<Li> The rhyme was also the basis of a Sesame Street Muppet skit from the show's first season, in which the boy Muppet holding a numeral 7 sings the rhyme as a song to the girl Muppet twice (the second time, the girl is busy writing down the calculations) and finally, in keeping true to the spirit of the riddle, reveals the answer as 1 (the traditional answer), because he was going to St. Ives and the kits, cats, sacks and wives were going the other way . Then the girl turns the tables on the boy and asks how many were going the other way . She then reveals the mathematical answer from her calculations: 1 man + 7 wives + 49 sacks + 343 cats + 2,401 kittens, which comes to 2,801 . Astonished, the boy responds, "How about that?!" </Li> <Li> Mad magazine used it in at least two articles over the years for the following parodies: <P> As I was going to St Ives I met a man with seven wives Of course, the seven wives weren't his But here in France, that's how it is </P> and <P> As I was going to St Ives I met a man with seven wives I know this sounds absurd and loony But that poor man was Mickey Rooney! </P> </Li> <P> As I was going to St Ives I met a man with seven wives Of course, the seven wives weren't his But here in France, that's how it is </P> <P> As I was going to St Ives I met a man with seven wives I know this sounds absurd and loony But that poor man was Mickey Rooney! </P>

As i was going to st ives i met a man with 7 wives