Some say, compar'd to Bononcini
That Mynheer Handel's but a Ninny
Others aver, that he to Handel
Is scarcely fit to hold a Candle
Strange all this Difference should be
'Twixt Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dee!
Starting in the early nineteenth century, collections of nursery rhymes began to include:
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Agreed to have a battle;
For Tweedledum said Tweedledee
Had spoiled his nice new rattle.
Just then flew down a monstrous crow,
As black as a tar-barrel;
Which frightened both the heroes so,
They quite forgot their quarrel.
The third (and only source I knew of prior to today) is Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass. Carroll, having introduced two fat little men named Tweedledum and Tweedledee, quotes the above nursery rhyme, which the two brothers then go on to enact. The Tweedle brothers never contradict each other, even when one of them, according to the rhyme, "agrees to have a battle". Rather, they complement each other's words.
More at Wikipedia.
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