Round And Round The Village

Source: Games For The Playground, Home, School And Gymnasium
Category: SINGING GAMES



_6 to 30 or more players._

_Indoors; out of doors._

Go round and round the village,
Go round and round the village,
Go round and round the village,
Go as we have done before.

Go in and out the windows,
Go in and out the windows,
Go in and out the windows,
Go as we have done before.

Now stand and face your partner,
Now stand and face your partner,
Now stand and face your partner,
And bow before you go.

Now follow me to London,
Now follow me to London,
Now follow me to London,
As we have done before.

The players form a circle, clasping hands, with one player outside. In
this game the circle stands still and represents the houses of a
village. The player outside sings the first verse dancing around the
circle. On the second verse, "In and out the windows," etc., the
players forming the ring raise their clasped hands to represent
windows, and the outside player passes in under one arch, out under
the next, and so on, winding in and out until the circle has been
completed. She tries to get around by the time the verse is finished,
and then goes on singing the third verse while she pauses in the
circle and chooses a partner. These two then run around the outside of
the circle while singing the last verse, "Follow me to London," etc.,
returning at the close to the center of the circle, where they bow and
part, the first player taking her place in the ring. The game is then
repeated, with the second player running around the outside of the
village.

Where large numbers are playing, several players may be chosen instead
of one, to run around the village and in and out of the windows. In
that case several partners will be chosen, and at the close the first
players will return to the circle, and the partners whom they have
chosen will go on with the game by running around the village and
singing the first verse again.

FOR THE SCHOOLROOM
In the schoolroom two players may be chosen to
run "Round and round the village," starting from different parts of
the room. The remainder of the class sits and sings while these
players run up and down through the aisles, each touching two or three
pupils, who rise and run after them. When the windows are mentioned,
the seated players who still have neighbors sitting across the aisles,
stand, and clasp hands with the neighbors to form an arch under which
the runners make their way.

Variations
A pretty variation in this game, adapting it to the
modern city environment, with which many city children are more
familiar than they are with village life, is to substitute for the
words "Round and round the village" and "In and out the windows" the
words, "Round and round the city" (presumably on elevated or subway
trains) and "In and out the stations" or "In and out the subway."
While this tampering with a traditional form of the game is
questionable, there is no doubt that children much enjoy playing about
things related to their own experiences. A gradual and probably
unconscious adaptation to environment is one of the manifestations of
the folk-lore spirit.

This is one of the very old traditional games, based on village
customs. Mrs. Gomme traces it to the periodical village
festivals at which marriages took place. In some of these it
was customary for the young people to go through the houses in
procession.


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