Chenodia
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The work familiarly known as “Mother Goose’s Melodies” has the dignity of being already an undoubted classic among the most incipient cultivators of literature in the United States. It is a compilation taken mostly from “Gammer Gurton’s Garland” or the “Nursery Parnassus,” an English child’s book about a century old, of which various editions have been published in London, Glasgow, and other places. It is stated in one of its late prefaces that it was originally issued at Stockton in a small twopenny brochure, without date, printed by and for R. Christopher. Sir Harris Nicholas says it appeared in the year 1783. The American “Mother Goose” contains many interpolated articles indigenous in the Western hemisphere, which are of various, and some even of doubtful merit.
In England, the “Arundines Cami,” the “Sabrinæ Corolla,” and other representative works of distinguished seminaries, have occasionally drawn on “Gammer Gurton” for materials of their classic versions. These versions are sometimes stately in their prosodial exactness, and at other times as playfully loose as the original English ditties first set to rhyme by Gurton and afterwards copied by Goose.1
The Chenodia, now first printed, an experiment for the author’s own amusement, partly in classic verse of various metres, partly in mediæval and unclassic rhyme, and partly, like the original English, in no metre at all, is tendered as an offset for any disparagement of the dead languages contained in two essays read in 1865 and 1866, at a time when classical studies were paramount in Harvard University and other colleges of the United States.
J. B.SPRATTUS ET UXOR
Jack Spratt could eat no fat,His wife could eat no lean,And so between them bothThey licked the platter clean.Sprattus horrescens adipem recusat,Uxor et non vult tolerare macrum:Conjuges digni! potuêre sic de-tergere lancem.Σπράττος ὠμηστὴς στέαρ ἐξέλειπεν‧Ἡ γυνὴ σφοδρῶς ἀπέφευγεν ἰσχνόν‧Εὔγαμοι, δείπνῳ ταχέως ἕκαστοςΠάντ’ ἀπολείχει.PAR AVIUM
Two little birds were sitting on a stone,One flew away and then there was one,T’ other flew away and then there was none,So the poor stone was left all alone.One of the little birds back again flew,In came t’ other and then there were two;Says one bird to t’ other, “How do you do?”“Very well, I thank you; pray how do you?”Fama est par avium venisse insistere saxo,Quarum primâ abeunte superstitit inde secunda:Illa autem fugiens jam vix vestigia liquit,Et saxum mœrens in campo luget inani.Ecce autem rediens avium comparuit una,Altera non segnis sociam complectitur almam:Arreptâque manu, “Quid agis dulcissima rerum?”“Suaviter ut nunc est, et jam cupio omnia quæ vis.”REX ARTHURUS
When King Arthur ruled the land,He ruled it like a king:He bought four pecks of barley-mealTo make a brave pudding.A pudding brave the king did makeAnd stuffed it well with plums;Great lumps of suet he put into it,As big as both his thumbs.The king and queen partook thereof,And all the court beside;And what they did not eat that night,The queen next morning fried.Angliæ rex imperio potitus,Hordei nactus modium farinæ,Ordinat cœnâ properè institutâSternere mensam.Mira farrago exoritur culinâ,Turgidis uvis maculata passisIntus et frustis adipis refertaPollicis instar.Rex et affines epulantur omnesPrincipes magni dominæque lectæ:Alma regina exoriente luceFragmina frixit.MORS TURDO-GALLI
Who killed Cock Robin?I, says the sparrow;With my bow and arrow,I killed Cock Robin.Quis Turdo-gallum necavit?En, adsum qui feci,Qui telum conjeci;Jaculis et arcuPasser interfeci.PUER CÆRULEUS
Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn,The cow’s in the meadow, the sheep in the corn.Where’s the little boy that looks after the sheep?Under the haycock fast asleep.Cœrule parve puer, cornu nunc suscipe cantum.Per segetes errant pecudes, per pascua vaccæ.Ah, ubi nunc ovium custos tam parvulus absit?En, gregis oblitus sub fœno dormit opaco.VETULA CALCEOCOLA
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe,Who had so many children she didn’t know what to do;She gave them some broth without any bread,And whipt them all soundly and sent them to bed.Calceus inclusit vetulam turbamque suorum,Multum quæ luctans natos compescuit arctos;Jus illis profert oblita apponere panem,Verberibusque datis dormitum sæva remittit.CANIS KEVENSIS
I am his Highness’s dog at Kew.Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?Principis excelsi coram canis ecce Kevensis.Dic mihi vicissim quæso cujus canis es tu?DICCORA DOGIUM
Dickory dickory dock,The mouse ran up the clock,The clock struck one,The mouse ran down,Dickory dickory dock.Diccora diccora dogium,Ascendit mus horologium.Insonuit hora,Fugit mus sine morâ,Diccora diccora dogium.Δίκκορα δίκκορα δόγιονἈνέβη μῦς εἰς ὡρολόγιον·Ἕν! ὥρα ἔφη·Ὁ δὲ μῦς κατέβη.Δίκκορα δίκκορα δόγιον.Ἄρχετε Δικκορικᾶς μοῖσαι φίλαι ἄρχετ’ ἀοιδᾶς.Ἠγέρθη ποθ’ ὕραξ, ἀνέβη δ’ εἰς ὡρολογητήν‧Κώδωνος φθογγὸν δεινὸν κατέφευγε φοβηθείς.Λήγετε Δικκορικᾶς μοῖσαι ἴτε λήγετ’ ἀοιδᾶς.THOMÆ QUADRIJUGÆ
