A big playbook for boys and girls [antikvár]

DID Kinc COIC THE STORY BEHIND THE RHYME Everyone in Music Land was very happy and excited. Princess Melody was to marry Prince Ray of the Land of Scales. Everyone was busy preparing for the wedding, especially Old King Cole, who spent most of the day rehearsing his three fiddlers who were to play at the banquet after the wedding. "Let's try it just once again," he said to Crotchet, Quaver and Trill. "Somehow it doesn't seem quite right. In fact, it is just as if . . ." The King paused, and looked rather uncomfortable. "His Majesty means that someone is playing out of tune," whispered Crotchet to Trill, and they both looked crossly at poor old Quaver. Just then Queen Sonata called to the King to come and see the princess in her wedding dress. "Keep on practising," ordered the King as he went off to the prin- cess's apartments. "I will be back as soon as I can." "I know that I am playing out of tune," said Quaver to the others when old King Cole had left the room. "I really can't understand it. It is as if my fiddle is bewitched." "Perhaps it is," cried Trill eagerly, for he liked old Quaver, who had been very kind to him when he had first become a Royal fiddler. "Why don't you go over to Nursery Rhyme Land and see the Wise Woman of the Woods who lives there? Perhaps she will be able to help you." "I'll go straight away," cried Quaver, donning his hat and coat. "And I'll take my fiddle with me to show her." Quaver was getting quite old and he could not walk very quickly, so he was very pleased when Barnaby the tinker stopped by the wayside and offered him a lift in his pony and trap into the Whispering Woods. "Going to see the Wise Woman, are ye?" Barnaby asked shrewdly. "Everyone goes to her when they are in trouble. What's wrong?" "I'd rather not say," replied Quaver quietly, for he knew that Barnaby was rather a gossip, and that the news would soon be all round Nursery Rhyme Land if Barnaby found out.