The South and North Ends of Jail. (from Words by Tristram Tangent.) "Are there monsters in the North-West Flatlands they ask me - the answer is yes of course, and they live in the south part of Jail, where all the bad creatures lurk - and what do I mean by BAD your lordship? Why, I mean nothing more than poor and vicious. Thieves they are - oh yes, who steal from one another so that a few poor possessions are passed about the area from hand to clever hand - everyone gets a turn my Ladies and Baronettes, there's no discrimination here, no-one is left out - see these rags on my legs? AGED is what they are! These trousers have seen owners and travelled farther in a roundabout fashion than you have yourselves - and had more interesting experiences as well, I'll bet my eyes on it (never let it be said that a southern Jailite would not stake their eyes on a bet - we hold betting to be our life's blood.) Distinguished is what I call them, these trousers - historical relics and I wouldn't swap them for all the velvet capes you've ever worn on your back - and if you want to see if I'll refuse, make me the offer and hear what I say then! This is the water trough filled with black slime - where the children play and the beasties drink - sick creatures those beasties and we wonder why it is so when the thieves in the north part of town have beasties as sleek and rosy as any you'd see in houses abroad. This is the grey road that leads to the grey beach that lets out onto the grey sea - by some contrivance the same sea is blue in the north part of town, not one quarter of a day's walk away from the place where we stand now - but grey here - and the sky is blue there as well - but grey here. Nonetheless we are a cheerful lot - alive with drink and fleas and pleurisy - our roadways are alleyways and our alleyways are steams of warm filth, our houses are dark - our houses have no rooves - our houses are often the gutters - and this happy state of affairs keeps us out in the street where we provide merriment and good companionship for our fellows. What form does this merriment take? asks her ladyship. Why, drinking, of course, and fighting, and mutilation and coarse language and vileness and thievery and plotting and thoughts and lies and spitting and eating and dying and sleeping and being stepped on and pain and murder and weeping and screaming and gossip and rape and attacks on every dignity a person may or may not hold dear - and betting - and singing, oh we mustn't forget the singing. It is we who fill the theatres in the evenings. It is we who make one piece of musical theatre popular and another odourous - it is our tastes that the theatre owner consults when she wants to know which soprano to keep and which tenor to discard. Our ear for music is as delicate as a lark's - our desires as refined as an Exian's. The Jailites from the northern end of town - they call themselves thieves and connoiseurs - ha! - they've never been worthy of either title. They steal but they are not thieves like us your Dukeness, they live in fine houses, they put good food on their tables - they are rich. They do not swarm as we swarm, they walk the street or not, as they choose - they steal but not from one another - they are well guarded and we are not. Armies of thugs surround them - finer thugs than us, my ladyship! yes, such a thing is possible - thugs who do as they are told, who are not true, free persons - who have more possessions than we, but we do not have to answer to any well-dressed pirate. We would like to be enslaved like that sometimes. Their roads are wide and bright and straight - ours have ricketts, are curved and narrow and do not go where they are supposed to or do not go anywhere at all but more alleyways or butt their heads against walls - their northern theatres are clean and polished - and with no crowd to speak of! We cannot understand it. They say they prefer it this way and that music is easier to listen to when the audience is small - not clustered around the doorways, not perched across the roof-beams, not sitting where the actors can step on them - if this is so then why is their musical ear poor compared to ours? They are less choosy about the play than we are, they will take "Long Story" five times in a row but we will take it only once and then demand "The Clouds" so that our palates are cleansed. There is an art to choosing musical plays, my dear Marchioness. They invite the singers to their homes - we have them in our hearts - we love them - as we squat in our gutters - they feed them - in those high, clean houses with their fences and their guards."