His burden, thus our burden hear:
King Ruli!
The king is dead; long live the king!
And live again, King Ruli!
But as night after night of song and wine went by, the king grew older and older in his cups. Little he saw or cared that new revellers, new minstrels, new lords, had one by one taken the places of old ones, and that the speech of the new-comers was loud and hoarse, and their song ribald and discordant. Those who remained with him of his old friends and retainers had gradually imbibed the character of the latest revellers, and their potations were deeper and their jests broader than ever. Once in a while the king groaned and complained that his beer was too bitter; but they so flattered his jokes, and praised his beard, and spoke of his noble brow, and his royal blood, and his glorious voice, that he sang and roared as of old, and swallowed his beer without further complaint. On such an occasion as this it required the cynical courage of the minstrel Knipfenbausenstein to sing, as he did, from the end of the hall, which he had just entered after a long absence:
There were ten vintners old and sick,
And all their wine had gone to lees;
Of empty casks they made them cells:
Oh! very bitter folks were these.
Misgives me now, good friends, to think