Wine, Women, and Song Part 18

Two lyrics of distinguished excellence, which still hold their place in the _Commersbuch_, cannot claim certain antiquity in their present form. They are not included in the _Carmina Burana_; yet their style is so characteristic of the Archipoeta, that I believe we may credit him with at least a share in their composition. The first starts with an allusion to the Horatian _tempus edax rerum_.

TIME'S A-FLYING.

No. 48.

Laurel-crowned Horatius, True, how true thy saying!

Swift as wind flies over us Time, devouring, slaying.

Where are, oh! those goblets full Of wine honey-laden, Strifes and loves and bountiful Lips of ruddy maiden?

Grows the young grape tenderly, And the maid is growing; But the thirsty poet, see, Years on him are snowing!

What's the use on h.o.a.ry curls Of the bays undying.

If we may not kiss the girls, Drink while time's a-flying?

The second consists of a truly brilliant development of the theme which our Herrick condensed into one splendid phrase--"There's no l.u.s.t like to poetry!"

THERE'S NO l.u.s.t LIKE TO POETRY.

No. 49.

Sweet in goodly fellowship Tastes red wine and rare O!

But to kiss a girl's ripe lip Is a gift more fair O!

Yet a gift more sweet, more fine, Is the lyre of Maro!

While these three good gifts were mine, I'd not change with Pharaoh.

Bacchus wakes within my breast Love and love's desire, Venus comes and stirs the blessed Rage of Phoebus' fire; Deathless honour is our due From the laurelled sire: Woe should I turn traitor to Wine and love and lyre!

Should a tyrant rise and say, "Give up wine!" I'd do it; "Love no girls!" I would obey, Though my heart should rue it.

"Dash thy lyre!" suppose he saith, Naught should bring me to it; "Yield thy lyre or die!" my breath, Dying, should thrill through it!

A lyric of the elder period in praise of wine and love, which forcibly ill.u.s.trates the contempt felt by the student cla.s.s for the unlettered laity and boors, shall be inserted here. It seems to demand a tune.

WINE AND VENUS.

No. 50.

Ho, comrades mine!

What is your pleasure?

What business fine Or mirthful measure?

Lo, Venus toward our crew advancing, A choir of Dryads round her dancing!

Good fellows you!

The time is jolly!

Earth springs anew, Bans melancholy; Bid long farewell to winter weather!

Let lads and maids be blithe together.

Dame Venus spurns Her brother Ocean; To Bacchus turns; No colder potion Deserves her G.o.dhead's approbation; On sober souls she pours d.a.m.nation.

Let then this band, Imbued with learning, By Venus stand, Her wages earning!

Laymen we spurn from our alliance, Like brutes to art deaf, dumb to science.

Two G.o.ds alone We serve and mate with; One law we own, Nor hold debate with: Who lives the goodly student fashion Must love and win love back with pa.s.sion!

Among drinking-songs of the best period in this literature may be reckoned two disputations between water and wine. In the one, Thetis defends herself against Lyaeus, and the poet a.s.sists in vision at their contest. The scene is appropriately laid in the third sphere, the pleasant heaven of Venus. The other, which on the whole appears to me preferable, and which I have therefore chosen for translation, begins and ends with the sound axiom that water and wine ought never to be mixed. It is manifest that the poet reserves the honour of the day for wine, though his arguments are fair to both sides. The final point, which breaks the case of water down and determines her utter confusion, is curious, since it shows that people in the Middle Ages were fully alive to the perils of sewage-contaminated wells.

THE CONTEST OF WINE AND WATER.

No. 51.

Laying truth bare, stripped of fable, Briefly as I may be able, With good reasons manifold, I will tell why man should never Copulate, but rather sever, Things that strife and hatred hold.

When one cup in fell confusion Wine with water blends, the fusion, Call it by what name you will, Is no blessing, nor deserveth Any praise, but rather serveth For the emblem of all ill.

Wine perceives the water present, And with pain exclaims, "What peasant Dared to mingle thee with me?

Rise, go forth, get out, and leave me!

In the same place, here to grieve me, Thou hast no just claim to be.

"Vile and shameless in thy going, Into cracks thou still art flowing, That in foul holes thou mayst lie; O'er the earth thou ought'st to wander, On the earth thy liquor squander, And at length in anguish die.

"How canst thou adorn a table?

No one sings or tells a fable In thy presence dull and drear; But the guest who erst was jolly, Laughing, joking, bent on folly, Silent sits when thou art near.

"Should one drink of thee to fulness, Sound before, he takes an illness; All his bowels thou dost stir; Booms the belly, wind ariseth, Which, enclosed and pent, surpriseth With a thousand sighs the ear.

"When the stomach's so inflated, Blasts are then e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed From both draughts with divers sound; And that organ thus affected, All the air is soon infected By the poison breathed around."

Water thus wine's home-thrust warded: "All thy life is foul and sordid, Sunk in misery, steeped in vice; Those who drink thee lose their morals, Waste their time in sloth and quarrels, Rolling down sin's precipice.

"Thou dost teach man's tongue to stutter; He goes reeling in the gutter Who hath deigned to kiss thy lips; Hears men speak without discerning, Sees a hundred tapers burning When there are but two poor dips.

"He who feels for thee soul's hunger Is a murderer or wh.o.r.emonger, Davus Geta Birria; Such are they whom thou dost nourish; With thy fame and name they flourish In the tavern's disarray.

"Thou by reason of thy badness Art confined in prison sadness, Cramped and small thy dwellings are: I am great the whole world over, Spread myself abroad and cover Every part of earth afar.