But the rest
of the story is unsupported by any evidence whatever. In fact, all
that Mr. Eliot knew of it was the statement of the late Edward A.
Crowninshield, of Boston, that he had seen Fleet's edition in the
library of the American Antiquarian Society. Repeated researches at
Worcester having failed to bring to light this supposed copy, and no
record of it appearing on any catalogue there, we may dismiss the
entire story with the supposition that Mr. Eliot misunderstood the
remarks made to him. Indeed, as Mr. William H. Whitmore points out in
his clever monograph upon Mother Goose (Albany, 1889), it is very
doubtful whether in 1719 a Boston printer would have been allowed to
publish such "trivial" rhymes. "Boston children at that date," says
Mr. Whitmore, "were fed upon Gospel food, and it seems extremely
improbable that an edition could have been sold."
Singularly enough, England's claim to the venerable old lady is of
about the same date as Boston's. There lived in a town in Sussex,
about the year 1704, an old woman named Martha Gooch. She was a
capital nurse, and in great demand to care for newly-born babies;
therefore, through long years of service as nurse, she came to be
called Mother Gooch. This good woman had one peculiarity: she was
accustomed to croon queer rhymes and jingles over the cradles of her
charges, and these rhymes "seemed so senseless and silly to the people
who overheard them" that they began to call her "Mother Goose," in
derision, the term being derived from Queen Goosefoot, the mother of
Charlemagne.
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