Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/147

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LITTERATEUR AND BOOK-HUNTER

To the verse above mentioned I select another to be included in this narrative. The Haslibacher hymn written in the sixteenth century and published in the Ausbund, a hymn book of the Mennonites which has gone through eight editions in America and is still used among the Amish of Lancaster County, always made a strong impression upon me because of its dramatic power and simplicity. It has many of the features of the ballad literature and of the Nibelungenlied. I translated it from the German when at Harrisburg, in the midst of my first session of the legislature, as a sort of relief from the onerous pressure of new and difficult official duties. The translation preserves the rhyme, meter and versification, and to a certain extent maintains the spirit of the original:

Xanthippe[1]

(Sola)

The tea of yarbs that cured my mother must
Have lost its virtue, opodeldoc don't
Appear to do no good, and what betwixt
The rheumatiz and Socrates I feel
A-worried nigh to death. He is the most
Provoking man alive I do believe.
While I am down upon my knees, and me
All stiff and crippled, scrubbing off the floor
And trying hard to keep things neat and clean
He's gone with Alcibiades and them
Old loafers wandering around the streets
To talk about Philosophy. There's lots
Of work to do in Athens he might get.
If he would only try, and give up these
Ridiculous notions. Then we might live just
As nice as other folks. There has not been
A carpet on this floor for seven years,
And when I tell him, as I sometimes do,
He says, “The Gods require no carpet and
Xanthippe we but imitate the Gods.”
As if that consolation were to me!
  1. Written by request in early life for a public entertainment given at Phœnixville at which were represented a number of historic women.
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