LITMIR.BIZ

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or less far-fetched, strings of words could be obtained which, with a little arrangement, were capable of being represented as a tirade against monarchism, sacerdotalism, catholicism. Consequently the nurses were the true heralds and apostles of Protestant principles—such principles being scurrilous abuse of what members of the Roman Church held as sacred and respected.

      Now, unhappily for Mr. Ker's argument, not one of these Netherland renderings has survived in Holland, the most Protestant country in the world, and there was absolutely no explanation of how these nursery profanities and pasquinades arrive in England, and took root there, without leaving a trace behind them. It is quite true that we drew a king from the Netherlands—William of Orange; but there is no record of his having brought over with him a fleet filled with nurse-maids, wherewith to inundate our English homes.

      An equally misdirected and absurd attempt was made later by Mr. Henry George to force one of our nursery jingles into a record of English history. This was "An attempt to show that our Nursery Rhyme, "The House that Jack built," is an historical allegory, portraying eventful periods in England's history since the time of Harold, by Henry George,' published by Griffith and Farren, 1862. A specimen of this will Suffice. 'The man all tattered and torn' represents the Protestant Church under Henry VIII., 'persecuted by banishment, torture, spoliations': somewhat comical history, for it was rather the Roman Catholic Church which was despoiled by that monarch. The 'kissing the maiden all forlorn' signifies 'Elizabeth's union of the Churches.' Mr. George also gives the Jewish nursery rhyme found in all passover books, and which he pompously describes as taken out of 'an ancient Jewish hymn in the Bodleian library, Oxford,' and plays the same tricks with it. Undoubtedly Mr. George had read Mr. Ker's book.

      The fact really is that which Mr. Ker recognised at the outset: Nursery Rhymes are nonsense. To which we may add, that in a good many cases they never were intended to be otherwise. They owe their origin to the circumstance that children have to be amused and lulled, and that a bit of rhyme, set to an easy tune, will lull them to sleep when peevish, and amuse them in the twilight, when they are tired of romping and racketing.

      One thing a nurse would be certain to do, in either case, would be to sing to the child some ditty she herself has heard—probably as a child, and which she remembers imperfectly. A long song thus gets cut down to a couple of verses; and, in another generation, the two verses shrink into one. An instance in case is that of the song 'All in a Misty Morning.' This appears in Durfy's 'Pills to Purge Melancholly,' 1719, in fifteen stanzas. This has as its burden, 'With how do you do? and how do you do? and how do you do again?'

      I have heard this sung in a most fragmentary manner, never extending beyond three verses. The story of Jack and Jill exists in a long ballad; of that nothing has remained in the nursery save the lines—

      Jack and Jill went up the hillTo fetch a pail of water.Jack fell down, and broke his crown,And Jill came tumbling after.

      Little Jack Horner is the subject of a very lengthy ballad and chap-book tale. He is a sort of Jack the Giant Killer, and Tom Thumb, and Tom, the Piper's Son with the magic pipes that make all men dance. But what of all that remains? Nothing. Everything is gone, save the solitary incident of his putting his thumb into the Christmas pudding, and belauding himself like the Pharisee. Some old ballads have been mutilated purposely, because indelicate and unfit for children's ears, and in the process of mutilation have lost their significance. They have lived in this condition, whereas the originals have happily disappeared. But in a great majority of cases nursery jingles are due to no other origin than the clashing together of rhymes. Why did

      Little Jack JingleUse to live single—

      save because the rhyme required it. And

      Little Jack-a-dandyWanted sugar-candy;

      whereas—

      Little Billy CookAlways reads a book,

      for no other earthly reason than that 'candy' rhymes with 'dandy,' and 'book' rhymes with 'Cook.' It is true that some nursery rhymes, and especially game rhymes, have an origin that points back to very early beliefs and usages. This is far more the case in Germany than in England. Nevertheless, there are some of ours that derive from an early period in the history of civilisation. The counting out rhymes may be, and probably are, a relic of the time when such counting out was employed for selecting a victim for sacrifice. As I have noticed in the notes, Jack and Jill in the nursery rhyme are reminiscences of Hjuki and Bil the two children in the moon, according to Scandinavian mythology.

      Some nursery rhymes have a definite object aimed at,—that of practising a child's memory, or of teaching it the letters of the alphabet, or the numbers of a clock face, or the ordinary numerals. In Jewish books of prayer for the Paschal Festival, two nursery rhymes are almost always inserted, wherewith the tedium of the service may be lightened to the children. One of these is very similar to our English, 'Sing a song of One, O!' It begins thus:—

      Who is one, and who can declare it?I will teach you it;One is God in Heaven and on earth.What is two, and who can declare it?I will teach you it;Two are the tables of the Covenant,One is God in Heaven, etc.What is three, and who can declare it?I will teach you it;Three are the Patriarchs,Two are the tables, etc.,One is God, etc.

      and so on to twelve.

      The other nursery song is like our 'Stick, stick, beat dog.' It begins:—

      There was a lamb, a little lamb,And daddy he did buy it.There came a nasty pussy catAnd ate the little lambkin.A dog that was enragedBecause of guiltless blood,Came hastening swift as arrow,And tore to death the cat.A stick stood by the doggieHad long been used in threat,The stick it beat the doggie,And doggie fell down dead.Upon the hearth the fire,To avenge the stick it came,The stick was next consumedAll in the ardent flame.There bubbled up a fountain,The water out did well,It washed o'er the fireAnd quenched it as well.A thirst ox came thither,And drew towards the spring,He drank and drank, and drinkingHe drained the well away.A butcher drew up slylyAnd in his hand a knife,He fell upon the oxen,And took its precious life.

      Then ensues a moral. God avenges all violence. Death butchers the butcher, and the butcher butchers the ox, and the ox sucks up the water, and the water quenches the fire, and the fire burns the stick, and the stick beats the dog, and the dog tears the cat, and the cat eats the little lamb that belonged to my daddy, and for which he paid—so much.

      I. THE TASK

       Table of Contents

      For other versions of this work, see The Elfin Knight.

      Will you buy me, my lady, a cambric shirt?

       Whilst every grove rings with a merry antine (antienne);

       And stitch it without any needle-work?

       O and then you shall be a true lover of mine.

       O and you must wash it in yonder well,

       Whilst every grove, etc.

       Where never a drop of water in fell.

       O and then, etc.

       O and you must hang it upon a white thorn,

       Whilst every grove, etc.

       That never has blossomed since Adam was born.

       O and then, etc.

       O and when that these tasks are finished and done,

       Whilst every grove, etc.

       I will take thee and marry thee under the sun.

       O and then, etc.

       Or that ever I do these two and three,

       Whilst every grove, etc.

       I will set of tasks as many to three,

       O and then, etc.

       You must buy for me an acre of land,

       Whilst every grove, etc.

       Between the salt sea and the yellow sand,

       O and then, etc.

       You must

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