The True Story of the Cat and the Fiddle
Hey, diddle, diddle!
The cat and the fiddle!
He played such a merry tune,
That the cow went mad
With the pleasure she had,
And jumped right over the moon.
But then, don’t you see?
Before that could be,
The moon had come down and listened.
The little dog hearkened,
So loud that he barkened,
“There’s nothing like it, there isn’t.”
Hey, diddle, diddle!
Went the cat and the fiddle,
Hey diddle, diddle, dee, dee!
The dog laughed at the sport
Till his cough cut him short,
It was hey diddle, diddle, oh me!
And back came the cow
With a merry, merry low,
For she’d humbled the man in the moon.
The dish got excited,
The spoon was delighted,
And the dish waltzed away with the spoon.
But the man in the moon,
Coming back too soon
From the famous town of Norwich,
Caught up the dish,
Said, “It’s just what I wish
To hold my cold plum-porridge!”
Gave the cow a rat-tat,
Flung water on the cat,
And sent him away like a rocket.
Said, “O Moon there you are!”
Got into her car,
And went off with the spoon in his pocket
Hey ho! diddle, diddle!
The wet cat and wet fiddle,
They made such a caterwauling,
That the cow in a fright
Stood bolt upright
Bellowing now, and bawling;
And the dog on his tail,
Stretched his neck with a wail.
But “Ho! ho!” said the man in the moon—
“No more in the South
Shall I burn my mouth,
For I’ve found a dish and a spoon.”
XXV
Diamond’s Dream
“There, baby!” said Diamond; “I’m so happy that I can only sing nonsense. Oh, father, think if you had been a poor man, and hadn’t had a cab and old Diamond! What should I have done?”
“I don’t know indeed what you could have done,” said his father from the bed.
“We should have all starved, my precious Diamond,” said his mother, whose pride in her boy was even greater than her joy in the shillings. Both of them together made her heart ache, for pleasure can do that as well as pain.
“Oh no! we shouldn’t,” said Diamond. “I could have taken Nanny’s crossing till she came back; and then the money, instead of going for Old Sal’s gin, would have gone for father’s beef-tea. I wonder what Nanny will do when she gets well again. Somebody else will be sure to have taken the crossing by that time. I wonder if she will fight for it, and whether I shall have to help her. I won’t bother my head about that. Time enough yet! Hey diddle! hey diddle! hey diddle diddle! I wonder whether Mr. Raymond would take me to see Nanny. Hey diddle! hey diddle! hey diddle diddle! The baby and fiddle! O, mother, I’m such a silly! But I can’t help it. I wish I could think of something else, but there’s nothing will come into my head but hey diddle diddle! the cat and the fiddle!
I wonder what the angels do—when they’re extra happy, you know—when they’ve been driving cabs all day and taking home the money to their mothers. Do you think they ever sing nonsense, mother?”
“I daresay they’ve got their own sort of it,” answered his mother, “else they wouldn’t be like other people.” She was thinking more of her twenty-one shillings and sixpence, and of the nice dinner she would get for her sick husband next day, than of the angels and their nonsense, when she said it. But Diamond found her answer all right.
“Yes, to be sure,” he replied. “They wouldn’t be like other people if they hadn’t their nonsense sometimes. But it must be very pretty nonsense, and not like that silly hey diddle diddle! the cat and the fiddle! I wish I could get it out of my head. I wonder what the angels’ nonsense is like. Nonsense is a very good thing, ain’t it, mother?—a little of it now and then; more of it for baby, and not so much for grown people like cabmen and their mothers? It’s like the pepper and salt that goes in the soup—that’s it—isn’t it, mother? There’s baby fast asleep! Oh, what a nonsense baby it is—to sleep so much! Shall I put him down, mother?”
Diamond chattered away. What rose in his happy little heart ran out of his mouth, and did his father and mother good. When he went to bed, which he did early, being more tired, as you may suppose, than usual, he was still thinking what the nonsense could be like which the angels sang when they were too happy to sing sense. But before coming to any conclusion he fell fast asleep. And no wonder, for it must be acknowledged a difficult question.
That night he had a very curious dream which I think my readers would like to have told them. They would, at least, if they are as fond of nice dreams as I am, and don’t have enough of them of their own.
He dreamed that he was running about in the twilight in the old garden. He thought he was waiting for North Wind, but she did not come. So he would run down to the back gate, and see if she were there. He ran and ran. It was a good long garden out of his dream, but in his dream it had grown so long and spread out so wide that the gate he wanted was nowhere. He ran and ran, but instead of coming to the gate found himself in a beautiful country, not like any country he had ever been in before. There were no trees of any size; nothing bigger in fact than hawthorns, which were full of may-blossom. The place in which they grew was wild and dry, mostly covered with
