What chiefly makes The Book of Philip Sparrow interesting is that it is the original of our nursery rime Who Killed Cock Robin?  It is written in the form of a dirge, and many people were shocked at that, for they said that it was but another form of mockery that this jesting priest had chosen with which to divert himself.  But I think that little Jane Scoupe at school in the nunnery at Carowe would dry her eyes and smile when she read it.  She must have been pleased that the famous poet, who had been the King’s tutor and friend and who had been both the friend and enemy of the great Cardinal, should trouble to write such a long poem all about her sparrow.

Here are a few quotations from it:—­

    “Pla ce bo,*
    Who is there who? 
    Di le sci,
    Dame Margery;
    Fa re my my,
    Wherefore and why why? 
    For the soul of Philip Sparrow
    That was late slain at Carowe
    Among the nuns black,
    For that sweet soul’s sake,
    And for all sparrows’ souls,
    Set in our bead rolls,
    Pater Noster qui,
    With an Ave Mari,
    And with the corner of a creed,
    The more shall be your need.

    Placebo is the first word of the first chant in the
service for the dead.  Skelton has here made it into three
    words.  The chant is called the Placebo from the first
word.
    . . . . 
    I wept and I wailed,
    The tears down hailed,
    But nothing it availed
    To call Philip again,
    That Gib our cat hath slain. 
        Gib, I say, our cat
    Worried her on that
    Which I loved best. 
    It cannot be expressed
    My sorrowful heaviness
    And all without redress.
    . . . . 
    It had a velvet cap,
    And would sit upon my lap,
    And seek after small worms,
    And sometimes white bread-crumbs.
    . . . . 
    Sometimes he would gasp
    When he saw a wasp,
    A fly or a gnat
    He would fly at that;
    And prettily he would pant
    When he saw an ant;
    Lord, how he would fly
    After the butterfly. 
    And when I said Phip, Phip
    Then he would leap and skip,
    And take me by the lip. 
    Alas it will me slo,
    That Philip is gone me fro.

Slay. . . . .  For it would come and go, And fly so to and fro; And on me it would leap When I was asleep, And his feathers shake, Wherewith he would make Me often for to wake. . . . .  That vengeance I ask and cry, By way of exclamation, On all the whole nation Of cats wild and tame.  God send them sorrow and shame!  That cat especially That slew so cruelly My little pretty sparrow That I brought up at Carowe. 
    O cat of churlish kind,
The fiend was in thy mind, When thou my bird untwined. I would thou hadst been blind.  The leopards savage, The lions in their rage,