Eugene Oneguine [Onegin]. A Romance of Russian Life in Verse

Impelled by Spring's dissolving beams,

The snows from off the hills around

Descended swift in turbid streams

And flooded all the level ground.

A smile from slumbering nature clear

Did seem to greet the youthful year;

The heavens shone in deeper blue,

The woods, still naked to the view,

Seemed in a haze of green embowered.

The bee forth from his cell of wax

Flew to collect his rural tax;

The valleys dried and gaily flowered;

Herds low, and under night's dark veil

Already sings the nightingale.

Mournful is thine approach to me,

O Spring, thou chosen time of love!

What agitation languidly

My spirit and my blood doth move,

What sad emotions o'er me steal

When first upon my cheek I feel

The breath of Spring again renewed,

Secure in rural quietude—

Or, strange to me is happiness?

Do all things which to mirth incline.

And make a dark existence shine

Inflict annoyance and distress

Upon a soul inert and cloyed?—

And is all light within destroyed?

Or, heedless of the leaves' return

Which Autumn late to earth consigned,

Do we alone our losses mourn

Of which the rustling woods remind?

Or, when anew all Nature teems,

Do we foresee in troubled dreams

The coming of life's Autumn drear.

For which no springtime shall appear?

Or, it may be, we inly seek,

Wafted upon poetic wing,

Some other long-departed Spring,

Whose memories make the heart beat quick

With thoughts of a far distant land,

Of a strange night when the moon and—

'Tis now the season! Idlers all,

Epicurean philosophers,

Ye men of fashion cynical,

Of Levshin's school ye followers,[70]

Priams of country populations

And dames of fine organisations,

Spring summons you to her green bowers,

'Tis the warm time of labour, flowers;

The time for mystic strolls which late

Into the starry night extend.

Quick to the country let us wend

In vehicles surcharged with freight;

In coach or post-cart duly placed

Beyond the city-barriers haste.

Thou also, reader generous,

The chaise long ordered please employ,

Abandon cities riotous,

Which in the winter were a joy:

The Muse capricious let us coax,

Go hear the rustling of the oaks

Beside a nameless rivulet,

Where in the country Eugene yet,

An idle anchorite and sad,

A while ago the winter spent,

Near young Tattiana resident,

My pretty self-deceiving maid—

No more the village knows his face,

For there he left a mournful trace.

Let us proceed unto a rill,

Which in a hilly neighbourhood

Seeks, winding amid meadows still,

The river through the linden wood.

The nightingale there all night long,

Spring's paramour, pours forth her song

The fountain brawls, sweetbriers bloom,

And lo! where lies a marble tomb

And two old pines their branches spread—

"Vladimir Lenski lies beneath,

Who early died a gallant death,"

Thereon the passing traveller read:

"The date, his fleeting years how long—

Repose in peace, thou child of song."

Time was, the breath of early dawn

Would agitate a mystic wreath

Hung on a pine branch earthward drawn

Above the humble urn of death.

Time was, two maidens from their home

At eventide would hither come,

And, by the light the moonbeams gave,

Lament, embrace upon that grave.

But now—none heeds the monument

Of woe: effaced the pathway now:

There is no wreath upon the bough:

Alone beside it, gray and bent,

As formerly the shepherd sits

And his poor basten sandal knits.

My poor Vladimir, bitter tears

Thee but a little space bewept,

Faithless, alas! thy maid appears,

Nor true unto her sorrow kept.

Another could her heart engage,

Another could her woe assuage

By flattery and lover's art—

A lancer captivates her heart!

A lancer her soul dotes upon:

Before the altar, lo! the pair,

Mark ye with what a modest air

She bows her head beneath the crown;[71]

Behold her downcast eyes which glow,

Her lips where light smiles come and go!

My poor Vladimir! In the tomb,

Passed into dull eternity,

Was the sad poet filled with gloom,

Hearing the fatal perfidy?

