Don’t Do It Again Matilda

An Analysis of the Language Used by Harry Champion in Don’t Do It Again Matilda

YouTube link

This page gives my comments on some of the language and intonation used on Harry Champion’s May 1910 recording of Don’t Do It Again Matilda, a song attributed, words and music, to Fred Murray.

My grandparents were born in the 1880s and a lot of the expressions and phrasing in the way they spoke were very similar to those used by Harry Champion. My parents, born in 1913 and 1914 also in London, were of a subsequent generation, with a few throwbacks in their language. They only spoke a little bit like Harry Champion

Lyric	Comment
Matilda, a lady I’ve known many years, She’s a beauty, a bit of alright. Last night in her parlour, I sat on a chair And I had such a terrible fright. I thought that her poodle had bit me, I did, When I rolled meself up in a knot, When she said that her beautiful set of false teeth She had laid on the chair, I said: ‘What!’	A bit of alright to describe a woman (or lady, Harry Champion would never have said: ‘a woman I’ve known many years’ as that would have seemed pompous and disrespectful) is a classic phrase. Very evocative for me, though I think it will have pretty-much died out with my grandparents. Possibly it would be used a bit by my parents’ generation (those born in the 1910s-1920s) but seeming rather dated by then I think. The use of the word parlour is of its time. The parlour was the sitting room, the best room. The full set of false teeth for a lady with a parlour would have been a relatively recent invention by 1910, since gas in the form of ether or chloroform or nitrous oxide as an anesthetic was only being pioneered in the 1840s. Probably this song is referring to something of a fashion. I said ‘What!’ sounds very familiar to me. Still in use in London as an expression well into the 1960s.
Don’t do it again, Matilda, Don’t do it again! Your beautiful teeth they are most unkind, Never bit me before, but they bit me behind. Wow, wow! They’re biting me now, And I cannot locate the pain. Pull them out of me south Put ’em into yer mouth, And don’t do it again!	Never bit me before but they bit me behind, very clever, slightly risqué. Get ’em out of me south. South as a word for backside has probably died out now. Used to be quite widespread.
Matilda and I went to Brighton one day And she stood on the beach long-a me. The wind it was windy, got under her clothes And it blew her right out in the sea. I saw her come up with a smile on her face, And she looked like a drownded old pup. She came up again to the top of the foam, And I said that’s yer second time up!	She stood on the beach long-a me, ie she stood on the beach beside me. The expression ‘long-a me’ was widely used in the period and later, and you would hear old fellers say it all the time. Died out now I think. Everyone at the time would understand what a ‘drownded old pup’ was, for drowning puppies when there got to be too many was a widespread practice, or said to be. I’ve never seen it done but I heard my uncles talk about the most effective methods, though whether they themselves every put puppies in a bag with rocks and slung them in the canal, who knows? They might have. Notice how there’s a cymbal crash to coincide with the exclamation mark. It happens a few times on the recording.
Ah, don’t do it again, Matilda, Never you do it again. You’ve done it now twice and number three You’ll find it unlucky – just take it from me. Don’t throw that under your nose, But swallow the Raging Main. Drink up all the lot, When you get to the bot’ Then never come up again!	Never you do it again, an admonition. Usually in English we make an imperative negative by putting ‘do not’ in front of it, as in ‘don’t do it again’, and we make this firmer by including ‘you’ as in ‘don’t you do it again’. Harry Champion makes it firmer still by using ‘never you’, as did my grandparents and older uncles and aunts, when they were being really, really firm. I think this form of expression may have died out now. Just take it from me is another typical firm admonition of the time. It often meant: I know what I’m talking about and you don’t. Possibly also died out though once widely used. I cannot quite make out what Harry Champion sings where I’ve written ‘Don’t throw that under your nose’ I think that’s what he says, and it would just about make sense. The Raging Main is a bit imaginative for Brighton. The Raging Main is what Neptune is the ruler of. I think it would be considered a bit posy now, though it sounds familiar from what I remember of the time, or rather from the speech of people who were alive at the time. When you get to the bot’, or Harry Champion might even say bottom with the final syllable mumbled. Bot was used as an abbreviation for bottom in the sense of someone’s bottom. I don’t think I ever heard it used in relation to the sea, but then again this may be an innuendo.
