'Aha' She Cried and Waved Her Wooden Leg...

Subject: RE: "Aha" She Cried and Waved Her Wooden Leg...
From: Deckman
Date: 21 Nov 06 - 09:37 AM

I heard it as: "AHA, she cried, as she lifted her wooden leg. Lumber's going up!"

Subject: RE: "Aha" She Cried and Waved Her Wooden Leg...
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 21 Nov 06 - 09:36 AM

This was a catchphrase in our family, but it was "Goot heffinks, she cried, as she waved her vooden leg".

Subject: RE: "Aha" She Cried and Waved Her Wooden Leg...
From: Snuffy
Date: 21 Nov 06 - 09:32 AM

A little bit of info here back in July 2005

Google gives a tantalising snippet And finally, our Wellerism probably shows contamination with another and quite unrelated Wellerism, "'Aha,' she cried and waved her wooden leg. ... at
JSTOR, but the site tells me I am not authorised to enter. Perhaps you can find someone who is.

More frustratingly Google lists this site which will not open at all for me. It appears you've been looking longer than you thought, Marg: Bak in 1994 Marg Meikle asked about a bit of doggerel/nonsense recitation beginning "Aha, she cried, and waved her wooden leg," and in March of 1996 ...

The various quotes you give seem to have inserted the phrase into a variety of sources:

• "but the villian he still pursued her" sounds like a typical Victorian melodramatic monologue with Sir Jasper or Ruthless Roderick or their ilk
  
• "and the price of timber went up" feels more like one of Billy Bennett's comic monologues of the inter-war years.
  
• "at last I have been satisfied." brings to mind the bawdy student/rugby Engineers Song (a version in DT as THE GREAT WHEEL)
  
• "It was on the bridge at midnight" is a fusion of the well-known parody of Casabianca "The boy stood on the burning deck, his heart was all a-quiver. He gave a cough, his leg dropped off, and floated down the river"
  
• "Aha she cried in accents wild and waved her wooden leg aloft Tis false tis false and with her evil eye she swept the garden path" is in the style of Thomas Hood's Faithless Nelly Gray - "Ben Battle was a soldier bold, And used to war's alarms: But a cannon-ball took off his legs, So he laid down his arms!" Or possibly "Miss Kilmansegg and Her Precious Leg".
  
• And Charles Dickens seemed to be obsessed with wooden legs. Perhaps it's from one of his works
  

Best of luck with your search

Subject: RE: "Aha" She Cried and Waved Her Wooden Leg...
From: GUEST,richard
Date: 21 Nov 06 - 08:10 AM

I remember reading a response to this on the Poetry Society noticeboard in London in the early eighties.
Searching for more information on its origins someone had written up 'No answer came the bold reply' which was an idiom or quote used by people when, (obviously), someone didn't answer a question, the kind of line a teacher might use in class...and this had been extended with the following line ' as she waved aloft her wooden leg',I think, saying this was a line used in Music Hall.

I came across your thread while searching for it's origins :)

Richard

Subject: Origins? - waved her wooden leg
From:
Date: 01 Jun 97 - 09:08 PM

"Aha" she cried, and waved her wooden leg aloft!

... For eight years, I had a spot on a national radio show in Canada (CBC) where I answer questions posed by listeners. I was known as The Answer Lady. I've been off this year because of budget cuts, but The host of the show, Vicki Gabereau, is moving on, so I was asked back to the final wrap up show live in a theatre next weekend.

For about 7 years I have been plagued by the question, where did "Aha" she cried, and waved her wooden leg aloft! come from? It seems that a lot of women in Canada in their seventies or eighties now use that as in exclamation, like Eureka! Likely these are women whose families originated in England. Over the years I have collected a number of variations from radio listeners and when I do public talks. I am dying to solve this mystery as my swan song. Here are some of the variations:

Aha she cried as she shook her wooden leg...
but the villain he still pursued her

Aha she said in childless glee as she shook her wooden leg aloft
and her glass eye rolled noiselessly down her dress front into the sink.

Manitoba 1930:
Aha, she cried as aloft she waved her wooden leg
and the price of timber went up.

"Aha, aha," the maiden cried
As she waved her wooden led and died,
"at last I have been satisfied."

It was on the bridge at midnight
'er lips were all a 'quiver
she coughed -- 'er wooden leg fell orf
an 'floated down the river.

Aha she cried in accents wild
and waved her wooden leg aloft
Tis false tis false
and with her evil eye
she swept the garden path.

Personally, I think it is from some sort of British Parlour Poetry or from a song. Does anyone know anything more? Thanks so much. And the Canadian radio listening public thanks you too... if I can pull this together this week I'll do in the show on Friday.

Marg Meikle
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