Being by the sea we often wake to mist in the morning and usually it blows away or is burned away by the sun, it’s what we call a sea fret. there are lots of meanings of the word fret, it can be a verb meaning to be anxious or to worry about something, it can be that piece of wood across the neck of a guitar, it can also apparently be a strait or a channel. A sea fret, also known by the Dutch word haar, is a mist or fog which comes off the sea and hangs around along the coast, and the word originates in that sense from the north-east of England.
Looking out on the misty morning an old nursery rhyme always pops into my head:
One misty, moisty, morning,
When cloudy was the weather,
There I met an old man
Clothéd all in leather
Cclothéd all in leather,
With a strap under his chin.
And how do you do?
And how do you do?
And how do you do again?
I began to wonder if it actually had any specific origin or if it was just one of those funny little rhymes which just arose out of someone actually meeting an old man dressed in leather on one foggy morning. Apparently it was a verse from a longer sixteenth century song, The Wiltshire wedding, about the marriage of Daniel Do-well and Doll the dairymaid; her old Father Leather-coat and Mother Plodwell were characters in the song. It was later used in John Gaye’s Beggar’s Opera in 1728, and again in Brecht’s Threepenny Opera… Fancy that!!
Lois Elsden 
In the misty moonlight. By the flickering firelight. Everything is alright. Long as I’m with you.Who sang that Princess?
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I don’t think it was Raul Malo… but maybe it should have been… I give up!
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Dean Martin. It was adapted from an old, old Heckawee Indian song that was thought to have originated with Welsh tin miners.
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That makes sense… you can almost smell the leeks and daffodils…
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Who has more fun than monkies. No more Heckawee stories. Promise!
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More monkeys have more fun… and I love the Heckawee myths and legends!
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We apparently have a sea fret here in Gordon’s Bay, Capetown, South Africa today. It’s very misty which brought to my 73 year old mind the poem “On a misty moisty morning” for which I then had to Google a source. Your version was the wording I remember from childhood in England. Thank you for the trip down Memory Lane. 🌍🕊️
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Greetings Nuli – no sea fret here today for us. just grey, grey, grey! It’s amazing what we have stored in our memories, and how memories can float to the surface sometimes unexpectedly!
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It’s just after 5 PM here in America. Fancy that. That rhyme has been with me for over 70 years. I thought about it just now, 11 December 2024. I actually just now purchased “The Tall Book of Mother Goose,” published in 1942 and illustrated by Feodor Stepanovich Rojankovsky. I had this book as a kid and it is more than just likely that it is the most significant publication in my life. I purchased it for my grandson, Theo, who survived a difficult birth and is thriving, flourishing, now. I know that this book might not be appreciated but then hope is an attitude, and it just might. When remembrance comes of early days, it often begins with “One misty moisty morning . . .”
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Thank you, Eugene! Lucky Theo to have such treasure in store!
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