[Verse 1] At St Martin's Gate the lantern crowd is thick — Lincoln, Doll, the Clown, George Betts, Williamson, quick, facing a Sergeant sent to read them the law, but Lincoln opens up with herring he once saw: a herring at a Harry groat (that's fourpence) all alone, butter at elevenpence, and beef four nobles a stone — a stone's fourteen pounds, if the word's new to you — the strangers eat more here than at home, he says, it's true. Williamson cries "Trash, trash" at the roots, the parsnips, foreign roots that bring the palsy — the shaking — to London hips. Lincoln just grins, lets the comedy depart: "for what's a sorry parsnip to a good heart?" [Chorus] This is the scene where the mob finds its tongue, half market-day joke, half powder-keg sung, they'll pocket the king's mercy, call it their own, but not a crumb offered to strangers alone. [Verse 2] The Sergeant steps up with a pardon to spend, the king's own mercy, held out like a hand to bend. Lincoln grabs it fast for himself and his friends: "we accept of the king's mercy, but we will show no mercy upon the strangers" — and there it ends. The crowd turns the Sergeant to a joke, to a jeer, drowns his careful reading till his message won't clear. In comes the Mayor, in comes Surrey, Shrewsbury too — but the mob can't settle which lordship gets through, half shout one name while half shout another, and Surrey gets booed like he insulted their mother. [Verse 3] More reads the danger plain as any flood or fire: "Whiles they are o'er the bank of their obedience, / Thus will they bear down all things," he warns them higher. Doll remembers a kindness nobody else would tell — More once found her brother work, hired him, treated him well, so she lifts up her voice above the rattle and the rout: "Let's hear him" — and Sheriff More's name starts to spread about. Lincoln mutters the devil himself can't rule this crowd — More turns the words right back, measured, unbowed: "To lead those that the devil cannot rule?" [Bridge] A riot isn't one voice, it's a hundred small complaints, a sergeant with no soldiers, everybody's patience faint, till one remembered kindness turns the shouting to a name — Doll's gratitude the reason More gets called to tame the flame. [Chorus] This is the scene where the mob finds its tongue, half market-day joke, half powder-keg sung, they'll pocket the king's mercy, call it their own, but not a crumb offered to strangers alone. [Outro] Groat and stone, pumpions, palsy — the old words now are clear, St Martin's Gate still rattles, centuries from here, a crowd that breaks its banks will bear down everything it meets — remember Doll, remember More, remember London's streets.
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