The Portland daily press., 1877-01-19
Mother Goose and the Old Soutb
Church.

/
Mother Goose and her melodies were com
memorated by Rev. j. NJ Manning, the pastor
OF the new Old South Church in Boston, at the
Christmas Festival of the Sunday school. He
| said:
| mere Is one thing in the history of the Old
| south Church which has not had the recogni-
| you u deserves la the list of admission for
| Tue year 1913 occurs the immortal name of
Elizabeth Goose. L almost beg pardon of bsr
memory for saying Elizabeth since by tina
| unanimous verdict OF the world in whose heart
ner name IS enshrined, she is known as ''Moth-
et Goose. So, then, Mother Goose is no myth,
| as some bave thought but once lived in Boston
| ~ veritable flesh and blood as the records OF
the Old South CLEARLY show. 1t IS also a pleas
ure To md, that in making GoOse of herself
she married into well-tU-do family, whete In
nue time she, too, by putting her melodies to
| the press, not merely lad one @ lden egg but
mas Oeen laying "A steady succession of them
from that day to this. Foy, unlike the goose in
the fable, she could Tot be killed, but still
IVes, aud yields stores of wealth to the book
sellers as often as Cbristmas-tide returns Her
nest Will not b. empty so long as there are
en- ldren and nurseries in the world, 1t ia
lmCst pity, If one may say So without strain
ing the tiphor, thai her eulogy cannot be-
written with quill taken from her own dear
wing What chld in all Christendom has not
often nestled under that wing, been brooded by
~, ana to' gotten every trouble BY listening 10
her immortal lays?
The maiden uame of this venerable LADY.
mo her OF US all, was Elizabeth Foster. She
liVed In Charl0stOwn, where she was born
until her m 4rrlage. Then she came to Boston,
where her thrifty husband, Isaac Goose, had a
green pasture ready for her, on what is now
washington street, and including the land in
aud about Temple place. She was his second
mate aud began her maternal life as step
mother to ten children. These all seem 10 have
oeen hveiy Itt!e gosllngs, and to their number
she rapidly added six more. Thbk of it, SIX
teen gosllDgs to single goose-assu ming that
none Of them had been eaten IN by the hawks
and that none had died of crook in the neck
Poor, happy Mother Goose! No wonder that
ner feelings were too many for her, and that
she poured them out in the celebrated lines:
There was an old woman lived in a shoe.
She had SO many children she didn't know what
Yet Der family cares seem, on the whole to
have sat lightly upon her. for she was no Wild
goose, flying South or North, with every turn
OF the sun, out she stayed by her nest through
cold and heat, happy as the day is loug, aud
living to be ninetS-two years old She even
survived the father Goose many Years, and she
led aud fed her numerous flock and tenderly
orooded them ia the little enclosure on Temple
themselves
One of these, her daughter Elizabeth, be-
came the wife OF Thomas Fleet And here Is
me TACT to which we owe it that ber name and
Tame are spread through the world Thomas
fleet was printer, living in Pudding Lane a
place whose very name had so savors a taste in
tne dear old lady'S mouth that when Thomas
Fleet became happy father she insisted on
gong TO live with him as purse of honor to his
SOD and heir. To coddle her own granIchil I.
IN PUDDING Lane, was the beau ideal of bless
edness for Mother Goose. Her activity and
concern IN the house were such as to throw
what we read about busy mothers-in-lsw
wholly into the shade. No doubt she would
nave been glad to save Rome, as certain other
geese once did With their cacs ling, but lacking
the opportunity to do this, she sang her duties
from morning till night, up stairs and down
stairs and in my lady's chamber" till her SON.
ln-law became se6sbly alarmed at the fertility
OF her genius. Sing she must however for
was sne not poet, full OF the divine ire which
refuses to be quenched? Ii is well for the
word that she Was law unto herself No up-
start son-in-law could control her, or keep her
from hummlng and cooling at her own sweet
will.
And now it was not Roman Senate, but a
Boston printer, that her persistent music
awakened. happy thought occurred to
Thomas Fleet. He printed and sold songs aud
ballads at his printing house in Pudding Lane
Was IL not sign of something good about to
come to him, that this precious mother-in-lsw
with her endless rockings aud lull .bys bad
put herself in his way? He stopped asking
The lrrepresslble songster to rock less, and
urged her to Sing more. And while she sat in
her armchair, or shuff1ed about the room lost
ln sweet dreams, he carefully wrot down
what he could of the rhymes which fell from
her lips. His Dotes rapidly accumulated, and
in little while he had enough of Them to
make volume. Tnese he now printed, aud
bound them into book, which ha offered for
sale under the following title: "Sones tor the
Nursery; or Mother Goose's Melodies for Chill
dreD. Printed by L. Fleet at his Printing
House, Pudding Lane 1719 Price two cop
pers." This ttle-page also bore large cut Of
verltaele goose, with wde-Open mouth show
ing that the proverbIal irreverence of sons-n-
law is not thing OF recent origin. They were
just as sancy in the days of Mother Goose IS
LOW, and just as ready to turn penny at the
expense of their mothers-in-law. How the im-
mortal author bore this profaDe use of her name,
or what she thought of the ungraoious but
shrewd Thomas Fleet, history does not say.
We have every reason to believe, however,
that she took 1t just as sweetly as she had
taken all the other trials and annoyances of
her life. She possessed her soul in patience,
and continued her gentle ministry to the little
ones; still gathering them into her arms aud
soothing and gladdening their hearts after the
shadows of old age had fallen about her; not
weary of her delightful task, but busy as ever
with 1t, when the time came for her mothery
soul to spread its wings aud fly away to the
great company Of children in Heaven.
Such IS the true story of Mother Goose. Her
little book started forth on its errand. 1t grew
and multiplied with each new edition. 1t made
ber Gear name household word wherever it
WeuL w Hdt SnOTe or IastntSS 1aS IL not VlSlted!
Where is the home in which its loving rhymes
are not sung? Ii is one of the few books which
cannot be destroyed. Not Homer or Shak'
speare is so sure of immortal tame as Mother
Goose. Considering the love in which her mel
OdieS are everywhere held, their freedom from
anything which might corrupt or mislead the
intantile mind, their practical wisdom, their
shrewd mastery of the motives of human cou-
duct, one is IA all soberness forced to admit
that her name is among the brightest of the
jewels which adOrn the brow of Old South.
What other son or daughter of the church, re-
nowned as many of them are in history, has
proved a greater blessing to mankind, or Sc
cured the benedctions of so many hearts? She
is to the sew world what Santa Claus is 60 the
old. Aud if the twain could, by some poeticsl Ii
cense, be made man and wife, who does not
confess that she, though much the younger,
would be by far the better half? Let US hope
that the day is not distant when a memorial
stature will be erected to this venerable lady
in one of the parks or squares of Boston. Let
IL be approprIte symbol of her and her blessed
ministry. Let it stand where the chIldren OF the
CITY may gather in their daily sports, trundling
their hoops and carts about, and singing their
dolles TO sleep in its motherly shad-
ows. Where could that memorial better
ground at the corner of Boyleston
and Dartmouth streets, so near to the present
Old South meeting-house, aud in full view OF
other buildings and institutions which are the
pride of Boston? 1t not there, yet IN some
place il should be reveIenly Set up. And on 1t
should be the following inscription:
Elizahetb Foster,
Known in the literature of The Nursery as
"Mother Goose
Was born in Charlestown, Mass 1865;
Married Isaac Goose, of Boston, 1892;
Became member of he Old South Church, 1898;
LARA