Or, beyond Lethe lulled to rest,

Hath the bard, by indifference blest,

Callous to all on earth become—

Is the world to him sealed and dumb?

The same unmoved oblivion

On us beyond the grave attends,

The voice of lovers, foes and friends,

Dies suddenly: of heirs alone

Remains on earth the unseemly rage,

Whilst struggling for the heritage.

Soon Olga's accents shrill resound

No longer through her former home;

The lancer, to his calling bound,

Back to his regiment must roam.

The aged mother, bathed in tears,

Distracted by her grief appears

When the hour came to bid good-bye—

But my Tattiana's eyes were dry.

Only her countenance assumed

A deadly pallor, air distressed;

When all around the entrance pressed,

To say farewell, and fussed and fumed

Around the carriage of the pair—

Tattiana gently led them there.

And long her eyes as through a haze

After the wedded couple strain;

Alas! the friend of childish days

Away, Tattiana, hath been ta'en.

Thy dove, thy darling little pet

On whom a sister's heart was set

Afar is borne by cruel fate,

For evermore is separate.

She wanders aimless as a sprite,

Into the tangled garden goes

But nowhere can she find repose,

Nor even tears afford respite,

Of consolation all bereft—

Well nigh her heart in twain was cleft.

In cruel solitude each day

With flame more ardent passion burns,

And to Oneguine far away

Her heart importunately turns.

She never more his face may view,

For was it not her duty to

Detest him for a brother slain?

The poet fell; already men

No more remembered him; unto

Another his betrothed was given;

The memory of the bard was driven

Like smoke athwart the heaven blue;

Two hearts perchance were desolate

And mourned him still. Why mourn his fate?

'Twas eve. 'Twas dusk. The river speeds

In tranquil flow. The beetle hums.

Already dance to song proceeds;

The fisher's fire afar illumes

The river's bank. Tattiana lone

Beneath the silver of the moon

Long time in meditation deep

Her path across the plain doth keep—

Proceeds, until she from a hill

Sees where a noble mansion stood,

A village and beneath, a wood,

A garden by a shining rill.

She gazed thereon, and instant beat

Her heart more loudly and more fleet.

She hesitates, in doubt is thrown—

"Shall I proceed, or homeward flee?

He is not there: I am not known:

The house and garden I would see."

Tattiana from the hill descends

With bated breath, around she bends

A countenance perplexed and scared.

She enters a deserted yard—

Yelping, a pack of dogs rush out,

But at her shriek ran forth with noise

The household troop of little boys,

Who with a scuffle and a shout

The curs away to kennel chase,

The damsel under escort place.

"Can I inspect the mansion, please?"

Tattiana asks, and hurriedly

Unto Anicia for the keys

The family of children hie.

Anicia soon appears, the door

Opens unto her visitor.

Into the lonely house she went,

Wherein a space Oneguine spent.

She gazed—a cue, forgotten long,

Doth on the billiard table rest,

Upon the tumbled sofa placed,

A riding whip. She strolls along.

The beldam saith: "The hearth, by it

The master always used to sit.

"Departed Lenski here to dine

In winter time would often come.

Please follow this way, lady mine,

This is my master's sitting-room.

'Tis here he slept, his coffee took,

Into accounts would sometimes look,

A book at early morn perused.

The room my former master used.

On Sundays by yon window he,

Spectacles upon nose, all day

Was wont with me at cards to play.

God save his soul eternally

And grant his weary bones their rest

Deep in our mother Earth's chill breast!"

Tattiana's eyes with tender gleam

On everything around her gaze,

Of priceless value all things seem

And in her languid bosom raise

A pleasure though with sorrow knit:

The table with its lamp unlit,

The pile of books, with carpet spread

Beneath the window-sill his bed,

The landscape which the moonbeams fret,

The twilight pale which softens all,

Lord Byron's portrait on the wall

And the cast-iron statuette

With folded arms and eyes bent low,

Cocked hat and melancholy brow.[72]

Long in this fashionable cell

Tattiana as enchanted stood;

But it grew late; cold blew the gale;

Dark was the valley and the wood

slept o'er the river misty grown.

