(Pick A Letter to Choose a Rhyme!)

Notes

*Here's the Oxford English Dictionary definition that seems to fit this meaning of bonny:

"Sometimes as a term of fondness or coaxing, as in 'my bonnie bairn'."

*****

Here's a version of Cushy Cow Bonny from The Only True Mother Goose Melodies (c. 1833):

Cushy Cow bonny, let down your milk,
And I will give you a gown of silk,
A gown of silk and a silver tee,
If you'll let down your milk to me.

Here's a version from The Nursery Rhyme Book, edited by Andrew Lang and illustrated by L. Leslie Brooke (1897):

Cushy cow bonny, let down thy milk,
And I will give thee a gown of silk;
A gown of silk and a silver tee,
If thou wilt let down thy milk to me.
If you love me, pop and fly;
If you hate me, lie and die.

[Kids used to say this to pips (pits) placed in the fire; it was a "species of divination practiced by children"].

Photos & Illustrations

Comments

The first version of this rhyme can be found in The Real Mother Goose (1916), illustrated by Blanche Fisher Wright.

Thanks and Acknowledgements

The 1st illustration is by The Nursery Rhyme Book, edited by Andrew Lang and illustrated by L. Leslie Brooke (1897). The 2nd illustration is from The Only True Mother Goose Melodies (published and copyrighted in Boston in 1833 by Munroe & Francis)