[If you like singing the round, “Why Shouldn’t My Goose,” then you will love this post. If you hate silly things like rounds, click away now while you still can.]
Dramatis Personae
A: City slicker and leader of singing group A.
B: Country bumpkin and leader of singing group B.
My Goose, Thy Goose
A: Oy! Watch out! Thou hast mixed up our things!
B: Sorry about that. We’ll just move over to the side.
A: Oy! Thou hast my goose!
B: This is not thy goose. Thy goose is over there.
A: No, but this is my goose; I can tell by how well it sings.
B: My goose probably sings better than thy goose.
A: How much didst thou pay for thy goose?
B: Ten shillings.
A: I paid TWENTY shillings for my goose.
B: Then thou art a goose thyself!
Group A sings:
Why shouldn’t my goose
sing as well as thy goose,
when I paid for my goose
twice much as thou?
B: This goose is much cleverer than thine average goose: he is a mongoose.
A: A mongoose? Oh, I see: he has no feathers at all. He looks like a big rat.
Group B sings:
Why should a mongoose
sing as well as yon goose?
It’s because the mongoose
had some lessons how.
A: He took singing lessons? He must be a clever creature indeed! What dost thou use him for?
B: A mongoose is great for hunting. He kills poisonous snakes and gigantic rats, and he even hunts and eats large waterfowl.
A: Oy, my goose!
B: Sorry about that.
A: Thou owest me twenty shillings!
B: For a goose?! It is no fault of mine that thou paidst twenty shillings for a goose!
A: This is no ordinary goose. This is an especially fat goose, raised on corn and sweetmeats. It is unsurpassed for frying; no other goose will fry up as tasty as this one.
Group B sings:
Why should I fry goose,
when I didn’t buy goose?
Hie thee hence with thy goose;
fry it up thyself.
A: I paid twenty shillings for a goose with the sweetest voice in all the county, and thy beast slew it. That THING silenced the most beautiful goose trumpet in the kingdom.
B: Trumpet? Thy goose sounded like a kazoo with a cold.
A: Kazoo or not, cold or not, thou owest me twenty shillings.
B: Lay off; I haven’t got twenty shillings.
A: Then give me the mongoose.
B: If I must. Be ware, though: Thou must know the command to make the mongoose come.
A: What is this word of command?
B: The word is MANDUCA.
A: Oy, my foot! Thy beast has crippled me!
B: Sorry about that.
A: You made the thing attack me!
B: I said the wrong word. The proper word to make the mongoose come is VENI. VENI, VENI!
A: Come back, villain!
B: Fare thee well!
All sing:
This is the moral:
if thou hast a quarrel,
do not let a mongoose
get in near thy foot.
