No. 117 Hunt the Squirrel
A ring of players is formed, about the outside of which circles a child who carries a knotted handkerchief, with which he finally taps another on the shoulder, and starts to run round the ring. The child touched must pick up the handkerchief, and run in the opposite direction from the first. The two players, when they meet, must courtesy three times. The toucher endeavors to secure the other’s place in the ring, failing which, he must begin again. As he goes about the circle, he recites the words:
Hunt the squirrel through the wood,
I lost him, I found him;
I have a little dog at home,
He won’t bite you,
He won’t bite you,
And he will bite you.
Cambridge, Mass.
In Philadelphia, a corresponding rhyme begins:
I carried water in my glove,
I sent a letter to my love.
A variation from New York:
I tis-ket, I tas-ket, A green and yel-low bas-ket. I
sent a let-ter to my love, And on the way I dropp’d it.
The name of the game in England is “Drop-glove.”
Another and apparently older way of playing “Hunt the Squirrel” is a game in which the child touched follows the toucher until he has caught him, pursuing him both in and out of the ring, being obliged to enter and leave the circle at the same point as the latter.
A kissing-game, in which the player who makes the circuit taps another on the shoulder, and then takes flight, while the person touched is entitled to a kiss if he can capture the fugitive before the latter has made the tour of the circle and gained the vacant place, is a favorite among the “Pennsylvania Dutch,” under the name of “Hen-slauch” (Hand-slag), that is, striking with the hand. The game is there called “Ring,” and has inspired certain verses of Harbach, the nearest approach to a poet which that unimaginative race has produced.106
In a similar game, formerly played in Massachusetts, the leader of the game touches one of the party on the shoulder, and asks, “Have you seen my sheep?” The first replies, “How was it dressed?” The toucher now describes the costume of some player, who, as soon as he recognizes the description of himself, must take flight, and endeavor to regain his place in safety.
Footnotes
97 The first lines, “Chickany,” etc., are from one old version, the rest from another. In the first the bird of prey was called the “Blind Buzzard,” and the game ended as Blind-man’s Buff.
98 That is: “Hawk, hawk, what are you digging for?” “My mother has lost a silver needle.” “Is it this?” “No.” “Is it this?” “No.” “Is it this?” “Yes.”
99 “So-and-so had a nail driven into his shoe, and insisted that he could not be touched while standing on iron.”—A Bostonian informant.
100 The French name in Berry is Tu l’as; elsewhere La caye; in Limousin, Cabé, which may have been derived from hoc habe.
101 Pronounced Hie Spy.
102 He who is “it.”
103 The identical words in Switzerland—“eis, zwei, drü für mich;” or, “eis, zwei, drü für den oder den.”
104 The formula of German children in New York, translated, runs: “Blind cow, we lead thee.” “Where?” “To the stable.” “What to do there?” “To eat soup.” “I have no spoon.” “Go get one.” The “blind cow” then seeks her “spoon.”
105 Professor F. J. Child has shown that Billie Blin, which occurs in English ballads, is originally a name of Odin, expressing the gracious side (German billig) of the blind deity. But it seems to have passed into a bad use, as a murderous dwarf or fairy.
106 See his “Schulhaus an dem Krik.”