Old Limericks

The august Maritime History Discussion List (marhst-l @ Queen's University, Canada) was entertained recently by an OT (off maritime topics) question.

A member was reading Patrick Leigh Fermor's entertaining (and rather enigmatically titled) picaresque, Between the woods and the water, on foot from Constantinople the Middle Danube to the Iron Gates, when he came across the final line of what seemed to be a limerick.

"What ho, when they lifted the lid!" it read.  "Where does it come from?" he asked.

And, as usual, he got instant information:

The first candidate was "The Careful Buyer."

There was an old man of Madrid,
Who went to an auction to bid;
He bought, if you please,
A case of old cheese-
But oh, Gosh! when they lifted the lid!

This, it seems, comes from The Limerick up to date Book, composed and collected by the whimsical Ethel Watts Mumford.  (San Francisco, Published by Paul Elder and Company, 1903.)


Candidates numbers two and three are similar rhythmical meditations:

There was an old man of Madrid
Who went to an auction to bid.
In the first lot they sold
Was an ancient commode -
And, my god, when they lifted the lid!

...or this rendition broadcast on radio 21 July 1984:


There was an old man of Madrid
Who went to an auction to bid
The first one they showed
Was an ancient commode
What ho, when they lifted the lid!