Tom’s coach and six, whither in such haste going?But a short journey, to his own undoing.Quadrijugis Thomas quo nunc se proripit ille?Abiit in celerem – brevis est via, nota – ruinam.HOMUNCULUS ET PUELLULA
There was a little man,And he wooed a little maid,And he said, Little maid, will you wed wed wed?I have little more to say,Then will you ay or nay,For the least said is soonest mended ded ded.Homunculus eximius puellulam amavit,Quam ut nubendam duceret sic ore compellavit:Quid verbis opus pluribus? Dic volo, dicve nolo,Sat verbum sapientibus: responde sine dolo.Then the little maid replied,“Should I be your little bride,Pray, what shall we have for to eat eat eat?Will the flame that you are rich inMake a fire in the kitchen,Or the little god of love turn the spit spit spit?”Responsum dat puellula, – Si flectar ad nubendumDic, quæso, quid cibarii habebimus edendum?Amorem credis ignem in culinâ servaturum,Aut parvulum Cupidinem jam veru versaturum?Then the little man replied,And, they say, a little sighed,For his little heart was big with sorrow sorrow sorrow,“My offers are but small,But you have my little all;And what we haven’t got we must borrow borrow borrow.”Replicuit homunculus suspiriis convulsus,Ingenti ægritudine cor parvulum perculsus,Non multa quidem profero, sed omnia relinquo;Et quicquid nobis deerit petemus a propinquo.The little man thus spoke;His heart was almost broke;And all for the sake of her charms charms charms.So the little maid relented,And softened she consentedThe little man to take to her arms arms arms.Sic fatur ille lacrymans ex corde desolato,Et propter pulchritudinem ad mortem vulnerato.Mollitur tum puellula, amorem et agnovit,Beatumque homunculum amplexu suo fovit.BOPIPIAS
Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep,And couldn’t tell where to find ’em.Let ’em alone, and they’ll come home,And bring their tails behind ’em.Parvula Bopipias amissos quæritat agnos,Nec reperire locum quo latuêre potest.Desine, Bopipias, redeuntes nocte videbis,Caudasque incolumes post sua crura ferent.ADVENÆ MENDICI
Hark, hark, the dogs do bark,The beggars have come to town;Some in rags and some in jags,And some in velvet gowns.En! cum canum latratu,Et multo ululatu;Veniunt mendici repentes,Egeni, pannosi,Squalentes, exosi,Vel sericas togas gerentes.LUNICOLA
The man in the moon came down at noon,Inquiring the way to Norwich.The man of the South has burnt his mouth,Eating cold milk porridge.Lunicola, meridie, ad terram descendebat,Et viam ad Norvicum assidue quærebat.Australis vir ineptus est et os excoriavit,Dum lacteum perfrigidum incontinens voravit.MAGI GOTHAMENSES
Three wise men of GothamWent to sea in a bowl.If the bowl had been stronger,My song had been longer.Tres magi GothamensesIn scypho mare tranantSi cymba secura,Canenda sint plura.Cives tres docti Gothamenses æquora verrunt,Crater et fragilis corpora obesa vehit.Mox en tempestas, surguntque ad sidera fluctus.Musa dolens casum nunc memorare nequit.JACKUS ET JILLA
Jack and JillWent up the hill,To draw a pail of water;Jack fell downAnd broke his crown,And Jill came tumbling after.Jackus cum JillâFormosâ ancillâ,Aquam hauriturus collem ascendebat;Prolabitur Jackus,Caput miserè fractus,Et Jilla desperata in fatum ruebat.FELIS IN FIDIBUS
Heigh diddle diddle,The cat and the fiddle,The cow jumped over the moon.The little dog laughedTo see such a craft,And the dish ran away with the spoon.Hidideldelis,In fidibus felis,Super lunam vacca saltavit.Tum risit canicula,Visâ re tam ridiculâ,Et lanx cochleare raptavit.GRUMBO GIGAS
Fee! faw! fum!I smell the blood of an Englishman.Dead or alive, I will have some.Fe! fau! fum!Sanguinem odoror Anglicum.Seu vivum seu mortuum,Bibendum est mihi aliquantum.Φῆ! φοῦ! φῶν!Αἵματος ὀσφραίνομαι τῶν Ἄγγλων·Ἢ νεκρὸν ἢ ζῶνΧαίρησω πίνων.MILES REDUX
Who comes here?A Grenadier.What do you want?A pot of beer.Where’s your money?I’ve forgot.Get you gone,You drunken sot.Heus! Quis illic?Ductor militiæ.Quid petis hic?Cantharum cervisiæ.Ubi moneta?Loqueris oblito.O, ebriose,In malum abito.ANSERCULA
Goosey goosey gander,Where shall you wander?Up stairs, down stairs,In my lady’s chamber.Ansercula vagula, blandula,Quæ nunc abibis in loca?Sursum, deorsum,In dominæ cubiculum.LABOR ET CURA
Double double,Toil and trouble.Fire burn andCaldron bubble.Ingeminat labor,Ingeminante curâ,Cum flamma ardescit,Aqua ebullitura.1
There appears to be some reason for believing that at least a century before Gammer Gurton’s works were published in England, a bodily “Mother Goose” was at work on the other side of the Channel. In Scott’s novel of “Woodstock,” chapter 28, Charles II., then a fugitive, says: “It reminds me, like half the things I meet with in this world, of the ‘Contes de Commère l’Oye.’” Not having been able to obtain a sight of “Commère l’Oye,” we must leave the original claim for authorship as a field for future controversy.