In Lancashire—
"Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With cockle shells and silver bells,
And pretty maids all in a row,"
is one of the songs the cottage mother sings to her child.
The Provençal—
"Ding dong, ding dong,
Ring the bells of St. John's.
Now they are saying prayers.
Why ring so high?
'Tis the little children in the sky!"
"Maids in white aprons, say the bells of St. Catherine's."
Every locality furnishes examples of bell rhymes. Selling the church bells of Hutton, in Lincolnshire, gave rise to this satire of the children—
"The poor Hutton people
Sold their bells to mend the steeple.
Ah! wicked people,
To sell their bells
To build the steeple."