A shepherdess loses her flock and finds them again with their tails hung up to dry on a tree, one of the odder turns in Mother Goose. The repeated refrain, leave them alone and they'll come home, gives it a swinging, singable shape.
From Mother Goose / Nursery Rhymes (traditional). See the whole collection.
Little Bo-Peep has lost her sheep,
And can't tell where to find them;
Leave them alone, and they'll come home,
And bring their tails behind them.
Little Bo-Peep fell fast asleep,
And dreamt she heard them bleating;
But when she awoke, she found it a joke,
For still they all were fleeting.
Then up she took her little crook,
Determined for to find them;
She found them indeed, but it made her heart bleed,
For they'd left all their tails behind 'em!
It happened one day, as Bo-peep did stray
Unto a meadow hard by—
There she espied their tails, side by side,
All hung on a tree to dry.
She heaved a sigh and wiped her eye,
And over the hillocks she raced;
And tried what she could, as a shepherdess should,
That each tail should be properly placed.
Public domain. Text from The Real Mother Goose (Blanche Fisher Wright, 1916), via Project Gutenberg. View the source edition