Samuel Waddington, comp. The Sonnets of Europe. 1888.
The Critics Conversion to the SonnetLudwig Uhland (17871862)
Translated by Alexander Platt
T
So sorely jaded us poor sonneteers,
And, spurting fire and gall about our ears,
Did’st execrate us to Hell’s lowest pool;—
Thou spotless ermine of the olden school,
O, what a blot thy snow-white hide besmears!
Thou ’st toodled forth a sonnet, it appears,
A whining sigh to win a lady-fool!
Forgot what veteran Voss, so oft dictating,
Half-angrily, half-jestingly, enjoined?
Forsooth, thou ’rt very like a new edition
Of him, who gave his pilfering boy a rating,
And then chopped up the cherries he’d purloined.
L