I had a little dog whose name was Buff,
I sent him up the street for a pennyworth of snuff.
He broke my box and spilt my snuff
I think my story is long enough—
'Taint you, 'taint you, and 'taint you, but 'tis you.
(1894, I, p. 111.)
In the collection of Nursery Songs by Rusher stands the following rhyme:—
I had a little dog and they called him Buff,
I sent him to a shop to buy me snuff,
But he lost the bag and spilt the stuff;
I sent him no more but gave him a cuff,
For coming from the mart without any snuff.
"Bufe" as a word for a dog occurs as far back as 1567.[42]
CHAPTER IX
CUSTOM RHYMES
THE comparison of our short nursery rhymes with those current in other countries, next engages our attention. Halliwell has remarked that some of our rhymes are chanted by the children of Germany and Scandinavia, which to him strikingly exhibited the great antiquity and remote origin of these rhymes. The observation which he made with regard to the countries of Northern Europe, applies to the countries of Central and Southern Europe also. Scholarly collections of rhymes have been published during recent years in Scandinavia, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and referring to special parts of these countries, which give us a fair insight into their nursery lore. (Cf., p. 212). The comparison of these collections with ours yields surprising results. Often the same thought is expressed in the same form of verse. Frequently the same proper name reappears in the same connection. In many cases rhymes, that seem senseless taken by themselves, acquire a definite meaning when taken in conjunction with their foreign parallels. Judging from what we know of nursery rhymes and their appearance in print, the thought of a direct translation of rhymes in the bulk cannot be entertained. We are therefore left to infer, either that rhymes were carried from one country to another at a time when they were still meaningful, or else that they originated in different countries as the outcome of the same stratum of thought.
The sorting of nursery rhymes according to the number of their foreign parallels, yields an additional criterion as to the relative antiquity of certain rhymes. For those rhymes that embody the more primitive conceptions are those that are spread over the wider geographical area. The above inquiry has shown that pieces such as Mother Hubbard and Three Blind Mice are relatively new, and that all the rhymes formed on the model of Little Miss Muffet go back to the Cushion Dance and to the game of Sally Waters. Rhymes of this kind are entirely without foreign parallels. On the other hand, calls, such as those addressed to the ladybird and the snail, and riddle-rhymes, such as that on Humpty Dumpty, have numerous and close parallels half across Europe.