{"collection":"Northern European Mythology","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/neu/celt/nes/nes07.htm","path":"neu/celt/nes/nes07.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/neu/celt/nes/nes07.htm","text":"| \"Fond father and mother, So guide it and feed it, Give gifts to it, clothe it: God only call know What lot to its latter days Life has to bring.\" | \nThere is a variation of the last line:--\nThe following refers to the brow, the eye, the nose, and the mouth:--\nHere is one about the fingers, beginning with the index finger:--\nThe nurse took hold of each finger as she repeated each line. There was another form of the rhyme, in which the thumb played the part of breaking the barn:--\nAnother form of the last line is:--\nThe legs and feet were utilised by the nurse as a means of amusement. Here is what she repeated while she held a leg in each hand and kept crossing them, slowly at first, and then with greater rapidity when the dogs were supposed to be on their homeward journey:--\nAnother version runs thus:--\nThe following rhyme was repeated to the child by the nurse while she took off the child's boot and imitated the blacksmith in nailing the shoes on the horse's foot:--\nHere is another version:--\nAnother rhyme about the legs and feet is as follows:--\nVarious members of the body were celebrated in the following way:--\nThe next two lines must be left untold.\nWhen the child was being fed, to keep it in good humour and induce it to take its food, the nurse kept repeating:--\nA fuller version of the same was:--\nWhen the child showed signs of being satisfied, the following words wore repeated:--\nWhen the child was being undressed for bed, the nurse kept repeating:--\nWhen the child got into the sulks it was called:--\nChildren in their amusements often repeated rhymes.\nThe following one was repeated when a child mounted a walking-stick or a piece of stick as a \"horse\":--\nAnother version is:--\nThis rhyme was repeated to the child when dandled on the knee in imitation of the modes of riding indicated in the lines:--\nAnother rhyme of the same kind is:--\nTwo children placed themselves back to back, locked their arms together, and alternately lifted each other, repeating the words:--\nHere follow various rhymes current among the young:--\n\"A, B, buff,\n Gee the cat a cuff,\n Gee her ane, gee her twa,\n Rap her hehd t\u2019 the stehn wa\u2019.\"\n\"Charlie Chats milkit the cats,\n An Gollochy made the cheese,\n An Charlie steed at the back o\u2019 the door,\n An heeld awa\u2019 the flees.\"\n\"A for Annie Anderson,\n B for Bettie Brown,\n C for Cirstle Clapperton,\n It danced upon her crown.\"\n\"A for Alexander,\n B for Bettie Brown,\n C for Kettie Clatterson,\n It clatters throo the town.\"\n\"John Prott an his man\n To the market they ran;\n They bought, they sold,\n Muckle money down told,\n Till they came till a plack,\n Steek your neive on that.\"\n\"'Hielanman, Hielanman,\n Fahr wiz ye born?'\n 'Up in the Hielands,\n Amon the green corn.'\n 'Faht got you there\n Bit green kail an leeks?'\n Laugh at a Hielanman\n Wintin his breeks.\" p. 19\n\"The little lady lairdie\n She longt for a baby,\n She took her father's grey hunn\n An row\u2019d it in a plaidy.\n Says 'Hishie, bishie, bow, wow,\n Lang legit now ow\n In\u2019t warna for yir muckle baird\n I wad kiss yir mou-ow'.\"\n\"Your plack an my plack,\n Your plack an my plack,\n Your plack an my plack an Jennie's bawbee,\n We'll pit them i\u2019 the pint stoup, pint stoup, pint stoup,\n We'll pit them i\u2019 the pint stoup,\n An join a\u2019 three.\"\n\"Matthew, Mark, Luke, air John\n Haud the horse till I win on;\n Haud him sicker, hand him sair,\n Haud him by the auld mane hair.\"\n\"I've a cat wi\u2019 ten tails,\n I've a ship wi\u2019 saiven sails,\n Up Jack, down Tom,\n Blow the bellows, old man.\"\n\"A bawbee bap,\n A leather strap,\n An a tow t\u2019 hang the baker.\"\n\"Four-an-twenty tailors\n Chasin at a snail,\n The snail shot oot its horns\n Like a hummil coo.\n 'Ah,' cried the foremost tailor,\n 'We're a\u2019 stickit noo.'\"\u00a01\n\"Wallace wicht\n Upon a nicht\n Took in a stack o\u2019 bere,\n An or the moon at fair daylicht\n Hid draff o\u2019t till's more.\"\n\"That's the lady's forks an knives,\n An that's the lady's table,\n An that's the lady's looking-glass,\n An that's the baby's cradle.\"\nThis rhyme was repeated on placing the fingers in such positions as to imitate knives, tables, &c.\nThe following is a rhyme on the numbers up to twenty:--\n\"Steal a needle, steal a preen,\n Steal a coo or a\u2019 be deen.\"\nThis sensible rhyme was often repeated to children when they were guilty of pilfering, or began to show any inclination to do so.\nThe following is called the \"Souter's Grace\":--\n\"What are we before thee, O King Crispin? Naething bit a parcel o\u2019 easy ozy sooter bodies, nae worth one old shoe to mend another. Yet thou hast given us leather to yark, and leather to bark, oot-seam awls, and in-seam awls, pincers and petrie-balls, lumps o\u2019 creesch and balls o\u2019 rosit, and batter in a cappie. Amen.\"\n19:1 Cf. Henderson, p. 26.","title":"Folk-lore of the North-East of Scotland: Chapter IV. The ...","type":"page"}