The Happy Old Days At Peckham

A humorous song from the music hall, 1906.
Words and music by George Grossmith.

The sheet music:

Happy-Old-Days-at-Peckham – Sheet MusicDownload

Accompaniment by Ross Duncan Boyle:

The-Happy-Old-Days-at-Peckham – MIDIDownload

Lyrics

  1. I was once a very common little shop boy
    Though now so many millions have I made
    At a charity school I used to be the top boy
    And I’ve earned the same distinction in my trade
    On my bread was spread a very little butter
    In those impecunious days so long gone by
    When I used to play at marbles in the gutter
    In our little street somewhere near Peckham Rye

Refrain
I shall never forget the happy old days at Peckham
The recollection sets my heart aglow
I would dance and sing
I loved a swing, and had a fling at kiss-in-the-ring
Of course that was a many years ago

  1. My father’s little shop was painted yallow
    With a sign of a Harlequin in red and green
    He did a little trade in grease and tallow
    And balls of string and cheese and parafeen
    He considered me the smartest of his nippers
    So I stood behind the marmalade and penny kippers
    The beetle poison, also brandy balls
  2. I grew a man and then became ambitious
    To advance my prospects I was always prone
    I seized an opportunity propitious
    To start a little business on my own
    I thought my shaky grammar I’d embellish
    And with spelling I would get in better touch
    I acquired a voice considered rather swellish
    And I didn’t drop my “h’s” quite so much
  3. With a single shop my way was rather narrowed
    So I started building houses by the scores
    Till they quite eclipsed the gorgeousness of Harrod
    And the multiplicity of Whiteley’s stores
    I sell everything from boots to sheep and cows, and
    There’s not a shingle thing you cannot get
    To Charities I often fling ten thousand
    That’s why I’ve been created Baronet
  4. My wife was known as little “Podgy Betsy”
    She is now “her Ladyship” I may remark
    She revels in my well-earned Baronetcy
    Observed of all observers in the park
    This curious world is quite replete with fallacies
    Our social rise we couldn’t then foretell
    Now we dine with Kings and Queens within their palaces
    And Kings and Queens have dined with us as well

Final refrain
We shall never forget those happy old days at Peckham
The recollection sets our hearts aglow
We’d dance and sing, we loved a swing
And had our fling at “Kiss in the ring”
But of ourse that was a many years ago