“ The moans, the cries, the young Bacchante makes,
When, clinging close in coilings like a snake’s,
With wounding kiss, and gush of hot caresses,
For the last moments’ thrills she quiveringly presses.
Far dearer thou, my gentle one, to me,
And happy I—distracted more by thee—
When yielding to long prayers with gentle grace,
You press me softly in your meek embrace;
Modestly cold, to love with passion fraught
You scarce respond; you conscience seem of naught;
Yet warm and warmer glowing, till at last,
As ’twere against your will, you share my blast.
[Pg 41]
⁂
Let me not lose my senses, God ”

“ The gipsy’s love will ne’er grow cold
Until the gipsy breathes no more.
Black bread, while meal to meal succeeds,
Her passion ne’er will lull to sleep;
One burning kiss is all she needs,
Her gipsy blood its warmth will keep. [Pg 88]
When time of trial draweth nigh,
No burning tears will she outpour;
Well skilled is she in misery—
’Twill only make her love thee more.
No change which doth our being move
A single pang to her can give;
But change in him her soul doth love
She hath no power to overlive. ”

“ And life—when the circle of cold contemplation’s complete—
Is a stupid and frivolous jest.
[Pg 15]
⁂
Alone I pass along the lonely road,
Thro’ gathering mist the pebbly pathway gleams;
The night is still;—the void remembers God,
And star vibrates to star with speaking beams.
A wondrous glory moves across the sky;
Soft sleeps the earth in dove-grey azure light.
Why aches my heart? Why troubled thus am I?
What wait I for, what grieve I for, this night?
No more from life can I expect to gain,
And for the “has been” it were vain to weep ”

“ Foam of luscious grape!
See, ’mid wreaths of pipe-smoke, lying
On his flowered divan,
By the sparkling pearly fountain
Dozeth Teheran! [Pg 32]
“Lo! around Jerusalem’s city,
Burned by God’s command,
Motionless, in voiceless stillness,
Death-like, lies the land.
“Farther off, to shade a stranger,
Yellow Nilus laves,
Glowing in the glare of noonday,
Steps of royal graves.
Bedouins forget their sorties
For brocaded tents,
While they count the stars and sing of
Ancestral events.
All that there the vision greeteth
Sleeps in prized repose;
No! the East will ne’er subdue me;
Feeble are such foes!” ”

“ False notes thou ne’er didst sing;
Nor to the passions of the mob
Thy sacred freedom fling.
Thou’st sung for fifty years,
Crowned with immortal bay,
A song to raise the soul of man
And cheer his upward way.
Oh, could these chords prolong
To us thy legacy,
With what unrivalled aims endowed
Would our true poets be!
[Pg 113]
FROM SHENSHIN (FET.) .
A RUSSIAN SCENE.
Wondrous the picture,
How homelike to me!—
Distant plain whitening,
Full moon on the lea;
Light—in the heaven’s high,
And snow flashing bright ”

“ From ’neath the hedge to me, with welcoming bows,
Her silver head the waving lily shows;
When sports the snow-cold runlet down the dale,
Plunging my restless thoughts in pensive dreams,
Whispering to me some deep mysterious tale
Of that reposeful source from whence it streams;—
Then in my soul calm peace succeeds alarm,
Upon my brow dissolves the furrowed frown;
On earth I catch of happiness the charm ”

“ Behold how she struggles! She’ll ne’er get away.
“Why stand ye a terrified group on the shore?
Ye have ne’er seen a beauty like this one before.”
Back glanceth the Prince, with delight, on his prize;
But the proud look of triumph soon fades from his eyes.
With a shudder he sees on the golden sand trail
A fearsome sea-monster, with hideous green tail—
A tail covered over with scales like a snake,
Its quivering coils in death-agony shake. [Pg 20]
The foam from her forehead is pouring in streams,
And the darkness of death from her closing eye gleams ”

“ And wicked eyes from grave to gay
He glanced! [Pg 85]
With fiery speech well fused together,
Our friendly union grew complete,
Although at times with wintry weather
We’d meet.
Designing once to cause his death,
My fingers in a cross I twirled, [11]
Out came his tongue; off in a breath
He whirled.
But scarcely dawns the Eastern light,
The nightly blackness scarce is o’er,
Ere back he comes, my foe, my sprite,
Once more.
How smart he’s grown! ”

“ Lermontof was himself killed in a duel on the slopes of the Caucasus.
[Pg 11]
CLOUDS.
(AN EXPERIMENT IN RUSSIAN DACTYLS.)
Cloudlets ethereal wandering ceaselessly,
Floating in pearly chains over the azure deep;
Maybe, as even I, suffering banishment, [2]
Leaving your own dear North, southward perforce you sweep.
What is compelling you? Destiny’s ordinance?
Envy invisible? Open iniquity?
Maybe deeds criminal heavily press on you;
Maybe the slander of friendship’s obliquity.
No! you are simply aweary of fruitless fields;
Strangers to passions and strangers to punishment. ”

“ Two mountains in the Caucasian range subdued by Russia with the rest of the Caucasus.
[Pg 35]
“WHY.”
I’m sad, for, loving thee, I know full well
That this world’s talk, with its calumnious spell,
Will never spare thy fresh youth’s opening flower.
For every happy day and sunny hour,
Fate will exact in grief and tears his pay.
I’m sad because I see my loved one gay!
[Pg 36]
MOSCOW.
Moscow, I love thee with a filial love,
Strong, burning, tender, which a Russian knows! ”

