There Was a Man and He Had Naught
There Was a Man and He Had Naught
Nursery Rhyme
There was a man and he had naught,
And robbers came to rob him;
He crept up to the chimney top,
And then they thought they had him.
But he got down on the other side,
And then they could not find him;
He ran fourteen miles in fifteen days,
And never looked behind him.
Notes
Here's a slightly different version from The Nursery Rhyme Book, edited by Andrew Lang and illustrated by L. Leslie Brooke (1897)...
THERE was a man, and he had nought,
And robbers came to rob him;
He crept up to the chimney-pot,
And then they thought they had him.
There was a man, and he had nought
But he got down on t' other side,
And then they could not find him.
He ran fourteen miles in fifteen days,
And never looked behind him.
Thanks and Acknowledgements
The illustration is from Mother Goose, The Original Volland Edition (1915), edited and arranged by Eulalie Osgood Grover and illustrated by Frederick Richardson (with some graphical editing by Mama Lisa).