The Narrator sets the scene:
Attention! Quiet there!
For drama hovers in the air.
Old Schlendrian draws near;
His daughter Lizzie seems obsessed.
He growls and grumbles like a bear.
Be patient! Let us hear the rest.
Old Schlendrian growls and grumbles:
Worse than pox and plague are children.
What a thousand miseries!...
All the time I'm in a tizzie
Giving sound advice to Lizzie,
But the point she never sees.
I deliver words of warning,
I implore on bended knees...
Wasted like a passing breeze.
Lizzie goes into ecstacies:
Ah, coffee offers a rapture
Not even kisses recapture.
So, so, so good especially -
Ah! Ah! When roasted freshly.
Coffee's aroma expresses
More than a thousand caresses,
Pleasure more pleasing than wine.
Coffee, coffee, coffee I adore so!
Like celestial ambrosia, but more so.
No! No! Nothing else but coffee!
Oh, supreme! Oh, cup divine!...
Schlendrian is rebuffed again:
Daughters bold and hard to handle
Pave the way for shame and scandal...
If only she'd recognize
That age, not youth, is wise...
Good news for Lizzie:
Ah, today! Happy day!
Darling father, don't delay.
Ah, today! Happy day!
Hasten, father, on your way.
Dearest father, I'll obey...
List of Donald Pippin's English Versions
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