Page:A book of nursery songs and rhymes (1895).pdf/171

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Quebec, 1865). It is known and sung also in Languedoc as 'Jean de Reulo' or 'Jean de Nibélo.' The song was sung by Mr. Purcell's 'Irish Vocalists,' and is given at length in 'The Dublin Comic Songster' (Dublin, 1841). There are often sung several other verses besides those given above, which were taken down in Devonshire. What 'a bone of my Stover' signifies, I do not know.

XI. GREEN AND AIRY AROUND

This is an old nursery and schoolboy song. It occurs in a collection of Garlands in the British Museum (11,621, 6, 18).

XII. LAST NIGHT THE DOGS DID BARK

An old English song. It occurs with music in 'The Thrush, Crosby, London, 1827. There is a popular nursery version:—

'Hark! hark! the dogs do bark,
The beggars are coming to town,
Some in Rags, and some in Jags,
And others in Velvet Gowns,'

which is supposed to be a Jacobite jingle in derision of the House of Hanover.

'Hark! hark! the dogs do bark,
My wife is coming in,'

went anciently to 'The Devil's Dream,' which is given in the 'Dancing Master,' 6th ed., 1675.

XIII. NICE YOUNG MAIDENS

This was sung to an old lady by her grandmother some sixty years ago. It appears in 'The Universal Songster,' 1826. It was very popular in London in 1820, when J. P. Hodgson wrote words like these: 'Smart Young Bachelors.' J. Blewett composed the music, but Mrs. Humby sang the other words to the probably traditional air, and this entirely put out Blewett's tune. The song reached Scotland, where Buchan picked it up, and tacked on to it the words of his own:—

'But we'll apply to James the Third,
Puir auld maidens,
And our petition mawn be heard,
And for ilk dame a man secured
To puir auld maidens';