Behind the mountain sank the moon.

Long, long the hour had past when home

Our youthful wanderer should roam.

She hid the trouble of her breast,

Heaved an involuntary sigh

And turned to leave immediately,

But first permission did request

Thither in future to proceed

That certain volumes she might read.

Adieu she to the matron said

At the front gates, but in brief space

At early morn returns the maid

To the abandoned dwelling-place.

When in the study's calm retreat,

Wrapt in oblivion complete,

She found herself alone at last,

Longtime her tears flowed thick and fast;

But presently she tried to read;

At first for books was disinclined,

But soon their choice seemed to her mind

Remarkable. She then indeed

Devoured them with an eager zest.

A new world was made manifest!

Although we know that Eugene had

Long ceased to be a reading man,

Still certain authors, I may add,

He had excepted from the ban:

The bard of Juan and the Giaour,

With it may be a couple more;

Romances three, in which ye scan

Portrayed contemporary man

As the reflection of his age,

His immorality of mind

To arid selfishness resigned,

A visionary personage

With his exasperated sense,

His energy and impotence.

And numerous pages had preserved

The sharp incisions of his nail,

And these the attentive maid observed

With eye precise and without fail.

Tattiana saw with trepidation

By what idea or observation

Oneguine was the most impressed,

In what he merely acquiesced.

Upon those margins she perceived

Oneguine's pencillings. His mind

Made revelations undesigned,

Of what he thought and what believed,

A dagger, asterisk, or note

Interrogation to denote.

And my Tattiana now began

To understand by slow degrees

More clearly, God be praised, the man,

Whom autocratic fate's decrees

Had bid her sigh for without hope—

A dangerous, gloomy misanthrope,

Being from hell or heaven sent,

Angel or fiend malevolent.

Which is he? or an imitation,

A bogy conjured up in joke,

A Russian in Childe Harold's cloak,

Of foreign whims the impersonation—

Handbook of fashionable phrase

Or parody of modern ways?

Hath she found out the riddle yet?

Hath she a fitting phrase selected?

But time flies and she doth forget

They long at home have her expected—

Whither two neighbouring dames have walked

And a long time about her talked.

"What can be done? She is no child!"

Cried the old dame with anguish filled:

"Olinka is her junior, see.

'Tis time to many her, 'tis true,

But tell me what am I to do?

To all she answers cruelly—

I will not wed, and ever weeps

And lonely through the forest creeps."

"Is she in love?" quoth one. "With whom?

Bouyanoff courted. She refused.

Petoushkoff met the selfsame doom.

The hussar Pikhtin was accused.

How the young imp on Tania doted!

To captivate her how devoted!

I mused: perhaps the matter's squared—

O yes! my hopes soon disappeared."

"But, matushka, to Moscow you[73]

Should go, the market for a maid,

With many a vacancy, 'tis said."—

"Alas! my friend, no revenue!"

"Enough to see one winter's end;

If not, the money I will lend."

The venerable dame opined

The counsel good and full of reason,

Her money counted, and designed

To visit Moscow in the season.

Tattiana learns the intelligence—

Of her provincial innocence

The unaffected traits she now

Unto a carping world must show—

Her toilette's antiquated style,

Her antiquated mode of speech,

For Moscow fops and Circes each

To mark with a contemptuous smile.

Horror! had she not better stay

Deep in the greenwood far away?

Arising with the morning's light,

Unto the fields she makes her way,

And with emotional delight

Surveying them, she thus doth say:

"Ye peaceful valleys all, good-bye!

Ye well-known mountain summits high,

Ye groves whose depths I know so well,

Thou beauteous sky above, farewell!

