All the talent of the city
For this concert had united.
From the ironworks of Albbruck
Even came the superintendent;
He alone played the viola.

Like a troop of mounted warriors
Who the enemy expecting,
Lurk in safe and hidden ambush,
So they waited for the Baron
To arrive. And like good marksmen
Who with care before the battle
Try their weapons, if their powder
By the dew has not been damaged,
If the flint is good for striking;
So by blowing, scraping, tuning,
They their instruments were trying.

Margaretta led the Baron
And his guest now to the garden.
Women never are in want of
A good pretext, when some fun or
Some surprise they are preparing.
So she praised the shady coolness
And the view from the pavilion,
Till the two old friends were turning
Toward that spot without suspicion.
Like a volley then resounded
At their entrance a loud flourish,
Every instrument saluting;
And like roaring torrents bursting
Wildly through the gaping sluice-gate,
So the overture let loose now
Its loud storming floods of music
On the much astonished hearers.
With the greatest skill young Werner
Led the orchestra, whose chorus
Gladly yielded to his baton.
Ha! that was a splendid bowing,
Such a fiddling, such a pealing!
Hopping lightly, like a locust,
Through the din the clarinet flew,
And the contra-bass kept groaning,
As if wailing for its soul,
While the player's brow was sweating
From his arduous performance.

There behind in the orchestra
Fludribus the drum was beating;
As a many-sided genius,
During pauses, he was also
To the triangle attending.
But his heart o'erflowed with sadness;
And the drum's dull sound re-echoed
His complaints, as dull and grumbling:
"Dilettanti, happy people!
Merrily they suck the honey
From the flowers which with heavy
Throes the Master's mind created;
And they spice well their enjoyment
With their mutual frequent blunders.
Genuine Art is a titanic
Heaven-storming strife and struggle
For a Beauty still receding,
While the soul is gnawed with longing
For the unattained Ideal.
But these bunglers are