It is just such a piece of burlesque as Swift might have written: but
many circumstances lead me to think it must be much older. Has it ever
been printed? {258}

There is another old (indeed an evidently very ancient) song, which I do
not remember to have seen in print, or even referred to in print. None
of the books into which I have looked, from deeming them likely to
contain it, make the least reference to this song. I have heard it in
one of the midland counties, and in one of the western, both many years
ago; but I have not heard it in London or any of the metropolitan
districts. The song begins thus:--

"London Bridge is broken down,
Dance over my Lady Lea:
London Bridge is broken down,
With a gay ladée."

This must surely refer to some event preserved in history,--may indeed
be well known to well-read antiquaries, though so totally unknown to men
whose general pursuits (like my own) have lain in other directions. The
present, however, is an age for "popularising" knowledge; and your work
has assumed that task as one of its functions.

The difficulties attending such inquiries as arise out of matters so
trivial as an old ballad, are curiously illustrated by the answers
already printed respecting the "wooing frog." In the first place, it was
attributed to times within living memory; then shown to exceed that
period, and supposed to be very old,--even as old as the Commonwealth,
or, perhaps, as the Reformation. This is objected to, from "the style