Where Have You Been All Day? Mother Goose 1869
[This version is from Mother Goose's Melodies for Children, or Songs for the Nursery: Illustrations by Stevens and Fay; New York Published by Hurd And Houghton Cambridge: Riverside Press; 1869. The notes refer to Halliwell and it is nearly identical to a version published by him. The "Tammy's Courtship" text given by Halliwell and refered to in the notes (below) is the early version from the 1700s usually titled, My Boy Tammy.
A 1878 edition of Mother Goose's Melodies for Children, or Songs for the Nursery by William Adolphus Wheeler also has the famous legend in Boston about the "original Mother Goose" one Elizabeth Goose, a second wife who inherited seven children from her husband's first marriage. From whom was produced a mystical book, “Songs for the Nursery, or Mother Goose's Melodies for children. Printed by T. Fleet, at his printing-house, Pudding Lane, 1719. Price two coppers,” which has never been found.
Original text: Mother Goose's Melodies, Or, Songs for the Nursery
Where have you been all the day,
My boy, Willy?
"I've been all the day,
Courting of a lady gay;
But O! she's too young
To be taken from her mammy."
What work can she do,
My boy, Willy?
Can she bake and can she brew,
My boy, Willy?
She can brew and she can bake,
And she can make our wedding-cake;
But O! she's too young
To be taken from her mammy.
What age may she be?
What age may she be?
My boy, Willy?
"Twice two, twice seven,
Twice ten, twice eleven;
But O! she's too young
To be taken from her mammy."
I've arranged the stanzas below in standard form.
R. Matteson 2011]
No. 147, p. 156.— Where have you been all the day. This is a very popular nursery ballad. There is a Scottish version of it, called "Tammy's Courtship," which is given by Halliwell in his "Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales," p. 260.
"Where have you been all the day, my boy, Willy?
Where have you been all the day, my boy, Willy?
"I've been all the day, courting of a lady gay;
But O! she's too young to be taken from her mammy."
What work can she do, my boy, Willy?
Can she bake and can she brew, my boy, Willy?
She can brew and she can bake, and she can make our wedding-cake;
But O! she's too young To be taken from her mammy.
What age may she be, my boy, Willy?
What age may she be, my boy, Willy?
"Twice two, twice seven, twice ten, twice eleven;
But O! she's too young to be taken from her mammy."