Notes

*According to The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, edited by Iona and Peter Opie (1951), "a black man" at that time meant that the man had black hair.

Comments

James Orchard Halliwell (a British collector of nursery rhymes in the 19th century) wrote the following about this rhyme: "The following is partly quoted in an old song in a MS. at Oxford, Ashmole, No. 36, fol. 113."

Thanks and Acknowledgements

This rhyme can be found in The Nursery Rhyme Book, edited by Andrew Lang and illustrated by L. Leslie Brooke (1897). This rhyme can also be found in "The Nursery Rhymes of England" 5th edition (1886), collected by James Orchard Halliwell and illustrated by W. B. Scott.