The Little People of Cologne

Oh, for Cologne of days of yore
With little people to the fore,
When loafers would divest themselves
Of tools and things and rest themselves!
Then came in the night
To put things right
The wee ones and hurried
And scampered and scurried,
Inspected,
Selected,
And laundered and dusted
And cooked and adjusted,
Before the day had just begun
A lazy body´s chores were all but done.

The carpenters would stretch and yawn
And sleep on shavings until dawn.
Meanwhile appeared the tiny host
To see where it could help the most.
And quickly would draw
Ax, hammer and saw.
Then soon there was fitting
And nailing and splitting
And rapping
And capping
And working in teams
To sqare up the beams.
The morning sun would rise and shine
Above a brand new house along the Rhine.

The baker and the baker boy
resorted to this idler`s ploy:
To dreamland they referred themselves
While little men bestirred themselves.
They carried big sacks
On tiny backs
And blendes and lifted,
Did season
With reason
And into hot hatches
Pushed sweet-smelling batches.
The baker was not yet awake
When all his shelves were lined
with bread and cake.

The lazy butcher, out of wares,
Just rested and forgot his cares.
The elves came from their habitat
And chopped the beef this way and that,
Took cleaver and fork
And veal and pork.
And whetted and honed
And quartered and boned,
And spicing
And dicing
And grindling they toiled,
Stuffed casings and boiled.
By daybreak they had filled the shop
With sausages and meats
that looked tiptop.

And was the local winery
A good place for an employe!
The cellar master drank his fill,
The little people worked at will.
They sweetened the must,
They fined and fussed,
Checked barrel and bubble
And bung on the double,
Filled bottles
And pottles,
And blended and rated
And hoisted and crated,
And by the morning´s early ray
The wine was fine
and had the right bouquet.

A tailor was in great distress:
He must complete a gala dress.
Plunked down bis things to fetch himself
A good night´s sleep and stretch himself.
It happened again.
The tiny men
Came, saw and they fitted
And threaded and knitted.
While placing
the lacing
They lowered and raised
And stitched and appraised.
Before the sun rose they had sewn
The new mayoral dress coat of Cologne.

Nose trouble got the tailor´s wife
As talk about the elves was rife.
She sprinkled peas about the house.
A little elf, shy as a mouse,
Comes by and soon sprawls.
The next one crawls.
Some pitch and some stumble,
Some trip and sone fumble.
They clutter,
They mutter,
They bump into chairs,
They tumble downstairs.
The woman nears by candle light
And - swoosh - they disappear into the night.

How sad it is! Gone are the elves
And folks must do their chores themselves
They can no longer stay in bed
And let the wee ones stir instead.
No! No-one may shir
His daily work
Of cooking and baking
And liverwurst making
But trundle
And bundle
And rustle and hustle
And bother and bustle.
Some townsmen may still knock on wood,
But, oh, those lazy days are gone for good.


From the German `Die Heinzelmaenchen`
by August Kopisch.
Translated by Rudolf Wiemann , P.E.,
St. Paul / USA