Mercy

Going Round the Mulberry Bush

Here we go round the mulberry bush,
The mulberry bush,
The mulberry bush.
Here we go round the mulberry bush
So early in the morning!
At least that's the way WE used to sing it! 
 
Sometimes we added other verses: "This is the way we wash our clothes, dry our clothes, iron our clothes" or just about any OTHER chore our imaginations could come up with!

According to Wikipedia, historian R. S. Duncan suggested that the song originated with  female prisoners at HMP Wakefield. A sprig was taken from Hatfield Hall (Normanton Golf Club) in Stanley, Wakefield, which grew into a fully mature mulberry tree around which prisoners would exercise.  Apparently, there is no corroborative evidence to support this theory.



However, it makes PERFECT sense to me that a sprig would grow quickly into a fully mature mulberry tree!  Just a few years ago, wanting SOMEthing to grow in this spot and being too frugal to purchase a "real" tree, we dug up a small (maybe 3') tree growing uninvited along our back yard fence.  We didn't know what kind it was, but it turned out that just a few short years later we have a mulberry tree! (It's huge, messy parent tree was chopped down last year.  We try to keep this one trimmed up.  Still it produces its annual berries.)

We'll be more careful before we "go round the mulberry bush" again!  
What you sow, you DO reap!
and
How quickly trees from little "sprigs" grow!

5 comments:

  1. It's beautiful!! Generally if something VOLUNTEERS to grow it is going to take some maintenance. Definitely something we've learned here... But what blessing. There's such satisfaction when you can manipulate a landscape without putting out cash! I love it.

    Blessings, Debbie

    ReplyDelete
  2. That last line is SO powerful!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh yes Rebecca! We have those growing all around the yard!!! I keep cutting them back. I've yet to get any mature berries before the birds do!!!
    Which is why I suspect we have so many to begin with!! Love Di ♥

    ReplyDelete
  4. My son wanted to plant a mustard seed just to see how it would grow. It's about a foot tall now, ugly as mud, and half-eaten by something, but it sure did prove a point to him, and to me. Small seeds, when planted in faith, grow. Just grow, and somehow, that's enough for me.

    Love your bush/tree. It's really quite beautiful.

    peace~elaine

    ReplyDelete
  5. ....and you always reap more than you sow. Sow one seed of corn, reap a whole ear.
    It can be for the good too, it's not always bad!
    Today, we are reaping what we sowed in the past. I find that very interesting. Look at where you are today....heart and soul and body. It's because of little decisions of a hundred yesterdays.

    ReplyDelete