The Inkbottle (Charles Villiers Stanford)

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• (Posted 2024-05-15)  CPDL #80654:     

Editor: David Anderson (submitted 2024-05-15).   Score information: Letter, 8 pages, 516 kB   Copyright: Personal

Edition notes:

General Information

Title: The Inkbottle
Composer: Charles Villiers Stanford
Lyricist: Mary E. Coleridge
Number of voices: 4vv   Voicing: SATB
Genre: Secular, Partsong

Language: English
Instruments: A cappella

First published: 1910 Stainer & Bell
Description: Eight Part-Songs, Op. 119, No. 5

Original text and translations

English text

THE CONTENTS OF AN INKBOTTLE

Well of blackness, all defiling,
Full of flattery and reviling,
Ah, what mischief hast thou wrought
Out of what was airy thought,
What beginnings and what ends,
Making and dividing friends!

Colours of the rainbow lie
In thy tint of ebony;
Many a fancy have I found
Bright upon that sombre ground;
Cupid plays along the edge,
Skimming o’er it like a midge;
Niobe in turn appears,
Thinning it with crystal tears.

False abuse and falser praise,
Falsest lays and roundelays!
One thing, one alone, I think,
Never yet was found in ink;—
Truth lies not, the truth to tell,
At the bottom of this well!