I’ve used the last of my nice pine blocks to do an approximate copy of a picture from Pompeii, showing the Lares, one kind of household gods the Romans had (they seem to have had slightly different ideas of exactly what the lares were at different periods – whether or not they were ancestors, for example. They are the the chaps to right and left – the one in the middle is the genius of the household (coughs modestly). Don’t ask me about the snake – no idea.

So having finished my ‘tiles’ I was left with a few spare pine blocks. The only thing to do, obviously, was to paint more pictures on them.

Here then, is the frog that now graces our downstairs loo. It’s a copy of one by Matsumoto Hoji, in the British Museum, only my version is greener and a bit cruder. Hoji was around in the nineteenth century, but I can’t find much information about him – this seems to be his big hit (as well it might be).

The poem underneath is this…

What a wonderful bird the frog are!
When he stand, he sit almost,
When he leap, he fly almost.
Ain’t got no nose, hardly,
Ain’t got no tail hardly, either.
When he sit, he sit upon what he ain’t got, almost.

Now when I first read that, years ago, I’m sure it was attributed to some author, but googling it now I find it’s down to Anon. Also, my version isn’t quite right, or at any rate, not the earliest. But it’s the version I like, so I’m sticking with it. Anon never sues.