There was a young lady from Niger,
Who smiled as she rode on a tiger.
They came back from the ride,
With the lady inside,
And the smile on the face of the tiger.
There was a Young Lady of Welling,
Whose praise all the world was a-telling;
She played on a harp,
And caught several carp,
That accomplished Young Lady of Welling.
There was an Old Man of Corfu,
Who never knew what he should do;
So he rushed up and down,
Till the sun made him brown,
That bewildered Old Man of Corfu.
There once was a farmer from Leeds,
Who swallowed a packet of seeds.
It soon came to pass,
He was covered with grass,
But has all the tomatoes he needs.
There once was a wonderful star,
Who thought she would go very far.
Until she fell down,
And looked like a clown,
She knew she would never go far.
There was an Old Person of Ischia,
Whose conduct grew friskier and friskier;
He dance hornpipes and jigs,
And ate thousands of figs,
That lively Old Person of Ischia.
Limericks I cannot compose,
With noxious smells in my nose.
But this one was easy,
I only felt queasy,
Because I was sniffing my toes.
There was an Old Man of Marseilles,
Whose daughters wore bottle-green veils;
They caught several Fish,
Which they put in a dish,
And sent to their Pa' at Marseilles.
There was an Old Man with a flute,
A sarpint ran into his boot;
But he played daay and night,
Till the sarpint took flight,
And avoided that man with a flute.
There was an Old Person of Rheims,
Who was troubled with horrible dreams;
So, to keep him awake
They fed him on cake,
Which amused that Old Person of Rheims.
There was a Young Lady of Troy,
Whom several large flies did annoy;
Some she killed with a thump,
Some she drowned at the pump,
And some she took with her to Troy.
There was a young lady named Rose,
Who had a large wart on her nose.
When she had it removed,
Her appearance improved,
But her glasses slipped down to her toes.
She followed her nose,
One day, I suppose,
And no one knows which way she went.
There was an Old Man in a boat,
Who said, 'I'm afloat, I'm afloat!'
When they said, 'No! you ain't!'
He was ready to faint,
That unhappy Old Man in a boat.
There was an Old Man of Dundee,
Who frequented the top of a tree;
When disturbed by the crows,
He abruptly arose,
And exclaimed, 'I'll return to Dundee.'
Once I visited France,
And learned a new, awesome dance.
I twirled,
And I swirled,
And then I lost my pants.
There was a Young Lady of Sweden,
Who went by the slow rain to Weedon;
When they cried, 'Weedon Station!'
She made no observation
But thought she should go back to Sweden.
There was an Old Person of Ewell,
Who chiefly subsisted on gruel;
But to make it more nice
He inserted some mice,
Which refreshed that Old Person of Ewell.
There was a Young Lady whose eyes,
Were unique as to colour and size;
When she opened them wide,
People all turned aside,
And started away in surprise.
There was a young fellow named Clyde,
who fell in an outhouse and died.
Along came his brother,
and fell in another,
and now they're interred side by side.
The was a Young Lady of Bute,
Who played on a silver-gilt flute;
She played several jigs,
To her uncle's white pigs,
That amusing Young Lady of Bute.
As for beauty I am not a star,
There are others much more handsome by far.
But my face - I don't mind it,
For I am behind it,
It's the people in front that I jar.
There was an Old Person of Berlin,
Whose form was uncommonly thin;
Till he once, by mistake,
Was mixed up in a cake,
So they baked that Old Man of Berlin.
There is a Young Lady whose nose
Continually prospers and grows;
When it grew out of sight,
she exclaimed in a fright,
"Oh! Farewell to the end of my nose!"
There was an Old Man of the East,
Who gave all his children a feast;
But they all ate so much
And their conduct was such
That it killed that Old Man of the East.
A painter who lived in Great Britain,
Interrupted two girls with their knitting,
He said, with a sigh,
That park bench--well I,
Just painted it, right where you're sitting.
