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elle

23rd March 2015, 21:20
Bolton, Chris - and I lived there for 20 odd years.
And the nursery rhyme, as I know it, bears it out.
As I said earlier, it's obviously a regional pronunciation.
Look at the different set out of the rhyme as Jazzy knows it.
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malone

23rd March 2015, 21:22
...the nursery rhyme is regional too. The normal/common/most prevalent version of Hickory Dickory Dock has 'the mouse ran down'.
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elle

23rd March 2015, 21:26
See my post at 16, Malone!
but maybe only for Southerners, Malone?
and that isn't even a RHYME!!
Anyway, let's all agree to differ, shall we? or we'll be at this all night!
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malone

23rd March 2015, 21:32
It's enough of a rhyme for the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations - where the mouse has been running down since about 1744!

I actually find this all very interesting -and I'm quite happy for everyone to have their own views and pronunciations.
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elle

23rd March 2015, 21:58
Regional variations on nursery rhymes are quite common, I think.
For instance, where I was brought up we had:
Ding dong bell,
pussy's in the well.
Who put him in? Little Tommy Thin.
Who pulled him out? Little Tommy Stout ...etc......

(as you can see , this rhymes...)

but round here, where I now live, people say
Who put him in ? Little Johnny Green.
Who pulled him out? Little Tommy Stout...... etc

('Green' doesn't rhyme with 'in')

However, Wikipedia says 'Flynn' which does rhyme!
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heathcliff67

23rd March 2015, 22:17
Where I was brought up the rhyme (!) would likely have gone something like.....

The clock struck yin
The moose ran doon

Doesn't really work, does it?

Mind you, on a more positive note, the dialect does create rhymes which would not normally be possible; such as these classic lines from the immortal poet William Topaz McGonagall:

This is Dundee, withoot a doo't (without a doubt)
'cause there's the Workmen's Institute.
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