The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #168851   Message #4078448
Posted By: Mo the caller
06-Nov-20 - 05:52 AM
Thread Name: Two little ...
Subject: Two little ...
The thread on Shortning Bread which has been revived by a scammer includes a post from 2005 by Q
Lyr. Add: SHORTENED BREAD

Run hyeur, mammy, run hyeur quick!
Shord'n bread make baby sick!
My! don't 'e love shord'n shord'n shord'n
Don't 'e love shord'n bread!

Oh, give me sump'n, I don't kyeur what
Tuh cyore this awful pain I got!
My! don't 'e love shord'n etc.

Two little n...s layin' in bed;
One turned over, en the tother one said,
"My! don't yer love," etc.

Two little n...s layin' in bed;
They sent fer the doctor, en the doctor said,
"Feed them niggers on shord'n," etc.

Two little n...s black ez tar
Tried to go ter heaven on a 'lectric car.

Two little n...s dressed in black
Tried to go to heaven on a railroad-track.

Two little n...s dressed in white
Tried to go to heaven on the tail of a kite.

Two little n...s black as hell
Tried to go to heaven in a pea-nut shell.

Two little n...s in a pea-nut shell
Tried to go to heaven but they went to hell.

From East Tennessee. mountain whites, collected in 1912.
No. 22, with music, an adaptation of that of "Run, N..., Run!"
E. C. Perrow, 1915, "Songs and Rhymes from the South," Jour. American Folklore, III, section VII, Songs of the Plantation.

And further back in the thread it was suggested they (v5 ->) were floating verses.
They floated to me at my daughter's Guide camp (in the 1980s) as

3 little angels all dressed in white
Tried to go to heaven on the end of a kite.
Kite it broke and down they all fell
Instead of going to heaven they all went to ... (the last word was not sung, straight on without a pause to the next verse)

3 little Devils...red
... bed
etc

there may have been more verses, you could make up anything that rhymed

3 little girl guides all dressed in blue
Tried to go to heaven on the end of a shoe
etc

Don't get excited don't turn red
Instead of going to heaven they all went to bed.