“Hard labor—working day and night—
And very little pay,—
Must I, even on holidays,
Do clowning for his play?
“During that recent thunderstorm
In the hot lightning’s fire—
There’s where I burned a great big hole
In this, my best attire.
“Small wages, and but little graft,
And scarcely any tips—
Harldy enough for salad oil
To grease my parching lips.
“A roast on Sundays only,
With water—what a life—
On such a paltry income
I could hardly get a wife!
“This job would never keep me
Did I not have the choice
To help with physics lessons
Some backward college boys.
Did not some peasant women
Make a few kopeks clink,
I could not, e’en on Sundays,
Buy me a little drink.
“To work for nearly nothing
Drives me most to despair;
Tell him that for his chocolate
I do not give a care.
[23]
