Another great comic of the ’fifties was Hughie Leggat. He sang at the Britannia Music-Hall, familiarly known as the Brit, and Roxburgh, the owner of that house, thought sufficient of his abilities to give him a standing engagement to appear as often as he could. In consequence of such an attractive contract, Leggat sang nearly every night for three years—and always, if I remember rightly, the same song. Of course, everybody got sick to death of Hughie and his old songs, and as audiences in those days did not hesitate to show their disapproval, violently and otherwise, he was often hissed and booed off the stage. But he stuck it valiantly. He seldom tried a new number, and when he did, generally failed to “get it over.” However, when he found himself up against an audience, Hughie cunningly switched on to “The Puirhoose,” an old favourite, and thus generally managed to turn dismal failure into literally a howling success. It was a curious song this “Puirhoose” number. A meandering sort of musical reading, it was a description of the poorhouse and how the luckless paupers were treated there, and the patter was so "pathetic” in its appeal, especially when describing the paupers’ bill of fare, that it became one of the greatest songs of the period. Looking back now, I cannot understand what was funny about it.... Perhaps it was because we were all wretchedly poor ourselves and felt a certain comfort in knowing that some folks were even not so well off as we were. << less