[Verse 1] Seventeen ninety-nine, London's ledger bleeding red, Pitt stands and says we'll tax the living, not wait on the dead, Ten percent on incomes clearing two hundred pound a year — A war tax, a stopgap, never meant to persevere. He calls it "temporary," a word that aged like old claret, Parliament signs reluctant while Bonaparte eyes the Channel strait. [Chorus] Dez por cento, pague então, Pitt apertou o cinto de ferro, Ten on two hundred, hold the line — guerra custa dinheiro, Income tax, imposto novo, the war bill's climbing steep, Napoleão do outro lado, England pays to keep the peace. [Verse 2] Meanwhile at the Bank of England, seventeen ninety-seven, They lock the vault, suspend the specie — that's the gold and silver given For paper notes, now inconvertible, a promise dressed as coin, No one can redeem a pound note while the war machine's enjoined. Twenty-four years of floating money, propped on faith, not metal weight, Printing presses fund the Continent while the currency depreciates. [Chorus] Dez por cento, pague então, Pitt apertou o cinto de ferro, Ten on two hundred, hold the line — guerra custa dinheiro, Income tax, imposto novo, the war bill's climbing steep, Napoleão do outro lado, England pays to keep the peace. [Verse 3] By eighteen-fifteen the number's staggering — eight hundred million pound, Two hundred percent of all the output, maybe two-fifty bound, Waterloo gets won on credit, Wellington's march, the Treasury's groan, Britain minted the first mega-debt the modern world had known. [Verse 4] Consols trade below their value, interest swallowing the budget whole, Every harvest, every tariff feeding debt without a soul, Landlords grumble, merchants grumble, smugglers dodge the customs men, Yet the ledger keeps demanding one more shilling, now and then. Across the water, farmers watch the price of bread and wheat, While bankers in the City count the bonds they can't repeat. Some say bankruptcy is coming, some say credit's iron will Can carry nations through the fire if they only hold it still. [Bridge] Parliament says enough in sixteen, strike the income tax down, Peel's Act in nineteen brings the gold back, convertibility's crown restored — Mas a dívida, ela fica — debt doesn't vanish with decree, Can a nation outgrow its burden? That's the wager history leaves to see. [Outro] Dez por cento, quase esquecido, mas o molde ainda está, First mega-debt in a modern frame — the pattern that it cut will stay, Pitt's percent, Peel's gold, Napoleon's bill still owed, Grow or founder — a century's gamble down the long, uncertain road. [Chorus] Dez por cento, pague então, Pitt apertou o cinto de ferro, Ten on two hundred, hold the line — guerra custa dinheiro, Income tax, imposto novo, the war bill's climbing steep, Napoleão do outro lado, England pays to keep the peace.
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