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MOTHER, MAY I GO OUT TO PLAY 393 |
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And where's the cat ? Up on the wood [i.e., the faggots]. And where's the wood ? Fire burnt it. Where's the fire ? Water douted it [i.e., put it out]. Where's the water ? Ox drank it. Where's the ox ? Butcher killed it. And where's the butcher ?
Behind the door cracking nuts, and you may eat the shells of them if you like.
—Dorsetshire (Folk-lore Journal, vii. 219).
V. Please may I go out to play ? How long will you stay ? Three hours in a day. Will you come when I call you ? No.
Will you come when I fetch you ? Yes.
Make then your curtseys and be off. The girls then scamper off as before, and as they run about the field keep calling out, " I won't go home till seven o'clock, I won't go home till seven o'clock." After they have been running about for some five or ten minutes the Mother calls Alice (or whatever the name may be) to come home, when the one addressed will run all the faster, crying louder than before, " I won't go home till seven o'clock." Then the Mother commences to chase them until she catches them, and when she gets them to any particular place in the field where the others are playing, she says—
Where have you been ?
Up to grandmother's.
What have you done that you have been away so long ?
I have cleaned the grate and dusted the room.
What did she give you ? |
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