When Ding and Dong,
Had finished a song,
One day, they went to Dell,
And to him or her
Said, “We should prefer
That you should do something as well,—
Something amusing
Of your own choosing.”—
“And so I will,” says Dell.
There goes a bell,
Ding, dong, dell,
A cracked old bell,
A shaky old bell,
A quavering old bell,—
Can anybody tell
What the cracked old bell is saying?
“Yes, I can tell,” says Dell,
“Without measuring or weighing,
And this is what it is saying;
Ding, dong, dell!
Goes the cracked old bell;
And this is what it is saying:
“There is an old woman whose name it is Gray,
Lives in an old town in an old-fashioned way;
You cross an old bridge, and go up an old road,
And down an old lane, to find out her abode.
“She wears an old cap that stands ever so high;
She looks through old goggles as round as the sky;
She keeps an old dog, and a very old cat;
She sits in an arm-chair much older than that.
“She crosses her old arms; she shakes her old pate;
She only hears half of the tale you relate;
She puts her old ear-trumpet up, and cries ‘What?’
And when you say ‘Freezing!’ she thinks you say ‘Hot!’
‘She thinks as she sits that she hears a bell ring,
As even and slow as a rook on the wing;
It booms in her old ear; she shakes her old head;
That old bell says, Put out the lights and to bed!”