

A Skinner's the next one we see,
    Who's one of the Methodist Ministers ;
And if you want coffee or tea,
    He'll serve you at home from his cannisters.
When he with the brewer did fight,
    His speeches were quite contrariety ;
And many a one since that night,
    Has left their fine Total Society.

For instance a convert 'tis true,
    Who their leading men praised for his piety,
Its a fact I'm telling to you,
    He has strayed from the Total Society.
He delivered tracts yet he was seen,
    In a state which is called inebriety ;
And every place yet where I've been,
    They are leaving the Total Society.

A tailor chap near the Arcade,
    Who likes for to cabbage the dimity ;
When he goes down to Hawks' its said,
    His speeches are full of sublimity.
He says while the cows eat the grains,
    He cannot sup milk with propriety ;
But be like his goose has no brains,
    Yet he does for the Total Society.

A whitish man down the South Shore,
    Who is noted for his validity ;
To Totalers he spoke from the core,
    But his speech it was full of stupidity.
For he said that a man went to bed
    One night in a state of ebriety,
And when he got up he was dead,
    And joined himself to their Society.

A thriving man comes to their class,
    With news from the Glass House repeatedly ;
He stands and he brays like an ass,
    But at the same time it's conceitedly.
He says he won't eat yeasted bread,
    Nor he cannot with any propriety ;
For fear he should mix with the dead,
    Then adieu to their Total Society.

The friends are the next on the list,
    Who are noted much for their formality ;
They will fly from an alcohol mist,
    Lest it should destroy their morality.
If a brewer's dray comes in their way,
    From it they will walk with rapidity,
And then to their Mends they will say,
    That's a drag to our Total Society.

There's feminine gentry too,
    Declare that liquors won't nourish them ;
But what do they go there to do,
    But just to get men for to cherish them.
They gossip and backbite at tea,
    And that is a plain notoriety,
And I hear they make very free,
    When they come from the Total Society.

My song is almost at an end,
    With madness they seem in affinity ;
But yet I fain hope they would mend,
    And not go to such an extremity.
So now to end these few lines,
    You surely have had a variety,
Then adieu to these selfish divines,
    And away with their Total Society.
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