A programme for children under five
Nursery rhymes, stories, and music
'Please,' wrote a little girl, 'would you play "This is the way the ladies ride" for my three-and-a-half-year-old sister? This is her favourite song; the part she likes best is where the old man falls down into the ditch.'
'The great favourite,' writes the mother of a boy of three, is "This is the way the ladies ride," and he just roars with laughter at the old man and loves the music.'
Numerous similar letters suggest how popular this nursery rhyme has become among our small listeners, who love to play at riding like the ladies and the gentlemen and the farmers, and tumbling into the ditch like the old man. It is a game even baby can play, riding on mother's foot or knee.
Only occasionally do we hear of some concern for the old man, as from the two sisters who asked would we mind not singing the rhyme 'because it makes us feel sad,' but this response to the minor key of the old man's music does not seem widespread, and we hope those who ' feel sad will remember it is only a game when they hear it again in today's programme. (Elizabeth A. Taylor)