“I only wait till the number’s complete,
“Then, making a regular clearance,
“I’ll free my country, my German folk,
“Who trustingly wait my appearance.”—
Thus spake the Emperor, while I cried:
“Old fellow! seize time as it passes;
“Set to work, and hast thou not horses enough,
“Then fill up their places with asses.”
Then Barbarossa smiling replied:
“For the battle there need be no hurry;
“Rome certainly never was built in one day,
“Nothing’s gained by bustle and flurry.
“Who comes not to-day, to-morrow will come,
“The oak’s slow growth might shame us;
“Chi va piano va sano wisely says
“The Roman proverb famous.”
CAPUT XVI.
The carriage’s jolting woke me up
From my dream, yet vainly sought I
To keep awake, so I slumber’d again,
And of Barbarossa thought I.
Again we went through the echoing halls,
And talked of great and small things;
He ask’d me this, and he ask’d me that,
And wish’d to know about all things.
He told me that not one mortal word
From the world above had descended
For many a year,—in fact not since
The Seven-years’ war had ended.
With interest he for Karschin[57] ask’d,
For Mendelssohn (Moses the glorious),
For Louis the Fifteenth’s mistress frail,
The Countess Du Barry notorious.
“O Emperor,” cried I, “how backward thou art!
Old Moses is dead and forgotten,
With his Rebecca; and Abraham too,
The son, is dead and rotten.