Hi,

I looked at my notes for "Coffee Grows" (AKA "Four in the Middle"). A play party-game titled "Flour in the Middle" was known in Scotland in the late 1800s: From "Golspie- Contributions to its Folklore" by Edward Williams Byron Nicholson 1897.

"J. S. tells me that the game [Four in the Middle] is played as follows. Two girls go out of the ring and then return to the middle of it, and dance, while the others walk round. They end by each taking- another girl out, and the girls so taken out repeat the performance, the first two joining the ring in their stead.

M. S. tells me that they dance in a ring, repeating these words, 'Four-joy,' until they are tired of them, when they change to another rime. Mr. A. M. Dixon, the postmaster of Golspie, tells me that 'the soldier's joy' is the name of a country dance in which there are four in the middle, who cross hands and swing round. Sir John Stainer adds that this is the Chain in the old 'Lancers'."

The earliest collected version in the US I have is from Perrow:

COFFEE GROWS ON WHITEOAK TREES- from SONGS AND RHYMES FROM THE SOUTH by E. C. PERROW. (From Virginia; country whites; singing of Miss N. B. Graham; 1912.)

Coffee grows on white-oak trees;
Rivers all flow with brandy;
Rocks all shine with a glittering gold,
And the girls as sweet as candy.

It's an 1800s play-party song. I have no idea if the Scottish "Four in the Middle" is even the same exact song and I doubt if the "coffee grows" text is used. I do play "Soldier's Joy" which is a different tune/lyric. An example of the text in the US is:

Four in the middle and you better get around,
Four in the middle and swing.
Four in the middle and you better get around;
I love Miss Susie Brown.

* * * *

Richie