Ludwig Uhland: “Night Journey”

Excerpt, “Schiller’s Homage of the Arts, with it Miscellaneous Pieces from Rückert, Freiligrath, and Other German Poets.”  By Charles T. Brooks. 1846.

J. Ludwig Uhland: “Bout Rimes — III. The Night-wanderers”

J. Ludwig Uhland: “Bout Rimes — II. The Troubadour and the Critic”

J. Ludwig Uhland: “The New Fairy-Tale”

J. Ludwig Uhland: “The Cavalier By Night”

J. Ludwig Uhland: “Tom Thumb”

Excerpt, “German Lyric Poetry:  A Collection of Songs and Ballads.”  Translated from the Best German Lyric Poets, with Notes by Charles Timothy Brooks.  1863.

Ludwig Uhland: “The Ancestral Vault”

Excerpt, “Ballads from the German.”  Translator, Henry Englis.  1864.

The Ancestral Vault

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There went a hoary war-worn sire

Across the solitary wold,

Up to the sanctuary old,

And stepped into the gloomy choir.

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In ranks, the bannered vault along,

The grim ancestral coffins lay;

And through the darkness came alway

A warning, wondrous strain of song.

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“Ye warriors, in your shrouds of mail,

Your stately burial-dirge I hear;

It calls me to yon empty bier—

It bids your latest kinsman hail.”

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There stood, by shadows half concealed,

One empty bier amongst the dead;

He laid him in the narrow bed,

Cold pillowed on his dinted shield.

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His sword, recumbent on his breast,

Was folded in the sleep of death;

Hushed was the ghostly anthem’s breath,

And the dead warriors were at rest.

J. Ludwig Uhland: “The Mower’s Maiden”

Excerpt, “German Ballads, Songs, etc., comprising translations from Schiller, Uhland, Burger, Goethe, Korner, Becker,  Fouque, Chamisso, etc., etc.” London:  Edward Lumley. 1900.

The Mower’s Maiden.

“Good morrow to thee, Mary ! right early art thou laden !

Love hath not made thee slothful, thou true and steadfast maiden!

Ay, if in three brief days, methinks, thy task of work be done,

I shall no longer have the heart to part thee from my son.”

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It was a wealthy farmer spake, it was a maiden listened:

Oh, how her loving bosom swelled, and how her full eye glistened !

New life is in her limbs, her hand outdoes her comrades all,

See how she wields the scythe, and see how fast the full crops fall!

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And when the noon grows sultry; and the weary peasants wend

To sleep in pleasant thickets, and o’er cooling streams to bend;

Still are the humming-bees at work beneath that burning sky,

And Mary, diligent as they, works on unceasingly.

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The sun hath sunk, the evening bell gives gentle summons home;

” Enough,” her neighbours cry, ” enough ! come, Mary, prithee come! “

Shepherds, and flocks, and husbandmen, pass homeward through the dew,

But Mary only whets her scythe and goes to work anew.

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And now the dews are thickening, the moon and stars are bright,

Sweet are the new-mown furrows, and sweet the songs of night;

But Mary lies not down to rest, and stands not still to hear,

The rustling of her ceaseless scythe is music to her ear.

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Even thus from morn till evening, even thus from eve to morn,

She toils, by strong love nourished, by happy hope upborne;

Till when the third day’s sun arose, the labour was complete,

And there stood Mary weeping, for joy so strange and sweet.

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“Good morrow to thee, Mary! How now ? — the task is done!

Lo, for such matchless industry, rich guerdon shall be won;

But for the wedding—nay indeed—my words were only jest;

How foolish and how credulous we find a lover’s breast!”

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He spake and went his way, and there the hapless maid stood still,

Her weary limbs they shook, they sank, her heart grew stiff and chill ;

Speech, sense, and feeling, like a cloud, did from her spirit pass,

And there they found her lying upon the new-mown grass!

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And thus a dumb and death-like life for years the maiden led,

A drop of fragrant honey was all her daily bread.

Oh, make her grave in pleasant shades, where softest flow’rets grow,

For such a loving heart as hers is seldom found below !