Nursery Rhymes (no pub. date, Ramboro, illus. not attributed)

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A group of children and animals running down a hill with a well at the top: Little Bo-Peep, Mary Had a Little Lamb, Little Boy Blue, and Goosey, Goosey, Gander. The cover for Nursery Rhymes, published by Ramboro.
Nursery Rhymes, published by Ramboro Books

This is a lovely little vintage board book published by Ramboro Books, London, but with no publication date. I can't find further information about it online, but the ISBN was reused by Ramboro to publish their Essential Guide to Jazz in 1997 so we can assume it was published before then. Another possibility is that it has a vintage look and was published post-1997, but that seems less likely.

Despite being a short board book, we are treated to eleven rhymes. (See contents list at end of post). The final rhyme appears on the back cover. The front cover artwork appears to be of a different style to the interior illustrations, although it features all the same characters, in the same clothes. Unfortunately no illustrator is attributed.
The illustrations are colourful and interesting. I particularly enjoyed the variety of different period clothing – the red-coated Little Jack Horner; the European folk costumes of Jack and Jill; the Puritan boy peeking at the King of Spain's ornately dressed daughter; the gorgeous dresses (and hats!) of both the Marys; and the warm blue finery of sleepy, black-haired little boy blue.

A beautiful young woman waters her garden. Vintage illustration of Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary A girl in a beautiful apricot coloured dress walks with a pretty lamb. Vintage illustration for Mary Had a Little Lamb.
Illustrations of 'Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary' and 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'

The narrow ALL CAPS typeface was a bad fit for the illustrations and spoiled the look of the board book. I could have forgiven it, but it was compounded by typos, spacing issues, and a weird use of punctuation. Colons and semi-colons were added into familiar nursery rhymes that usually have none, full stops and commas appeared in the wrong places, end quotation marks and possessive apostrophes were missing, and the wrong letters appeared in the wrong places too - "ABOUE" for "ABOVE" in 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star', and "NAY-COCK" for "HAY-COCK" in 'Little Boy Blue'. I thought at first that "come blow up your horn" was also an error (come explode your horn?!) but a quick Google search taught me that's an accepted variation for the more familiar (to me at least) "come blow your horn".

A boy dressed in blue period clothing, sleeping on a haystack, with a golden horn at his feet. Little Boy Blue, published by Ramboro.
A finely dressed 'Little Boy Blue'

This appears to be a rare book, with virtually no online presence, and no copies for sale online. If anyone knows the illustrator(s) or its publication date, I'd welcome the information.

Nursery Rhymes – Contents

  • Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star
  • Little Jack Horner
  • Goosey, Goosey, Gander
  • Old Mother Hubbard
  • Jack and Jill
  • Wee Willie Winkie
  • Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary
  • I Had a Little Nut-Tree
  • Little Bo-Peep
  • Mary Had a Little Lamb
  • Little Boy Blue


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