The cow considered very well,
And gave the piper
a penny,
And bade him play the other
tune,
“Corn rigs
are bonny.”
Away, pretty robin, fly home to your nest,
To make you my captive I still should like best,
And feed you with worms and with bread:
Your eyes are so sparkling, your feathers so soft,
Your little wings flutter so pretty aloft,
And your breast is all cover’d with
red.
Handy-spandy, Jacky dandy,
Loves plum-cake and sugar candy.
He bought some at a grocer’s shop,
And pleased away went hop, hop, hop.
When good King Arthur ruled his land
He was a goodly king;
He stole three pecks of barley meal
To make a bag-pudding.
A bag-pudding the king did make,
And stuff’d it well with plums;
And in it put great lumps of fat,
As big as my two thumbs.
The king and queen did eat thereof,
And noblemen beside;
And what they could not eat that night,
The queen next morning fried.
Rock-a-bye, baby, your cradle is green,
Father’s a nobleman, mother’s a queen,
And Betty’s a lady, and wears a gold ring,
And Johnny’s a drummer, and drums for the king.
See saw, Jack-a-daw,
Johnny shall have a new master;
Johnny shall have but a penny a day,
Because he can work no faster.
About the bush, Willie, about the bee-hive,
About the bush, Willie, I’ll meet thee alive.
We’re three brethren out of Spain,
Come to court your daughter Jane.
My daughter Jane she is too young,
She has no skill in a flattering tongue.
Be she young or be she old,
It’s for her gold she must be sold,
So fare you well, my lady gay,
We shall return another day.
Mistress Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells and cockle shells,
And maidens all in a row.
When I was a little boy, my mother kept me in,
Now I am a great boy, and fit to serve the king;
I can handle a musket, I can smoke a pipe,
I can kiss a pretty girl at ten o’clock at night.
Mary had a pretty bird,
Feathers bright and yellow,
Slender legs, upon my word
He was a pretty fellow.
The sweetest notes he always sung,
Which much delighted Mary,
And often where the cage was hung,
She stood to hear Canary.
This is the way the ladies ride,
Prim, prim,
prim;
This is the way the gentlemen ride,
Trim, trim,
trim.
Presently come the country-folks,
Hobbledy
gee, hobbledy gee.
One, Six, Two, Seven, Three, Eight, Four, Nine, Five, Ten, I caught a hare alive. I let it go again.
Cock a doodle doo,
My dame has lost her shoe;
My master’s lost his fiddlestick,
And knows not what to do.