October the Nineteenth: Ghoulies and Ghosties #Blogtober2021

Many years ago, I first learned this prayer. Maybe some would call it a poem.

"From ghoulies and ghosties,  

And long leggity beasties,

And things that go bump in the night,

Good Lord deliver us"

I have read that it originated in Scotland, or in Wales, or maybe in Cornwall, England. It's been around for a very long time, since the eighteenth century, or 1800, or 1905, or in 1912. It's anonymous, or it was written by Mr. Chaplin and appeared in a book called "The Beggar's Wallet. Obviously, there are many opinions about it.

A series of three postcards was drawn by Stan Chaplin in 1905. They were called "A Cornish Litany" and all contained this poem at the bottom. Each was a different scene, but all included scary monsters.

The poem was expanded into a song in the Broadway play "Meet me in St. Louis" in 1989. It was sung by the children and the Irish maid in a Halloween scene.  It wasn't included in the Judy Garland movie produced in 1944. Too bad. It's pretty cute. It can be found on YouTube.

I actually made a cross stitch sampler of this prayer and put it into my children's bedroom when they were young. I can't find the exact one, but it was something like this, except it had some long leggity beasties in it.