You bonny lads and lasses gay,
Who like a bit of chaff,
I'll tell you of a She He Barman,
And I'm sure 'will make you laugh.
She did not like the petticoats,
So she slipped the trousers on,
She engaged herself as a barman,
And said her name was Tom.
At the Royal Mortar Tavern, London Road,
She served the customers all round,
The She He Barman was engaged
By Mr Frederick Brown,
She popped around the bar like steam,
The girls and chaps did wink,
When they went in for a drop of gin,
But little did they think.
That Tommy Walker was a maid,
When they together met,
Last night a costermonger said,
Who'd thought Tom's name was Bet.
In the morning she put on her shirt,
Her trousers, coat, and boots,
She He Tommy Walker
A regular swell did look;
She could drink a little drop of stout,
And smoke a mild cigar,
Tommy Walker, the female barman,
Was a clever chap, oh ! la!
She had neither beard or moustache,
And her belly was not big,
But Tom the He She barman
Turned out to be a prig;
She nailed the sixpences and shillings,
And she prigged the half-a-crown;
She three months was Tom the barman
At Mr Frederick Brown's.
She Tom had been a sailor,
Two years upon the main,
She was dropped from the Royal Mortar,
On board the ship Horsemonger Lane
Three years she doffed the petticoats,
And put the trousers on,
She served behind the counter,
And the people called her Tom.
For years she plough'd the ocean,
As steward of a ship,
She used to make the captain's bed,
Drink grog and make his flip.
She could go aloft so manfully,
This female sailor Jack,
But if she slept with a messmate,
Why of course she turned her back.
Now tired of a sailor's life,
She thought she'd be a star,
She got a crib at Mr. Brown's,
To serve behind the bar,
This pretty female barman—
Her modesty don't shock—
It is better than handling of the ropes,
To be turning on the cocks.
If you'd seen her take them in her hand,
You'd have said she was a caulker,
So nicely she handled them—
She said her name was Walker.
To see her put on a butt of beer,
And when the brewers come,
She nicely drove the spigot in,
And then out came the bung.
The ladies like the trousers,
Of that there is no doubt.
Many would be a barman,
But fear they'd be found out.
Tom was not a handsome female,
She too long had been, adrift,
Since she put on the Gurnsey,
And chucked away her shift,
H. Disley, Printer, 57, High Street, St. Giles's.
SOURCE: Curiosities of Street Literature, London, Reeves and Turner, 196, Strand, 1871.