"N.Y. Times Book Review" (Jan. 4, 1948), p. 27:

"The jingle was used to advertise some packaged tea between 1893 and 1902 and pictures of babies accompanied the package:

"Today is the day we give babies away with a half a pound of tea.
If you know any ladies who want to have babies just send them around to me.

"There are white babies and black babies and babies of every degree,
For this is the day we give babies away with a half a pound of tea.

"...The original version of this parody was the lyric to George Rosey's 'Honeymoon March' (words by Dave Reed, Jr.), published in 1895 by Jos. Stern & Co."


G. L. Morrill, "Rotten Republics" (1916), p.73:

"There's an old nursery rhyme, 'This is the day we give babies away for a half a pound of tea.'"


"Sunset, the Pacific Monthly" (Apr., 1912) p. 485:

"Oh,this is the day we give babies away
With a half a pound of tea!"

he sang as they entered the club together."

"Indianapolis Morning Star" (Sept. 25, 1903), p. 4:

"'This is the day we give babies away
With a half a pound of tea.'

"So wrote Mr. Holloway, and his friends have mentioned him as the man ho wrote those words for the pretty 'Honeymoon Two-step,' ever since that popular song first appeared. The...words were written at Crawfordsville and were later sung all over the country."

"Arizona Republican" (March 24, 1901), p. 5 [ad]:
"This is the day we give babies away with every pair of shoes."

Wallis R. Sanborn, "The Klondike Stampede," p. 214. (Written 1932, based largely on his old letters, here referring to 1898):

"Someone...introduced a little piece of a song that ran as follows:

    Oh! This is the day
    We give babies away
    With a half barrel of beer   [sic]
    A half a barrel of beer   
    It makes you feel so queer.

"That was all of the song we ever heard."



It's hard for me to believe without proof that tea could have been advertised in 1893 with the words about "ladies who want to have babies, just send them around to me."