Readers may wonder why this well-known game should be classed as mythological; but such a character appears in the European versions. Thus, in Suabia, the two keepers of the "Golden Bridge" are called respectively the "Devil" and the "Angel," and the object is to decide who shall be devils and who angels. In France the game is known as "Heaven and Hell." The children who have made a good choice, after the selection is finished, pursue the devils, making the sign of horns with fingers extended from the forehead. In Italy, the name of the sport is "Open the Gates." The gates are those of the Inferno and of Paradise; St. Peter is the keeper of one, St. Paul of the other. The children choose between wine and water; but when the destiny of the last child is decided, the two girls who represent the keepers of the bridge break their arch of lifted hands and move in different directions, followed by their subjects, "while the cries and shrieks of the players condemned to the Inferno contrast with the pathetic songs and sweet cadences of those destined to the happiness of Paradise."
The game is mentioned by Rabelais (about A.D. 1533) under the name of the "Fallen Bridge."
In German versions, the keepers are called "Devil and Angel," "King and Emperor," or "Sun and Moon." In this latter form the game has been one of the few kept up by the Germans of Pennsylvania, who call it the "Bridge of Holland."[127]
Connected with this game in Massachusetts is a curious piece of local lore. A lady[128] recollects that, in the first years of the century, a pedler came to her father's house in Plymouth, Mass., and, in default of three cents change, left a "chap-book" or pamphlet of that value, called "Mother Goose's Melodies." In this pamphlet (the first authentic mention of a publication of that title) the song was included, in the familiar words; but, instead of London bridge, Charlestown bridge was substituted in the rhyme. In that form only the verses were familiar to herself and her companions.
Charlestown Bridge, over Charles River, connected Boston with Cambridge and other suburban towns, before that time only accessible by ferry or a long detour. The bridge was "dedicated" July 17, 1786; and was, in the eyes of the rustic population of Massachusetts, quite as important a structure as the London erection of the thirteenth century. The project was undertaken after a long incubation of sixty years, and not without many apprehensions lest the vast masses of ice rushing down the river in winter should sweep it away. The cost was fifteen thousand pounds. At the celebration, a salute of thirteen guns was fired from Fort Hill, "almost every person of respectable character in private and public life walked in the procession," and eight hundred persons sat down to dinner. No wonder that its fame superseded, locally at least, that of the celebrated structure which was so long the wonder of London, and so sacred in nursery lore. We may thus form an idea of the importance of bridges in earlier times—which importance, and the superstitions consequent, were the root of our game—and also of the tendency of each town to localize its traditions, even those of the nursery.
With the exception of the name, the words of the song, in the chap-book referred to, were identical with those of the familiar English version. We learn from another informant that these same words (this time, however, under the proper title of London Bridge) were often used as a dance-song at children's parties about the beginning of the century. The dancers sat in a circle, a boy next a girl; as each verse was sung, the lad whose turn it was led out his partner and promenaded, suiting action to meaning. The exact verbal correspondence, and absence of the original mode of playing, show that this version of the song, and consequently the rhymes of the pamphlet called "Mother Goose's Melodies," were not taken from the lips of Americans, but reprinted from English sources.
The version repeatedly printed in books for children is not truly popular. It has been remodelled by the recorder, and so the original idea has been disguised. We have, however, the pleasure of offering a genuine English version. We add fragments of American forms, and finally a curious text, for which Ireland is ultimately responsible. From these, taken together, the character of the old English game can be made out.
A.—Song of Charlestown Bridge, as printed (probably about 1786) in the chap-book, "Mother Goose's Melodies:"
Charlestown Bridge is broken down,
Dance o'er my lady Lee;
Charlestown Bridge is broken down,
With a gay lady.