Those were of course, simpler times; we'd never get away with that today, more's the pity. My choir is, however, singing a version of The Twelve Days Of Christmas and, while there are no paper mache birds involved, I'm quite enjoying it.
The version we're doing is an arrangement by Bob Chilcott, who is an English composer/director. His arrangement takes over 10 minutes to sing, but it's a lot of fun because it weaves in several different melodies, though always jumping back to the traditional one.