There was an Old Man who said, 'Hush!
I perceive a young bird in this bush!'
When they said, 'Is it small?'
He replied, 'Not at all!
It is four times as big as the bush!'
There was an Old Person of Tring,
Who embellished his nose with a ring;
Ha gazed at the moon
Every evening in June,
That ecstatic Old Person in Tring.
My ambition, said old Mr. King,
Is to live as a bird on the wing.
Then he climbed up a steeple,
Which scared all the people,
So they caged him and taught him to sing.
There once was a girl named Zoe,
She went out in her yard which was quite snowy.
She ate her brother,
Asked her parents for another,
So they had another named Joey.
There was a young lady of Kent,
Whose nose was most awfully bent.
There was a Young Lady of Wales,
Who caught a large fish without scales;
When she lifted her hook
She exclaimed, 'Only look!'
That ecstatic Young Lady of Wales.
There was an Old Man of the West,
Who never could get any rest;
So they set him to spin
On his nose and chin,
Which cured that Old Man of the West.
There was a Young Lady of Turkey,
Who wept when the weather was murky;
When the day turned out fine,
She ceased to repine,
That capricious Young Lady of Turkey.
There once was a man from Nantucket,
Who kept all of his cash in a bucket,
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man,
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
My neighbor came over to say,
Although not in a neighborly way,
That he'd knock me around,
If I didn't stop the sound,
Of the classical music I play.
There once was a man from Tibet,
Who couldn't find a cigarette.
So he smoked all his socks,
and got chicken-pocks,
and had to go to the vet.
There was an Old Man of Leghorn,
The smallest that ever was born;
But quickly snapped up he
Was once by a puppy,
Who devoured that Old Man of Leghorn.
There was an Ol Man of Quebec,
A beetle ran over his neck;
But he cried, 'With a needle,
I'll slay you, O beadle!'
That angry Old Man of Quebec.
There was an Old Person of Bangor,
Whose face was distorted with anger!
He tore off his boots,
And subsisted on roots,
That irascible Person of Bangor.
There was an Old Man of Vesuvius,
Who studied the works of Vitruvius;
When the flames burnt his book,
To drinking he took,
That morbid Old Man of Vesuvius.
There was an old lady from Ghent,
who slept on a bed of cement.
Her bed was well used,
and her body well bruised,
and the back of her head had a dent.
There once was a vicar at Kew
Who kept his pet cat in a pew.
He taught it to speak
alphabetical Greek,
but it never got farther than µ.
There was a Young Lady of Hull,
Who was chased by a virulent bull;
But she seized on a spade,
And called out, 'Who's afraid?'
Which distracted that virulent bull.
A newspaper man named Fling,
Could make "copy" from any old thing.
But the copy he wrote,
Of a five dollar note,
Was so good he is now wears so much bling.
There once was a fly on the wall,
I wonder why didn't it fall.
Because its feet stuck,
Or was it just luck,
Or does gravity miss things so small?
There was a young schoolboy of Rye,
Who was baked by mistake in a pie.
To his mother’s disgust,
He emerged through the crust,
And exclaimed, with a yawn, Where am I?
There was a young fellow named Hall,
who died in the spring in the fall.
'Twould have been a bad thing,
had he died in the spring,
but he didn't — he died in the fall.
There was an Old Person of Burton,
Whose answers were rather uncertain;
When they said, 'How d'ye do?'
He replied, 'Who are you?'
That distressing Old Person of Burton.
There was an old man in a tree,
Whose whiskers were lovely to see;
But the birds of the air,
Pluck'd them perfectly bare,
To make themselves nests on that tree.
There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who sat on a horse when he reared;
But they said, "Never mind!
You will fall off behind,
You propitious Old Man with a beard!"
There was an Old Person of Philæ,
Whose conduct was scroobious and wily;
He rushed up a Palm,
When the weather was calm,
And observed all the ruins of Philæ.