Tuesday, 12 June 2007 04:29 pm
(no subject)
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deckardcanineIf you're like me, you often remember something from early(ish) childhood with no obvious trigger. Today I thought of a nursery rhyme whose archaic first line I had to look up but which otherwise remained intact:
Crosspatch, draw the latch,
Sit by the fire and spin,
Take a cup and drink it up,
And call your neighbors in.
There are, of course, various wordings. Quite notably, I discovered that some versions say not to let your neighbors in. Must've depended on the attitudes of the setting. But they are all consistent on rhyming "spin" and "in."
The trouble is, when I was young enough to receive nursery rhymes regularly, I didn't think of a spinning wheel. In order for it to make sense to myself, I consciously altered it to "spit." As if that weren't bad enough, the last line became "And call your neighbors 'it.'"
I don't think that my variation would have caught on as a lesson in propriety in any setting.
Crosspatch, draw the latch,
Sit by the fire and spin,
Take a cup and drink it up,
And call your neighbors in.
There are, of course, various wordings. Quite notably, I discovered that some versions say not to let your neighbors in. Must've depended on the attitudes of the setting. But they are all consistent on rhyming "spin" and "in."
The trouble is, when I was young enough to receive nursery rhymes regularly, I didn't think of a spinning wheel. In order for it to make sense to myself, I consciously altered it to "spit." As if that weren't bad enough, the last line became "And call your neighbors 'it.'"
I don't think that my variation would have caught on as a lesson in propriety in any setting.
