Lina Eckenstein - Comparative Studies in Nursery Rhymes

The walls of the temple of King Sety at Abydos in Upper Egypt are decorated with sculptured scenes which represent the cult of the gods and the offerings brought to them. In a side chapel there is depicted the following curious scene. A dead figure lies extended on a bier; sorrowing hawks surround him; a flying hawk reaches down a seal amulet from above. Had I succeeded in procuring a picture of the scene, it would stand reproduced here; for the figure and his mourners recalled the quaint little woodcut of a toy-book which told the tale of the Death and Burial of Cock Robin. The sculptures of Sety date from the fourteenth century before Christ; the knell of the robin can be traced back no further than the middle of the eighteenth century A.D. Can the space that lies between be bridged over, and the conception of the dead robin be linked on to that of the dead hawk? However that may be, the sight of the sculptured scene strengthened my resolve to place some of the coincidences of comparative nursery lore before the gentle reader. It lies with him to decide whether the wares are such as to make a further instalment desirable.

23 September, 1906.

THE study of folk-lore has given a new interest to much that seemed insignificant and trivial. Among the unheeded possessions of the past that have gained a fresh value are nursery rhymes. A nursery rhyme I take to be a rhyme that was passed on by word of mouth and taught to children before it was set down in writing and put into print. The use of the term in this application goes back to the early part of the nineteenth century. In 1834 John Gawler, afterwards Bellenden Ker, published the first volume of his Essay on the Archaiology of Popular English Phrases and Nursery Rhymes , a fanciful production. Prior to this time nursery rhymes were usually spoken of as nursery songs.

The interest in these "unappreciated trifles of the nursery," as Rimbault called them, was aroused towards the close of the eighteenth century. In a letter which Joseph Ritson wrote to his little nephew, he mentioned the collection of rhymes known as Mother Goose's Melody , and assured him that he also would set about collecting rhymes. 1 1 Letters of Joseph Ritson , edited by his Nephew, 1833. 27 April, 1781. His collection of rhymes is said, in the Dictionary of National Biography , to have been published at Stockton in 1783 under the title Gammer Gurton's Garland . A copy of an anonymous collection of rhymes published by Christopher and Jennett at Stockton, which is called Gammer Gurton's Garland or the Nursery Parnassus , is now at the British Museum, and is designated as a "new edition with additions." It bears no name and no date, but its contents, which consist of over seventy rhymes, agree with parts 1 and 2 of a large collection of nursery rhymes, including over one hundred and forty pieces, which were published in 1810 by the publisher R. Triphook, of 37 St. James Street, London, who also issued other collections made by Ritson.

The collection of rhymes known as Mother Goose's Melody , which aroused the interest of Ritson, was probably the toy-book which was entered for copyright in London on 28 December, 1780. Its title was Mother Goose's Melody or Sonnets for the Cradle , and it was entered by John Carnan, the stepson of the famous publisher John Newbery, who had succeeded to the business in partnership with Francis Newbery. 2 2 Welsh, Ch., A Publisher of the Last Century , 1885, p. 272. Of this book no copy is known to exist. Toy-books, owing to the careless way in which they are handled, are amongst the most perishable literature. Many toy-books are known to have been issued in hundreds of copies, yet of some of these not a single copy can now be traced.

The name Mother Goose, its connection with nursery rhymes, and the date of issue of Mother Goose's Melody , have been the subject of some contention. Thomas Fleet, a well-known printer of Boston, Mass., who was from Shropshire, is said to have issued a collection of nursery rhymes under the following title, Songs for the Nursery, or Mother Goose's Melodies for Children , printed by Thomas Fleet at his printing-house, Pudding Lane, 1719, price two coppers. 3 3 Appleton, Cyclopædia of American Biography , 1887: Fleet, Thomas. The existence of this book at the date mentioned has been both affirmed and denied. 4 4 Whitmore, W. H., The original Mother Goose's Melody , 1892, p. 40 ff. John Fleet Eliot, a great-grandson of the printer, accepted its existence, and in 1834 wrote with regard to it as follows: "It is well known to antiquaries that more than a hundred years ago there was a small book in circulation in London bearing the name of Rhymes for the Nursery or Lulla-Byes for Children , which contained many of the identical pieces of Mother Goose's Melodies of the present day. It contained also other pieces, more silly if possible, and some that the American types of the present day would refuse to give off an impression. The cuts or illustrations thereof were of the coarsest description." On the other hand, the date of 1719 in connection with the expression "two coppers," has been declared impossible. However this may be, no copy of the book of Fleet or of its presumed prototype has been traced.

The name Mother Goose, which John Newbery and others associated with nursery rhymes, may have been brought into England from France, where La Mère Oie was connected with the telling of fairy tales as far back as 1650. 5 5 Lang, A., Perrault's Popular Tales , 1888. Introduction, XXIV. La Mère Oie is probably a lineal descendant of La Reine Pédauque , otherwise Berthe au grand pied , but there is the possibility also of the relationship to Fru Gode or Fru Gosen of German folk-lore. We first come across Mother Goose in England in connection with the famous puppet-showman Robert Powell, who set up his show in Bath and in Covent Garden, London, between 1709 and 1711. The repertory of his plays, which were of his own composing, included Whittington and his Cat , The Children in the Wood , Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay , Robin Hood and Little John , Mother Shipton , and Mother Goose . 6 6 Collier, J. P., Punch and Judy, citing "A Second Tale of a Tub or the History of Robert Powell, the puppet-showman, 1715." A play or pantomime called Mother Goose was still popular at the beginning of the nineteenth century, for the actor Grimaldi obtained his greatest success in it in 1806. 7 7 Dictionary of National Biography , Grimaldi.