HERALD.
| To hold a Golden Wedding feast
|
| one should be wedded fifty years;
|
| but once the struggle is composed,
|
4230
| give me the gold to hold and keep.
|
OBERON.
| Are you present and prepared?
|
| Then show your mettle, spirits;
|
| for the king and lovely queen
|
| have renewed their pledge today.
|
PUCK.
| Puck arrives and turns and twirls
|
| and stamps his foot in time.
|
| One hundred follow after him
|
| to share the pleasant hour.
|
ARIEL.
| Ariel engenders song
|
4240
| of pure, angelic voices.
|
| The sound attracts some ugly faces
|
| but lures some pretty ones as well.
|
OBERON.
| You, spouses who want harmony,
|
| look to us as an example!
|
| Those who are to burn with love
|
| merely must be separated.
|
TITANIA.
| If he should pout and she be cross,
|
| then take them both aside.
|
| Send her off to southern climes,
|
4250
| and him to northern regions.
|
ORCHESTRA, TUTTI
(
fortissimo
)
.
| Snouts of flies, mosquito jaws,
|
| and all their kith and kin,
|
| frogs and crickets in the grass:
|
| These are the music men!
|
SOLO.
| Look! The bagpipe comes this way!
|
| It is a bloated hose.
|
| Hear the snarky-snooky-snay
|
| squeezing through its nose.
|
SPIRIT
(
forming itself
)
.
| Spider’s foot and paunch of toad,
|
4260
| and winglets for the gnome!
|
| They will not make a horse or goat
|
| but compose a pretty poem.
|
A YOUNG COUPLE.
| A careful step, a bolder jump
|
| beneath the honeydew and briar;
|
| You trip along from stump to stump
|
| and never can go higher.
|
INQUISITIVE TRAVELER.
| Is this a blatant travesty?
|
| Is it true or mere disguise
|
|
that Oberon, the handsome god,
|
4270
| is here before my eyes?
|
AN ORTHODOX PERSON.
| I see no claws, no tail,
|
| and yet the case is crystal clear:
|
| just like the gods of ancient Greece,
|
| he can be a devil too, I fear.
|
NORDIC ARTIST.
| What I can seize and fix today
|
| is only rough and vague.
|
| I must prepare without delay
|
| for my Italian journey.
|
PURIST.
| Ah! My misfortune leads me here:
|
4280
| Such lewdness, such disgrace!
|
| Of the twitching horde of witches
|
| only two have a powdered face!
|
YOUNG WITCH.
| A powdered face is like a skirt
|
| for old and graying wives;
|
| so I sit naked on my buck
|
| and show my eager thighs.
|
MATRON.
| We are too civilized and proud
|
| to argue with the younger crowd.
|
| I wish the young and juicy fry
|
4290
| would wither up and putrefy.
|
ORCHESTRA LEADER.
| Snouts of flies, mosquito jaws,
|
|
do not crowd the naked girls!
|
| Frogs and crickets in the grass,
|
| keep the beat and stop your twirls.
|
WEATHER VANE
(
pointing one way
)
.
| This is congenial company,
|
| brides galore, more plentiful than ever.
|
| And bachelors as far as I can see,
|
| full of hope in their endeavor.
|
WEATHER VANE
(
pointing the other way
)
.
| If the earth won’t open wide
|
4300
| to swallow all this rabble,
|
| then I will walk with nimble stride
|
| and leap into perdition.
|
XENIES
.
63
| As insects are we here
|
| with little sharpened shears
|
| to honor Satan, Papa dear,
|
| whom everyone reveres.
|
HENNINGS.
64
| In its crude and silly vein
|
| the rabble acts so bold,
|
| and in the end they will maintain
|
4310
| that they have hearts of gold.
|
MUSAGET.
65
| I should like to use my ruses
|
| upon this band of witches,
|
| for I can guide the witches
|
| far better than the muses.
|
CI-DEVANT GENIUS OF THE AGE.
66
| You’ve got to know the proper people;
|
| take my coattail as we go.
|
| The Blocksberg has a spacious top,
|
| and so has Germany’s Parnassus.
|
INQUISITIVE TRAVELER
.
67
| What’s that rigid fellow’s name,
|
4320
| strutting up and down these places?
|
| He sniffs in every nook and cranny.
|
| “He’s on the Jesuits’ traces.”
68
|
A CRANE.
| I like to catch my fish
|
| in clear and troubled waters;
|
| hence you see that pious fellow
|
| making small talk with the devil.
|
WORLDLING.
69
| For those of strong religious faith
|
| all things will serve their pious ends.
|
| They erect their little churches
|
4330
| right here on this mountain.
|
DANCER.
| Another band is now approaching.
70
|
| I hear the beat of drums. Don’t be concerned,
|
| This is the bitterns’ monotone encroaching
|
| on the reeds and willows by the pond.
|
DANCING MASTER.
| How nimbly each one lifts his thigh,
|
| slyly skirting his dilemma!
|
|
The bent ones leap, some others try,
|
| they never worry how they look.
|
FIDDLER.
| The ragged pack is full of hate;
|
4340
| they’d gladly see each other dead,
|
| but by the bagpipe does their wrath abate
|
| much as Orpheus’ lyre tamed the beasts.
|
DOGMATIST.
| Let them shout their awful drivel;
|
| their doubts and carpings leave me cold.
|
| There must be something to the devil;
|
| else how could devils come to be?
|
IDEALIST.
| What’s been imagined in this fray,
|
| to my mind is overblown,
|
| and I’d be but a fool today,
|
4350
| if I believed what has been shown.
|
REALIST.
| These doings are a pain to me;
|
| I’ve had my fill of them by now.
|
| For the first time I have found
|
| that I stand on shaky ground.
|
SUPERNATURALIST.
| I derive some real satisfaction
|
| from being witness to this view.
|
| For the presence of the devils
|
| implies good spirits too.
|
SKEPTIC.
| They would like to find the treasure
|
4360
| employing flames to find their route,
|
| and I will have the keenest pleasure,
|
| since the devil lives on doubt.
|
ORCHESTRA LEADER.
| Frogs and crickets in the grass:
|
| You are the rankest amateurs.
|
| Snouts of flies, mosquito jaws,
|
| as musicians you are boors.
|
THE VERSATILE ONES.
71
|
Sans Souci
they call the corps
|
| by merry creatures led,
|
| and when our feet are tired and sore,
|
4370
| we walk on our heads instead.
|
THE AWKWARD ONES.
| In former times the people fed us well,
|
| but now may Heaven help us eat!
|
| We pranced and danced until we fell
|
| and limped about on naked feet.
|
WILL-O’-THE-WISPS.
| We arrived from swampy regions
|
| where once we came to be.
|
| But now we join the Brocken’s legions,
|
| a gallant troop are we.
|
SHOOTING STAR.
| I darted downward from the heights
|
4380
| in astral light and flame.
|
|
I now lie sick and crumpled—
|
| Who’ll help me up? I’m lame!
|
