<P> Peter, Peter pumpkin eater, Had a wife but couldn't keep her; He put her in a pumpkin shell And there he kept her very well . Peter, Peter pumpkin eater, Had another and didn't love her; Peter learned to read and spell, And then he loved her very well . </P> <P> The first surviving version of the rhyme was published in Infant Institutes, part the first: or a Nurserical Essay on the Poetry, Lyric and Allegorical, of the Earliest Ages, &c., in London around 1797 . It also appears in Mother Goose's Quarto: or Melodies Complete, printed in Boston, Massachusetts around 1825 . A verse collected from Aberdeen, Scotland and published in 1868 had the words: </P> <P> Peter, my neeper, Had a wife, And he couidna' keep her, He pat her i' the wa', And lat a' the mice eat her . </P> <P> This verse is also considered to be an older version of the rhyme Eeper Weeper . </P>

Where did old peter the pumpkin eater put his wife