Eat Nothing At All!

Illustration:  There Was An Old Woman.  Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes.  McLoughlin Brothers: New York. Ca 1900.

“There Was An Old Woman.”

There was an old woman

Called Nothing-at-all,

Who rejoiced in a dwelling

Exceedingly small:

A man stretched his mouth

To its utmost extent,

And down at one gulp

House and old woman went.

.

Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes.

McLoughlin Brothers: New York. Ca 1900.

Lick The Platter Clean!

Illustration:  Jack Sprat.  Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes.  McLoughlin Brothers: New York. Ca 1900.

“Jack Sprat and his Wife.”

 Jack Sprat could eat no fat,

His wife could eat no lean;

And so betwixt them both, you see,

They licked the platter clean.

Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes.

McLoughlin Brothers: New York. Ca 1900.

Giants Eat Little Boys & Girls!

Illustration:  Jack At The Table With Two Giants.  Jack The Giant Killer.  W. B. Conkey Company: New York. 1898.

A GOOD SUPPER

Many years ago, in the wonderful time when King Arthur ruled over England, there lived in Cornwall a number of giants, who never did any work, but stole sheep and cattle from the people in the country round. Some of them even ate little boys and girls when they wanted a specially good supper.

Jack The Giant Killer

W. B. Conkey Company: New York. 1898.

Circe’s Palace – Bad party behavior?

Illustration by Milo Winters, Tanglewood Tales, Circe's Palace
“It looked so intolerably absurd to see hogs on cushioned thrones.”
Circe’s Palace
Tanglewood Tales
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Illustrated By: Milo Winter
Rand McNally & Company: Chicago & New York. 1913

Whatever little fault they might find with the dishes, they sat at dinner a prodigiously long while; and it would really have made you ashamed to see how they swilled down the liquor and gobbled up the food. They sat on golden thrones, to be sure; but they behaved like pigs in a sty; and, if they had had their wits about them, they might have guessed that this was the opinion of their beautiful hostess and her maidens. It brings a blush to my face to rekcon up, in my own mind, what mountains of meat and pudding, and what gallons of wine, these two and twenty guzzlers and gormandizers ate and drank. They forgot all about their homes, and their wives and children, and all about Ulysses, and everything else, except this banquet, at which they wanted to keep feasting forever. But at length they began to give over, from mere incapacity to hold any more.

“That last bit of fat is too much for me,” said one.

“And I have not room for another morsel,” said his next neighbor, heaving a sigh. “What a pity! My appetite is as sharp as ever.”

In short, they all left off eating, and leaned back on their thrones, with such a stupid and helpless aspect as made them ridiculous to behold. When their hostess saw this, she laughed aloud; so did her four damsels; so did the two and twenty serving men that bore dishes, and their two and twenty fellows who poured out the wine. And the louder they laughed, the more stupid and helpless did the two and twenty gormandizers look. Then the beautiful woman took her stand in the middle of the saloon, and stretching out a slender rod (it had been all the while in her hand, although they never noticed it till this moment), she turned it from one guest to another, until each had felt it pointed at himself. Beautiful as her face was, and though there was a smile on it, it looked just as wicked and mischievous as the ugliest serpent that ever was seen; and fat-witted as the voyagers had made themselves, they began to suspect that they had fallen into the power of an evil-minded enchantress.

“Wretches,” cried she, “you have abused a lady’s hospitality; and in this princely saloon your behavior has been suited to a hog-pen. You are already swine in everything but human form, which you disgrace, and which I myself should be ashamed to keep a moment longer, were you to share it with me. But it will require only the slightest exercise of magic to make the exterior conform to the hoggish disposition. Assume your proper shapes, gormandizers, and be gone to the sty!”

Uttering these last words, she waved her wand; and stamping her foot imperiously, each of the guests was struck aghast at beholding, instead of his comrades in human shape, one and twenty hogs sitting on the same number of golden thrones. Each man (as he still supposed himself to be) essayed to give a cry of surprise, but found that he could merely grunt, and that, in a word, he was just such another beast as his companions. It looked so intolerably absurd to see hogs on cushioned thrones, that they made haste to wallow down upon all fours, like other swine. They tried to groan and beg for mercy, but forthwith emitted the most awful grunting and squealing that ever came out of swinish throats. They would have wrung their hands in despair, but, attempting to do so, grew all the more desperate for seeing themselves squatted on their hams, and pawing the air with their fore trotters. Dear me!  What pendulous ears they had! What little red eyes, half buried in fat! And what long snouts instead of Grecian noses!

But brutes as they certainly were, they yet had enough human nature in them to be shocked at their own hideousness; and still intending to groan, they uttered a viler grunt and squeal than before. So harsh and ear-piercing it was, that you would have fancied a butcher was sticking his knife into each of their throats, or, at the very least, that somebody was pulling every hog by his funny little twist of a tail.

“Be gone to your sty!” cried the enchantress, giving them some smart stokes with her wand . . .