This is a game Christabel learned when she was a child in Scotland.

Basically, you’d sit opposite someone and clap your hands against the other persons’ in a set pattern, and chant the rhyme in time to the claps. There were a lot of verses, but the ones I remember go like this;

My boyfriend gave me an apple
My boyfriend gave me a pear
My boyfriend gave me a kiss on the lips
And threw me down the stair

He threw me over Paris
He threw me over France
He threw me over London-town
Then took me to the dance

I gave him back his apple
I gave him back his pear
I gave my boy a kiss on the lips
Then kicked him down the stair

I kicked him over Paris
I kicked him over France
I kicked him over London-town
Then went off to the dance

However, sometimes the verses changed to:

He threw me over Paris
He threw me over France
He threw me over London-town
And lost his underpants

and

I kicked him over Paris
I kicked him over France
He had to go to Mothercare
To buy new underpants

These rhymes are very similar to several rhymes that are common in American culture- the “Cinderella, dressed in yellow/went upstairs to kiss her fella” jump-rope rhyme and the ever-popular “I see London, I see France” rhyme. All three share similar elements- they are games played with other people, generally of one’s own gender (although “I see London” tends to cross all boundaries when there is an underpants incident), and they all include vaguely transgressive elements- suggestions of liaisons with boys, for example- and although the children may not (probably don’t) recognize the underlying suggestion, these rhymes are indicative of a gradual coming-of-age. “Cinderella” and “My boyfriend gave me an apple” actually make use of liminal space in the air between jumps and claps. One crosses a threshold, and then crosses back over it into innocence.