Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, fifth series, no. 123, vol. III, May 8, 1886

No. 123.—Vol. III.
Price 1½ d.
SATURDAY, MAY 8, 1886.
BY RICHARD JEFFERIES.
Passing by the kitchen-door, I heard Louisa, the maid, chanting to a child on her knee:
Feyther stole th’ Paason’s sheep;
A merry Christmas we shall keep;
We shall have both mutton and beef—
But we won’t say nothing about it .
To rightly understand this rhyme, you must sing it with long-drawn emphasis on each word, lengthening it into at least two syllables; the first a sort of hexameter, the second a pentameter of sound:
Fey-ther sto-ole th’ Paa-son’s sheep.
The last line is to come off more trippingly, like an ‘aside.’ This old sing-song had doubtless been handed down from the times when the labourers really did steal sheep, a crime happily extinct with cheap bread. Louisa was one of the rare old sort—hard-working, and always ready; never complaining, but satisfied with any food there chanced to be; sensible and sturdy; a woman who could be thoroughly depended on. Her boxes were full of good dresses, of a solid, unassuming kind, such as would wear well—a perfect wardrobe. Her purse was always well supplied with money; she had money saved up, and she sent money to her parents: yet her wages, until late years, had been small. In doing her duty to others, she did good to herself. A duchess would have been glad to have her in her household. She had been in farmhouse service from girlhood, and had doubtless learned much from good housewives; farmers’ wives are the best of all teachers; and the girls, for their own sakes, had much better be under them than wasting so much time learning useless knowledge at compulsory schools.