One of my more interesting female ancestors was resident in the riverside village of Spyder-Upon-Whey, in the county of Curdshire, during the early nineteenth-century. Or at least that's what our treasured family coloring book says. Alas, the Muffet side of the family has always been somewhat of a mystery. Besides her pronounced arachnophobia, we know no more of Miss Muffet than what is contained within the pages of this heavily crayoned heirloom.
She was noticeably short, somewhat skittish and unconventional, preferring to sit on the ground during her woodland rambles rather than employing a deckchair, shooting stick or other alfresco seating device. Consequently, she appears to have suffered from an alarmingly red, sort of scribbly complexion with excessively rosy cheeks and an overall unnatural ruddiness extending to both her arms and legs. Her hair was a multi-fringed tangle of dark brown strands sticking out at strange, gravity-defying angles, as if it had been thrown on top of her head by a frustrated knitter of chunky brown sweaters.
Overall Miss Muffet must have looked extremely rough when judged by the genteel standards of her fellow Victorians, and such an unappealing visage has led my Great Aunt Mary Mary, always one to forward a contrary opinion, to suggest that Miss Muffet was probably a lesbian. But she's one to talk with all her pretty maids in a row.
My great Aunt Mary had a little lamb, she used to sit on a tuffet eating her curtains away.
Posted by: Peter Horne | August 14, 2007 at 06:37