Frankie’s Skin and Blister Gets a Tit for Tat - Stories: Non-fiction

Use your loaf . . . and you’ll understand this story
Frankie stashed his bees and honey in his sky rocket, dashed down the apples and pears, and ran out of the cat and mouse. He heard his little skin and blister calling him, but he ran on as fast as his clothes pegs would carry him. Today was her birthday, and he was going to buy her a nice warm tit for tat. He had to be back in time for her birthday Rosy Lee.

Panting like a hollow log, he stopped for a moment to wipe his sweaty boat race with his German band. He checked his sky rocket—but all he found there was a great big hole!

“Frankie! Frankie!” called his little skin and blister. “You dropped your bees and honey!”

So Frankie’s little skin and blister got her tit for tat. And if she knew she nearly didn’t, she never said a dicky bird.

If you figured out that each italicized group of words in the story above stands for a word that rhymes with the end of it, you know the story is called “Frankie’s Sister Gets a Hat,” and the other words are: money, pocket, stairs, house, legs, tea, dog, face, hand, and word.

Some people actually talk like this, at least in part. They live in the East End of London, England, born within the sound of the bells of the church of St. Mary-Le-Bow. They are called Cockneys (an ancient nickname for cheeky folk, meaning “cock’s eggs”), and this way of talking is called Cockney rhyming slang.

So far as we can tell, Cockneys started using their rhymes about 150 years ago. Some scholars say beggars used them first, as a secret language. Others say the rhymes began with the ballad sellers, people who wrote and sold rhyming stories.

Today this rhyming slang still flourishes, especially in London’s lively East End markets. And throughout England people can tell you what words the different rhymes stand for. Many English people still call what they put on their heads (what Frankie bought for his skin and blister) their titfer. That’s an especially teasing version of the slang, leaving off the rhyme. To understand it, any English person would tell you, you’ll really need your loaf (of ? ).

Try writing your own story in rhyming slang. You don’t need the Cockney rhymes—you’ll come up with any number of funny ones of your own. “Once upon a ? ”