Laudator Temporis Acti

Calvert Watkins (1933-2013), How to Kill a Dragon: Aspects of Indo-European Poetics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 91:

Consider from our own culture the tale beginning 'Once upon a time, long, long, ago, there lived in a house upon a hill a pig, a duck, a cat, and a little red hen...' The diction is formulaic, invariant, and the rhetoric and poetics of the prose narrative, its division into balanced cola, polished and precise. The genre, wisdom literature cast as beast fable, is far older than Aesop. I do not know how old 'The Little Red Hen' is, nor how long English speakers have been telling a tale to children in this form or something like it. But it is striking that the whole story does not seem to contain a single Romance or even Scandinavian loanword, nor a single Latin loanword with the exception of mill, which probably entered the language prior to the Anglo-Saxon migration from the Continent to Britain.

I can't find a version matching Watkins'. Cf. St. Nicholas, Vol. 1, No. 11 (September, 1874), pp. 680-681 (paragraph divisions added):

About twenty-five years ago my mother told me the story of the little red hen. She told it often to me at that time; but I have never heard it since. So I shall try to tell it to you now from memory:

There was once a little red hen. She was scratching near the barn one day, when she found a grain of wheat. She said, "Who will plant this wheat?" The rat said, "I wont;" the cat said, "I wont;" the dog said, "I wont;" the duck said, "I wont;" and the pig said, "I wont." The little red hen said, "I will, then." So she planted the grain of wheat.

After the wheat grew up and was ripe, the little red hen said, "Who will reap this wheat?" The rat said, "I wont;" the cat said, "I wont;" the dog said, "I wont;" the duck said, "I wont;" and the pig said, "I wont." The little red hen said, "I will, then." So she reaped the wheat.

Then she said, "Who will take this wheat to mill to be ground into flour?" The rat said, "I wont;" the cat said, "I wont;" the dog said, "I wont;" the duck said, "I wont:" and the pig said, "I wont." The little red hen said, "I will, then." So she took the wheat to mill.

When she came back with the flour, she said, "Who will make this into bread?" The rat said, "I wont;" the cat said, "I wont;" the dog said, "I wont;" the duck said, "I wont;" and the pig said, "I wont." The little red hen said, "I will, then." So she made it into bread.

Then she said, "Who will bake this bread?" The rat said, "I wont;" the cat said, "I wont;" the dog said, "I wont;" the duck said, "I wont;" and the pig said, "I wont." The little red hen said, "I will, then."

When the bread was baked, the little red hen said, "Who will EAT this bread?" The rat said, "I WILL;" the cat said, "I WILL;" the dog said, "I WILL;" the duck said, "I WILL;" and the pig said, "I WILL." The little red hen said, "No, you WONT, for I am going to do that myself." And she picked up the bread and ran off with it.