C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Art and Politics
By Carl Michael Bellman (1740–1795)
“G
Whom without coat and hatless I see?
Bloody thy mouth—and thou’rt lacking a tooth!
Where have you been, brother?—tell me the truth.”
“At Rostock, good sir,
Did the trouble occur.
Over me and my harp
An argument sharp
Arose, touching my playing—pling plingeli plang;
And a bow-legged cobbler coming along
Struck me in the mouth—pling plingeli plang.
The Polish Queen’s Polka—G-major the key:
The best kind of people were gathered around,
And each drank his schoppen ‘down to the ground.’
I don’t know just how
Began freshly the row,
But some one from my head
Knocked my hat, and thus said:
‘What is Poland to thee?’—Pling plingeli plang—
‘Play us no polka!’ Another one sang:
‘Now silent be!’—Pling plingeli plang.
As I sat there in quiet, enjoying my glass,
On Poland’s condition the silence I broke:
‘Know ye, good people,’ aloud thus I spoke,
‘That all monarchs I
On this earth do defy
My harp to prevent
From giving song vent
Throughout all this land—pling plingeli plang!
Did only a single string to it hang,
I’d play a polka—pling plingeli plang!’
Two notaries and a dragoon bold,
Who cried ‘Down with him! The cobbler is right!
Poland earns the meeds of her evil might!’
From behind the stove came
An old squint-eyed dame,
And flung at the harp
Glass broken and sharp;
But the cobbler—pling plingeli plang—
Made a terrible hole in my neck—that long!
There hast thou the story—pling plingeli plang.
If I suffered not wrongly?” “Why, certainly!”
“Was I not innocent?” “Bless you, most sure!”
“The harp rent asunder, my nose torn and sore,
’Twas hard treatment, I trow!
Now no better I know
Than to go through the land
With my harp in my hand,
Play for Bacchus and Venus—kling klang—
With masters best that e’er played or sang;
Attend me, Apollo!—pling plingeli plang.”