Riddle Me This.

I love these cosy late Autumn days when it's cold outside and toasty warm inside. Just after Halloween and before the Christmas rush really starts, my mood is reflective and nostalgic. I seem to have time to think about all kinds of things and remember lots of silly little things I never remember the rest of the year.

Today I was remembering how lucky I was to have a Gran and Bampi, that's a Welsh word for Grandpa, who knew all kinds of little funny riddles and puzzles to delight a little girl. Then later, when I went away to school I used to stay weekends with an older couple who knew a good deal more of them. For example:

As I was going to Saint Ives,
I met a man with seven wives.
Each wife had seven sacks.
Each sack had seven cats.
Each cat had seven kits.
Kits, cats, sacks and wives,
how many were going to Saint Ives?

Now, my Bampi, who wanted me to learn mental arithmetic and to count in my head, would never tell me the true answer to that one. I wonder if you know it. My word, the hours I've spent trying to work it out in my head! I'll tell you at the end if you haven't got it. Bampi didn't tell me till I was about twenty, and let me tell you I felt pretty stupid when he did! Now this one I did get pretty quickly, so I'm not completely brainless.

If a fellow met a fellow in a field of beans,
If a fellow asked a fellow what a fellow means,
How many effs are in that?

The answer is, of course, none.

And here's another one of Bampi's that I loved.

Little nancy Hetticoat
Has a yellow petticoat
And a red nose.
The longer she stands,
The shorter she grows.
What is she?

Answer at the end.

When I was a little girl I loved the tales of Beatrix Potter. Squirrel Nutkin was one of my favourites because I liked the riddles, though I didn't at all understand them. I used to be very annoyed that the answers to the riddles were never given to us. I had to grow up more to realize that they were, they were given to us in the words of the story before or after rude little Nutkin did his stuff. I always thought Miss Potter made up those riddles but she didn't. I was surprised in later life to come across them in other places and to find out how tradditional they were. Having my mind on food most of the time, I particularly like this one.

Flour of england, fruit of spain,
Met Together in a shower of rain.
Put in a bag tied round with string,
If you answer this riddle you get a gold ring.

If you answered either a plum pudding or a Clooty dumpling you would be right, the clooty dumpling being a darker, richer version from Scotland of our English plum pudding that we serve at Christmas.

And talking of Scotland, here's another version of one of Nutkin's riddles that I was surprised to come across in a book of Scottish songs and nursery rhymes.

Cum-a-riddle, cum-a-riddle cum-a-rote tote tote!
A wee, wee man in a red, red cote.
Wi' a staff in his hand an' a stone in his throat,
Cum-a-riddle, cum-a-riddle cum-a-rote tote tote!

no mention of groats there, I see. The answer is a cherry.

When I went away to school and stayed with dear, kind Mr and Mrs Grey, I would hear the Cockney rhyming slang alphabet. I can't reproduce that here, it's really not possible, and if you're not british it would make a loud whistling sound as it sailed over your head. It always reduced me to fits of eleven-year-old chuckles though. Then I would demand: "Do the rooster! Do the rooster!" There would be a martyred sigh. In the end I'd get my way, and I'd be told a long, involved story about a henhouse built half on farmer Smith's farm and half on Farmer Jone's farm. I'd know exactly what was coming, but I'd still hug myself with glee waiting for it. Now, Mr Grey would say, if a rooster climbed right up to the very top of the roof of the henhouse, so it was directly between Farmer Smith's and Farmer Jones's farm, and laid an egg there, who would it belong to? Of course you all know roosters don't lay eggs and so do I, you had to have been there, I just loved the way the slow burn of the story worked up to this, how I'd burst into schoolgirl giggles and say rooster's don't lay eggs, how Mr Grey would pretend to be outraged that I's sussed out his best puzzle so quicly, they were such happy days!

It's kind of nice to look back and remember the little things, the rhymes, funny songs, riddles and puzzles that I was taught by people who loved me as a little girl. In these days of parents, and even grandparents having to work full time, I wonder whether this kind of thing still happens. I sadly have to doubt it. I've been extremely lucky to grow up when I did. I really appreciate new technology, it has made my life so, so much easier and I don't want to go back to living without it, but conversely, I grew up in a time when there seemed to be more time. When we read, played games, made entertainment for ourselves because we had to, not because it was a conscious choice. It's too easy to condemn or judge the way anyone lives, we don't have that right, I certainly don't and I'm not doing it. I'm just taking these minutes to thank Gran, Bampi, the dear Greys and the people who love me for weaving these glittery threads of fun and goodness into the tapestry of my life. It is the richer for them.

The answers.

How many were there going to saint Ives? Well, kits, cats, sacks and wives, actually none. If you say one, I guess you could have it, because the riddlerl was going, but that's not what he asked. So I'd say the correct answer is none.

Little Nancy Hetticoat is a candle.