Ládo, ládo, ládo (Austria, Prussia, Czechia, Liechtenstein)

Christmas at Austria's house in Vienna, 2015

Austria wondered why it was that all of his attempts to sing Christmas carols were bound to go awry. It wasn't even possible to sing as simple a song as "O Christmas tree" without having some rascal butcher both text and music.

The rascal was Prussia, of course. He shouted at the top of his lungs: "O Christmas tree, o Christmas tree / You always shed your needles!" Needless to say that Austria's tree did not shed its needles.

Austria wondered why some people who typically drank beer seemed unable to digest wine without getting thoroughly intoxicated. Maybe this was the reason why Prussia acted irrationally when he was left alone with the wine-drinkers France and Spain for too long, Austria pondered. But then, it might simply have something to do with the amount of wine Prussia was wont to drink…

"They are green in Christmas time", Prussia continued, "and when Easter snow is white…" Austria couldn't even argue with that: It had indeed snowed on Easter this year, and right now, it was much too warm for wintertime.

"Hey, Prajzíček! Little Prussian!", Czechia interrupted Austria's reflections. She also sounded a little inebriated—beer drinkers, Austria thought once more. "You wanna sing some funny song? I have a funny song for you!"

Oh dear, Austria thought, sighing inwardly. He had a sneaking suspicion what that "funny song" was.

And sure as hell, Czechia sang—or, rather, brawled—about the Battle of Königgrätz, Hradec Králové, in 1866 and about her brave cannoneer Franz Jabůrek who fought on Austria's side against Prussia and who was always loading his cannon: "A u kanonu stál / a pořád ládo, ládo, ládo / a u kanonu stál / a furt jen ládoval…"

"Mr Austria", Liechtenstein addressed him after some time.

"Yes, my dear?"

"Are all Czech songs about defeats?"

"Some are, apparently."

"And do Czech songs usually feature dismembered soldiers who try to dismember Prussian crown princes?"

Austria seriously had no idea how to reply to this.

Notes

"O Christmas tree" (German: „O Tannenbaum") is a popular German Christmas carol. Of course, you can also spoof the German lyrics: „O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum / wie nadeln deine Blätter! Du grünst nicht nur zur Weihnachtszeit / nein, auch an Ostern, wenn es schneit..."

"Prajzíček" means "little Prussian" in Czech. The expression is a … bit derogatory.

The song Czechia sings is "Kanonýr Jabůrek", which was first published in 1884 and mocks war heroism. Its text narrates the decisive Austrian defeat in the Battle of Königgrätz (Hradec Králové in Czech) during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 from the perspective of the fictional Bohemian cannoneer Franz/František Jabůrek. At the time, Bohemia was part of the Austrian Empire, so Jabůrek was fighting on Austria's side. Even if Liechtenstein doesn't know Czech, she'd understand the part about Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia because the lines in question are sung in a mixture of Czech and German: "V tom ho zahlíd Kronprinc Fridrich, / herje den Kerl erschieß ich, […]" (roughly: "And when he saw Crown Prince Frederick, he thought: Dear Lord, I'll shoot that guy").

As for Austria's remarks about beer drinkers: Austria knows how to make (and drink) both decent wine and decent beer, even if he's a bit more on the side of the wine drinkers. If Czechia is Bohemia (and I think she is), she'd be more into beer, whereas Moravia, the other part of the Czech Republic, rather produces (and drinks) wine.