Food Chain

Instructions

Generate the lyrics of the song 'I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly'.

While you could copy/paste the lyrics, or read them from a file, this problem is much more interesting if you approach it algorithmically.

This is a cumulative song of unknown origin.

This is one of many common variants.

I know an old lady who swallowed a fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a spider.
It wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a bird.
How absurd to swallow a bird!
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a cat.
Imagine that, to swallow a cat!
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird.
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a dog.
What a hog, to swallow a dog!
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat.
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird.
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a goat.
Just opened her throat and swallowed a goat!
She swallowed the goat to catch the dog.
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat.
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird.
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a cow.
I don't know how she swallowed a cow!
She swallowed the cow to catch the goat.
She swallowed the goat to catch the dog.
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat.
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird.
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
I don't know why she swallowed the fly. Perhaps she'll die.

I know an old lady who swallowed a horse.
She's dead, of course!

This exercise is about code refactoring, so we are providing you with a solution that already passes the tests.

The challenge is to rewrite it until you are proud of it, and learn something in the process.

If you don't know where to start, here are some ideas:

• Try to reduce repetition to a minimum.
• Try to make the code readable.
• Generalize your solution, allowing the lady to swallow other things.

Take your time.

Change one thing at a time and check if your solution still passes the tests.

Have fun!

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Source

Wikipedia