Here we have a nursery scene, in which it is almost certain that the woman is a nurse and not a mother. However it is also pretty certain that with one infant starting to walk and the other in the cradle she would have tried to keep order with some kind of song. The cradle also leads us to "Rock-A-Bye Baby", which starts with the words "Rock a bye baby, on the tree top, When the wind blows the cradle will rock".
This is another eighteenth century nursery rhyme, but oddly the words and the song were not written at the same time. The words came first, as a poem, in 1765, which appeared in "Mother Goose`s Melody", a selection of little verses whose author is not known - only the printer, a John Newbery. Now he was a very interesting person, and the first publisher to specialise in works for children, and his shop, in St. Paul`s Churchyard, London, is regarded by many to be the first ever children`s bookshop, or, as he had on his shop sign, "Juvenile Library".
As for the tune, that took almost a hundred years to become joined to the words, and that was in America. Somehow, perhaps through a copy being taken across by an English settler, the book was reprinted (perhaps not entirely legally) at a printers in Boston, and it was reprinted too, with eventually quite a wide circulation, as far as New England. And here, one day in 1872, a fifteen year old girl called Effie Crockett, trying to settle down a baby not her own, used the words but set them to a little improvised tune, which was overheard by her music teacher, who helped her to have it published. The anomaly is that the publishing took place sixteen years after. It was published as Effie Crockett Canning, and the Canning is usually reported as being her grandmother`s name, done to conceal her work from her family until she was sure of their approval. That is a bit misleading as by the time it was published it was her name, too, for she had married a John F Canning, a Boston doctor, in 1881. He died eight years later and she remarried in 1894, another Bostonian, Harry J. Carlton - who she also outlived.
As well as this claim to fame, though, she was also an actress, and she used all three names, Crockett, Canning and Carlton. Her most famous role was in "The Private Secretary" with William Gillette, who co-wrote the first ever Sherlock Holmes stage play with the author Arthur Conan Doyle, in 1899. Therefore Mr. Gillette was also the first person ever to play Sherlock Holmes. As for our actress, she was in many productions, but gave it all up in 1922 when her second husband died. And she died in 1940.
However her fame lives on every time "Rock-A-Bye Baby" is used on screen or stage, as she is credited with its authorship.
I have also been reminded by reader and collaborator Malcolm Thompson, who supplied a great deal of this information, that there are other nursery rhymes which could equally apply -
The child in the foreground with his hobby horse could lead us to "Ride a Cock Horse to Banbury Cross", which is often thought to refer to a visit by Queen Elizabeth I to Banbury - however I cannot track that visit down. Another suggestion is that it was Lady Godiva, but she has no connection to Banbury. Then there is a theory, gaining ground, that the "Fine" Lady is actually the "Fiennes" Lady, after a lady who, rather excitingly, made a very grand tour of England - and yes, she is related to the actor Ralph Fiennes.
Then I also had a suggestion of "Cock A Doodle Do", referring to the rather misshapen head on top of the stick, which is indeed not very equine, and could be a chicken`s. There is also what may just be a "fiddling stick" on the floor, though it looks more like a whip to me.
As for our card, this may be anonymous, but it was issued through Reemstma and it appears as so in our original World Tobacco Issues Index, where the description is :
ALBUM NR. 9 or SAMMELWERK NR. 9 : DEUTSCHE KULTUR-BILDER, DEUTSCHES LEBEN IN 5 JAHRHUNDERTEN (German Culture - German Life Over 500 Years.) Size 70 x 84. Nd. (300). Anonymous.... R16-13
A. "Album Nr. 9"
B. "Sammelwerk Nr. 9". Front (a) matt (b) varnished.
It is exactly the same text in our updated version of this work, but has a new code of R189-375.
Though we give an English translation of of the title, as "German Culture - German Life Over 500 Years", for some reason we do not give the dates of those years in either the German version or the English, though they do appear on the card as part of the title. Maybe space would not allow? Anyway, they run from 1400 to 1900, whilst our card is dated for the eras 1300 to 1550.
The title of our card is also interesting, for it is "Kinderstube", and that has come to mean a nursery, though the direct translation is from the two parts "Kinder" (children) and "Stube" (room). There is sometimes another word used for this, "Kinderzimmer", and that means child bedroom. Kinderstube is also used in another sense though, meaning good manners, or education therein. And I suppose that teaching children good manners does indeed start when they are still in the nursery - though we tend to think of a nursery as only a place for play.
As for the reason why the cards are anonymous, that is because they were not designed to be kept loose, but to be stuck in an album. It was certainly a spectacular one, hardback, and when filled with these little miniature paintings it does look really attractive.
