The songs they still are singing Who dress the hills of vine, The tales that haunt the Brocken And whisper down the Rhine. Woodsy and wild and lonesome, The swift stream wound away, Through birches and scarlet maples Flashing in foam and spray,-- Down on the sharp-horned ledges Plunging in steep cascade, Tossing its white-maned waters Against the hemlock's shade. Woodsy and wild and lonesome, East and west and north and south; Only the village of fishers Down at the river's mouth; Only here and there a clearing With its farm-house rude and new, And tree-stumps, swart as Indians, Where the scanty harvest grew. No shout of home-bound reapers, No vintage-song he heard, And on the green no dancing feet The merry violin stirred. "Why should folk be glum," said Keezar, "When Nature herself is glad, And the painted woods are laughing At the faces so sour and sad?" Small heed had the careless cobbler What sorrow of heart was theirs Who travailed in pain with the births of God, And planted a state with prayers,-- Hunting of witches and warlocks, Smiting the heathen horde,-- One hand on the mason's trowel, And one on the soldier's sword! But give him his ale and cider, Give him his pipe and song, Little he cared for church or state, Or the balance of right and wrong. "'Tis work, work, work," he muttered,-- "And for rest a snuffle of psalms!" He smote on his leathern apron With his brown and waxen palms. "Oh for the purple harvests Of the days when I was young! For the merry grape-stained maidens, And the pleasant songs they sung! "Oh for the breath of vineyards, Of apples and nuts and wine! For an oar to row and a breeze to blow Down the grand old river Rhine!" A tear in his blue eye glistened And dropped on his beard so gray. "Old, old am I," said Keezar, "And the Rhine flows far away!" But a cunning man was the cobbler; He could call the birds from the trees, Charm the black snake out of the ledges, And bring back the swarming bees. All the virtues of herbs and metals, All the lore of the woods he knew, And the arts of the Old World mingled With the marvels of the New. Well he knew the tricks of magic, And the lapstone on his knee Had the gift of the Mormon's goggles Or the stone of Doctor Dee. For the mighty master Agrippa Wrought it with spell and rhyme From a fragment of mystic moonstone In the tower of Nettesheim. To a cobbler Minnesinger The marvellous stone gave he,-- And he gave it, in turn, to Keezar, Who brought it over the sea. He held up that mystic lapstone, He held it up like a lens, And he counted the long years coming By twenties and by tens. "One hundred years," quoth Keezar, "And fifty have I told: Now open the new before me, And shut me out the old!"