They Were Only Playing Leap-Frog

DESCRIPTION: "They were only playing leap-frog (x3) When one grasshopper jumped right over the other grasshopper's back. Oh, it's a lie... You know you're telling a lie." "They were only playing leap-frog When one staff officer jumped right over the other['s]... back"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1917 (Nettleingham-TommysTunes)
KEYWORDS: soldier bug
FOUND IN: Britain
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Brophy/Partridge-TommiesSongsAndSlang, p. 46, "They Were Only Playing Leap-Frog" (1 text)
Arthur-WhenThisBloodyWarIsOver, p. 81, "They Were Only Playing Leap-Frog" (1 text, tune referenced)
Nettleingham-TommysTunes, #42, "The Grasshopper" (1 text, tune referenced)
ADDITIONAL: John Mullen, _The Show Must Go On! Popular Song in Britain during the First World War_, French edition 2012; English edition, Ashgate, 2015, p. 208, "(One staff officer jumped right over another staff officer's back)" (1 excerpt)
Roud #10526
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "John Brown's Body" (partial tune)
NOTES [131 words]: Note that "leapfrog" was an infantry tactic, in which an advance took place in multiple lines. The front line would move forward to some set objective, then halt and dig in or provide covering fire while the next line moved past them to reach a more advanced objective, then the first line (or a third line if the leapfrog were in depth) would again resume the advance and move ahead of the second line, and so forth until the ultimate objective was reached or (World War I being World War I) one or another line had been so shot up that the advance could not continue.
Mullen, however, thinks this has one of two other meanings. One possibility is that the staff officers were trying to be promoted over each other. The other possibility is that it refers to homosexual behavior. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.8
File: BrPa046

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