Downward through the darkening twilight, In the days long time ago, now, In the last of drunken stages, By the Half-Moon fell poor Norah, On the pavement fell poor Norah, Just about to be a mother. She'd been tippling with some women, Just within the Wine-Vaults' swing-door, When her Gossip, out of mischief, Partly idle, partly spiteful, Pushed the swing-door from behind her, Pushed in twain the Wine-Vaults' door-flap, And poor Norah tumbled backward, Downward through the darkening twilight, On the gangway foul, the pavement, On the gangway foul with mud-stains. "See! a wench falls!" cried the people; Look, a tipsy wench is falling!" There amidst the gaping starers, There amidst the idle passers, On the gangway foul, the pavement, In the murky darkened twilight, Poor drunk Norah bore a boy-babe. Thus was born young Drop o' Wather, Thus was born the child of squalor. He was named, by those who knew him, Out of joke, and fun, and larking, For what's called an Irish reason, Or, by folks who sport the Classics, A _lucus a non lucendo_, Like, for all it is so unlike, Hold a thing to be another, For the sake of contradiction, Or the sake of droll connection; So the folks who knew our hero, Gave his nickname for this reason,-- 'Cause his mother never touched a Drop of Water in her lifetime. At the door on fine spring evenings, Played the little Drop o' Wather; Heard the cry of "Buy my inguns!" Heard the cry "Young raddyshees, yere" Calls of cadger, costermonger; "Bilin'-apples!" said the huckster; "Pies-all 'ot!" still said the pieman. Saw the pot-boy, Wall-eyed Tommy, Trudging through the dusk of evening, With the shrillness of his whistle Piercing all the courts and alleys. And he sang the song of street-boys. Sang the song the pot-boy taught him;-- "Wall-eyed Tommy, he's the cove, boys! He's the ranting, roaring blade, boys! He's the lad, the daring fellow! He's the chap, to carry ale-cans, Pots of beer, and all them 'ere boys!" Saw the balls at the pawnbroker's, Balls alike, and three in number, Saw the gold and burnish on them, Bawled, "What are those? I say, mother!" And the fuddled Norah answered, "Once a cricketer, when angry, Seized his ball, and bowling, threw it Up against the shop times threefold, Right against the shop he threw it; 'Tis its tri-ghost that you see there." Saw the gallows near the prison, In the morning sky, the gallows; Bawled, "What is that? I say mother!" And the fuddled Norah answered, "'Tis the gallows-tree, the gibbet; All the naughty boys of London, All the wicked ones and careless, When in town they steal and pilfer, Hang on that 'ere tree above us." When he heard the thieves at midnight,