Rabbi Meyer, poet likewise,
And the father of the beauty
Who in Iben Esra’s bosom
Kindled such a hopeless passion.
That he might forget his niece, he
Took in hand his pilgrim’s staff,
Like so many of his colleagues,
Living restlessly and homeless.
Tow’rd Jerusalem he wander’d,
When some Tartars fell upon him,
Fasten’d him upon a steed’s back,
And to their wild deserts took him.
Duties there devolved upon him
Quite unworthy of a Rabbi,
Still less fitted for a poet—
He was made to milk the cows.
Once, as he beneath the belly
Of a cow was sitting squatting,
Fing’ring hastily her udder,
While the milk the tub was filling,—
A position quite unworthy
Of a Rabbi, of a poet,—
Melancholy came across him,
And to sing a song began he.
And he sang so well and sweetly,
That the Khan, the horde’s old chieftain,
Who was passing by, was melted,
And he gave the slave his freedom.
And he likewise gave him presents,
Gave a fox-skin, and a lengthy
Saracenic mandoline,
And some money for his journey.
Poets’ fate! an evil star ’tis,
Which the offspring of Apollo
Worried unto death, and even
Did not spare their noble father,
When he, after Daphne lurking,
In the fair nymph’s snowy body’s
Stead, embraced the laurel only,—
He, the great divine Schlemihl!