“ With smile sunbright, with eyes the dove in hue,
With raylike raiment spun from upper air?
Who gifted thee with deep mysterious power
To heal the aching heart of human woe?
At thy approach delights that long lay dead
Revive, and once again with glad life glow. ”

“ Great Russian giant of a thousand years,
To cope with thee, and, by deceit betrayed,
To make thee bow thy soul to craven fears.
In vain the Stranger spurred; you reared; he fell!
The world grew silent ’neath his mighty spell;
Whilst thou alone didst live, my stately one,
Thou heir to glories ours, and ours alone!
Thou livest still, and every stone of thine
Doth tell of generations tales divine.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] Napoleon.
[Pg 37]
FROM PUSHKIN.
⁂
I wander down the noisy streets,
I enter crowded fanes,
I join in youthful revelries,
I give my fancy reins. ”

“ Most of the poems selected for translation are popular, not only amongst the higher classes of Russian society, but also with the Russian soldiery and peasantry, who are very fond of poetry, and amongst whom education has spread, and continues to spread, with marvellous rapidity.
The Translator trusts that this little volume may not only prove interesting to ordinary English readers wishing to get a general idea of Russian poetry, but may also be found of some service to Englishmen studying Russian, and Russians studying English. ”

“ FROM E. KYLAEF.
BILLOWS.
Rushing on, rushing on, speed the billows uproarious,
Breathing hard o’er the depths of the sea;
They roll and they rage, full of majesty glorious,
In broad ridges, boundless and free—
Speeding on to the shore where the tall cliffs are gleaming,
Glancing down o’er the deep of the blue;
So my thoughts from afar, whether waking or dreaming,
Stream ever, dear country, to you.
[Pg 118]
FROM COUNT T.
NO HALF-MEASURES.
If you love—then, love without reason ”

“ From its nook he it tenderly presses;
Then a burning kiss fell on the curve of my cheek,
And his lips sought my lips in caresses.
Neath the breath of his mouth my strength seemed to have flown,
From my breast unclaspt arms I extended,
And there breathed in my ears, “You’re my own! you’re my own!”
Distant notes, with harp’s melody blended!
Swiftly glided the hours; when I opened my eyes,
Rosy dawn through my chamber was streaming ”

“ Oh, true-believing peasantry!
Russia’s your mother small;
The Tsar’s your little father.
And that for you is all!
[Pg 61]
THE RUSSIAN SOLDIER.
Then up there comes a veteran,
With medals on his breast;
He scarcely lives, but yet he strives
To drink with all the rest.
“A lucky man, am I,” he cries,
And thus to prove the fact he tries.
“In what consists a soldier’s luck? ”

“ My cold dust in its keep?
Yet, though I know my lifeless form
Must rot where’er I die,
I’d fondly wish near my loved home,
In my own land, to lie.
There, round the entrance to the grave,
Let young life freely play,
And careless Nature calmly smile
With ageless beauty gay!
[Pg 39]
ANACREONTIC.
We know the steed of mettle
By the breed-marks branded on it;
We know the haughty Highlander
By his plumed and towering bonnet;
And I know the happy lovers
By the love-light in their eyes,
Where, its tale of joyance telling,
The languid flame doth rise.
[Pg 40]
(TO HIS WIFE.)
No! ”

“ Like our Shakespeare, Pushkin knew his own merits.
[Pg 49]
THE POET.
Until Apollo calls the Bard
To share the holy sacrifice,
Plunged in the petty cares of life
The Poet’s spirit lies.
Silent and still his sacred lyre,
His soul to sleep a prey,
Amongst earth’s worthless sons he seems
More worthless, p’raps, than they. ”

“ Lomonossoef—the first great Russian scholar—was the son of an Archangel fisherman.
[10] Ancient name of Russia.
[Pg 68]
PROPRIETY.
Ferdinand, the King, was courtly!
Pink of nice refinement he;
All the naked plasts of Venus,
Placed he under lock and key.
But the Herculean statues,
Left he in their places bare!
Men he did not mind offending;
Hurt the ladies? He’d not dare!
[Pg 69]
THE SINGER.
Beautiful I’m not, I know ”

“ Others, then, will stand around us;
Pray, my Dora, mark you this!
Just as if I never kissed you,
Blushing red before the rest,
You must kiss, with downcast eyelids;
I will kiss, with smile represt.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] It is the custom in Russia for all friends meeting on Easter morning (known as “Sun-bright Feast-day”) to exchange kisses three times in the name of the Trinity.
[Pg 67]
ON LOMONOSSOEF. [9]
God chose him from his earliest years ”

“ The chief merit the Translator claims for this little effort is “faithfulness of translation.” He has endeavoured to translate every word and every thought of the Russian writer, and to avoid additions. ”

“ In your soft lines another’s form I trace.
On living lips I press long-silent kisses;
In your sweet eyes I see a vanished face.
[Pg 30]
DISPUTE. [4]
Once, before a tribal meeting
Of the mountain throng,
Kazbek-hill with Shat-the-mountain [5]
Wrangled loud and long.
“Have a care, Kazbek, my brother,”
Shat, the grey-haired, spoke;
“Not for naught hath human cunning
Bent thee to the yoke.
Man will build his smoky cabins
On thy hillside steep;
Up thy valley’s deep recesses
Ringing axe will creep ”

“ The fool! That God through his lips spake—
This was the tale he strove to tell.
“Look, children! on him cast your eyes!
How sad he is! how thin and pallid!
How naked, and how poor and squalid!
How all the wretched man despise!”
[Pg 23]
WHEN—THEN.
When waves of shadow fret the yellowing fields ”