Matilda she went to a fancy dress ball And she played an original part. She rubbed herself over with raspberry jam And she went as a raspberry tart. I went up to hug her and give her a kiss, Well the jam went all over me kite. I know she’s a sticker, But Lor’ what a licker! I shouted: ‘you’ve done it tonight!’	Played an original part, playing an original part is what someone did if they did something out of the ordinary, especially if it was considered somewhat risky or rude. If my grandfather had seen someone walking along the road with their breast or penis exposed, he would definitely have described them as playing an original part. Not that he ever did see those particular things I should think, but it was that type of thing. Notice how Harry Champion slightly rolls his r’s in this verse, when he pronounces ‘raspberry’ in particular. This is accurate – well of course it’s accurate, for he was of the time. I mean that was how many people in London at the time spoke. When I was young, to have rolled the r on raspberry would have sounded very old-fashioned and uncool. In north London by the 1950s we pronounced raspberry sounding something like ooaarsboowee. Still do sometimes. A raspberry tart is a fart, rhyming slang, as in blow a raspberry or ‘who just rasped?’ This verse is not as straightforward as it seems. The Oxford English Dictionary and Partridge in his book Historical Slang both say that kite means belly, and people point to Harry Champion’s song Boiled Beef and Carrots where he sings: From morn til night you blow out your kite as an indication that it means belly. But I don’t think that’s right, or rather I don’t think that that’s what Harry Champion means, I think he means face. I always understood kite to mean face, and I understood ‘blow out your kite’ to mean the same as ‘fill your face’. I have a page about the use of the word kite in London slang at Kite You Are. I know she’ a sticker but Lor’ what a licker – I think that’s what he sings, though it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. I don’t get this phrase at all. Lor’ is short for Lord, and that was a widely-used expression of the time, oh Lor’ oh lumme. You’ve done it tonight! Now you’ve done it! You still hear this expression a bit I think. Sounds a bit Laurel and Hardy.
Ah, don’t do it again, Matilda Don’t do it again! That raspberry jam was made of glue It cannot be helped but I’m sticking to you. My luck, our noses are stuck and I’m starting to lose me train. I can’t walk about with you stuck on me snout, So don’t do it again!	It cannot be helped, a typical expression of that period and of the next generation too. It’s fatalistic, expressed in the passive voice, so is also an expression of the time. Of course Harry Champion is simply using a well-known phrase, I don’t suppose he analysed it for a moment. I’m starting to lose me train presumably means ‘train of thought’, that’s if Harry Champion actually does say train, it’s a bit hard to be sure. I can’t walk about. Very typical. Some of my older uncles, especially the Tottenham and Edmonton lot (Harry Champion lived in Tottenham) would say ‘You can’t walk about like that!’, which means: ‘I can’t . . .’: passive distancing to boot. Another Harry Champion song has ‘walk about’ used in this sense: Ginger, You’re Barmy. ‘Don’t walk about without your cady on, Ginger, you’re barmy!’ (And as an aside, I don’t know about the word: cady. Obviously means a hat but no one seems to know why. Not a word I ever heard I think.) With you stuck on me snout. Snout as a word for nose, typical London and maybe still used a bit.
I shall never forget, on the day I got wed Well, there’s only yer ’umble to blame. Matilda insisted on washing me shirt and I’ve only one shirt to me name. She sent it along and when I put it on I discovered that I was a jay, She’d starched it all over from bottom to top So I wrote her a letter to say . . .	Yer ’umble is your humble servant, or your humble self. Your humble servant would be a social filtering down of the formal sign-off: I remain, Sir, your humble servant; your humble self is something people sometimes said. The humble servant idea must have been becoming archaic even in 1910 so the expression would probably have been seen as something of a joke. The humble self is a passive distancing structure, because really it means not your humble self, but my humble self. I guess that Harry Champion used yer ’umble as an colloquial expression, I don’t suppose he analysed it at all. I’ve only one shirt to me name. The expression lasted well into the 1950s, having only one of something to your name. Quite a charming one, that one. I discovered that I was a jay. There are various references on the web to jay being mid-western American slang for a fool, hence the origin of the word ‘jaywalker’. Eric Partridge gives a number of references to it in UK slang of the 1880s as a fool or simpleton. She’d starched it all over from bottom to top. Starching of shirts, or more especially collars and cuffs, was what you did in them days, to make them stiff and believed-to-be smart-looking.
Don’t do it again, Matilda Don’t do it again! The dicky’s as stiff as a rusty nail And the back of it’s wagging about like a tail. My shirt, oh doesn’t it hurt, Just toddle around and explain. It’s a stiff as a pin and I can't tuck it in, So don’t do it again!	The dicky is the dicky dirt, shirt, rhyming slang. Stiff as a rusty nail, lovely simile, quite widely-used though it may be that this song was the origin of it, could be. I think that Harry Champion sings: just toddle around, sounds like it’s probably toddle, and that would fit. Toddle around or toddle off was used a fair bit, it goes for me with slope off, which always gave me the amusing image of someone departing on a lean.

So there we are, that’s some of the reasons why I love this song so much, it’s the wealth of language. She also my analysis of:

Never Let Your Braces Dangle.