‘Odds bobs, here’s fun! Milking-maids with breeches on! The likes I never see! I cannot go a mile from home But a cuckold I must be.’ The unhappy husband next wanders into the pantry, and discovers ‘three pairs of hunting-boots,’ which his spouse declares are ’ ... milking-churns, Which my mother sent to me.’ ‘Odds bobs, here’s fun! Milking-churns with spurs on! The likes I never see! I cannot go a mile from home But a cuckold I must be.’ The gentlemen’s coats, discovered in the kitchen, are next disposed of, but here my memory fails me. APPENDIX ‘’Twas on Christmas Day,’ found on a slip, “Sold at No 42 Long Lane,” in a volume in the British Museum, 1876. e (not paged, but at what would be p. 57), and again in The New Covent Garden Concert, London, Printed and sold by J. Evans, No 41 Long-Lane, West Smithfield, Br. Mus. 1077. g. 47 (4), dated in the catalogue “1805?” ’Twas on Christmas Day Father he did wed; Three months after that My mother was brought to bed. My father he came home, His head with liquor stord, And found in mother’s room A silver-hilted sword. Fiddle de dum de de, etc. ‘How came this sword here?’ My mother says, says she, ‘Lovee, ’tis a poker Antee sent to me.’ Father he stumbld and star’d; ’Twas the first, I ween, Silver-headed poker He had ever seen. Father grumbled on, But getting into bed Egad! as luck fell out, A man popd up his head; ‘That’s my milk-maid,’ says she; Says dad, ‘I never heard In all my travels yet A milk-maid with a beard.’ My father found a whip, And very glad was he; ‘And how came this whip here, Without the leave of me?’ ‘Oh! that’s a nice strap-lace My antee sent to me;’ Egad! he lac’d her stays, And out of doors went she. FOOTNOTES: [84] I am indebted for information concerning this song, and for a copy, to Mr P. Z. Round. [85] Hoffmann von Fallersleben, Unsere Volksthümlichen Lieder, No 478. It begins: Ich ging in meinen Stall, da sah ich, ei! ei! An Krippen standen Pferde, eins, zwei, drei. [86] ‘O Violina, tu hai le gote rosse,’ a very pretty little _contrasto_ bundled by Tigri with his _rispetti_ (Canti p. toscani, p. 284, No 1023, ed. 1856), is a skirmish between father and daughter, after the fashion of our ballad. (‘My cheeks are stained with mulberries.’ ‘Show me the mulberries.’ ‘They are on the hedges.’ ‘Show me the hedges.’ ‘The goats have eaten them.’ ‘Show me the goats,’ etc.) Ferrari, in an excellent paper in the journal referred to above, tries to make out some historical relation between the two. He seems to me to take ‘La Violina’ quite too seriously. 275 GET UP AND BAR THE DOOR