Question

You must be familiar with the following nursery rhymes:
i) ‘Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool’.
ii) ‘Mary had a little lamb, whose fleece was as white as snow’.
What is meant by the white fleece of the lamb?

Answer 1

Hint: Nursery rhymes are songs/poems written for children to convey important moral values in a fun and lighthearted manner. The above two rhymes are one of the most popular nursery rhymes known to all children.

Complete answer:
The word ‘fleece’ refers to the outer wooly covering of the lamb (young sheep) and can be brown, balck or white color. This line is taken from the popular rhyme ‘Mary had a little lamb’, in which Mary, who is a young girl, is followed by her lamb to school which soon attracts attention from everybody.

‘White fleece of the lamb’ means the outer covering, hair and body, of the lamb was white in color. Further, the rhyme conveys that the fleece of the lamb was as white as the snow. Because of the lamb’s bright color and features, it soon becomes the center of attention for all the children in Mary’s school. They all played with the lamb and had a good time.

This rhyme is based on the true events in the life of a young 14-year old, Mary Sawyer and was first written by Sarah Josepha Hale on May 24. 1830.

Note: Lamb means a young sheep. If you observe carefully, the above two rhymes both talk about sheep and their wool. The only difference is that in ‘Baa, Baa, Black sheep’ the boy refers to wool from a black sheep and in the second rhyme Mary has a lamb that has white wool. Both rhymes are traditional and easy to remember for children.