Delicious nature, thee I fly,

The calm existence which I prize

I yield for splendid vanities,

Thou too farewell, my liberty!

Whither and wherefore do I speed

And what will Destiny concede?"

Farther Tattiana's walks extend—

'Tis now the hillock now the rill

Their natural attractions lend

To stay the maid against her will.

She the acquaintances she loves,

Her spacious fields and shady groves,

Another visit hastes to pay.

But Summer swiftly fades away

And golden Autumn draweth nigh,

And pallid nature trembling grieves,

A victim decked with golden leaves;

Dark clouds before the north wind fly;

It blew: it howled: till winter e'en

Came forth in all her magic sheen.

The snow descends and buries all,

Hangs heavy on the oaken boughs,

A white and undulating pall

O'er hillock and o'er meadow throws.

The channel of the river stilled

As if with eider-down is filled.

The hoar-frost glitters: all rejoice

In mother Winter's strange caprice.

But Tania's heart is not at ease,

Winter's approach she doth not hail

Nor the frost particles inhale

Nor the first snow of winter seize

Her shoulders, breast and face to lave—

Alarm the winter journey gave.

The date was fixed though oft postponed,

But ultimately doth approach.

Examined, mended, newly found

Was the old and forgotten coach;

Kibitkas three, the accustomed train,[74]

The household property contain:

Saucepans and mattresses and chairs,

Portmanteaus and preserves in jars,

Feather-beds, also poultry-coops,

Basins and jugs—well! everything

To happiness contributing.

Behold! beside their dwelling groups

Of serfs the farewell wail have given.

Nags eighteen to the door are driven.

These to the coach of state are bound,

Breakfast the busy cooks prepare,

Baggage is heaped up in a mound,

Old women at the coachmen swear.

A bearded postillion astride

A lean and shaggy nag doth ride,

Unto the gates the servants fly

To bid the gentlefolk good-bye.

These take their seats; the coach of state

Leisurely through the gateway glides.

"Adieu! thou home where peace abides,

Where turmoil cannot penetrate,

Shall I behold thee once again?"—

Tattiana tears cannot restrain.

The limits of enlightenment

When to enlarge we shall succeed,

In course of time (the whole extent

Will not five centuries exceed

By computation) it is like

Our roads transformed the eye will strike;

Highways all Russia will unite

And form a network left and right;

On iron bridges we shall gaze

Which o'er the waters boldly leap,

Mountains we'll level and through deep

Streams excavate subaqueous ways,

And Christian folk will, I expect,

An inn at every stage erect.

But now, what wretched roads one sees,

Our bridges long neglected rot,

And at the stages bugs and fleas

One moment's slumber suffer not.

Inns there are none. Pretentious but

Meagre, within a draughty hut,

A bill of fare hangs full in sight

And irritates the appetite.

Meantime a Cyclops of those parts

Before a fire which feebly glows

Mends with the Russian hammer's blows

The flimsy wares of Western marts,

With blessings on the ditches and

The ruts of his own fatherland.

Yet on a frosty winter day

The journey in a sledge doth please,

No senseless fashionable lay

Glides with a more luxurious ease;

For our Automedons are fire

And our swift troikas never tire;

The verst posts catch the vacant eye

And like a palisade flit by.[75]

The Larinas unwisely went,

From apprehension of the cost,

By their own horses, not the post—

So Tania to her heart's content

Could taste the pleasures of the road.

Seven days and nights the travellers plod.

But they draw near. Before them, lo!

White Moscow raises her old spires,

Whose countless golden crosses glow

As with innumerable fires.[76]

Ah! brethren, what was my delight

When I yon semicircle bright

Of churches, gardens, belfries high

Descried before me suddenly!

Moscow, how oft in evil days,

Condemned to exile dire by fate,

On thee I used to meditate!

Moscow! How much is in the phrase

For every loyal Russian breast!

How much is in that word expressed!

Lo! compassed by his grove of oaks,

Petrovski Palace! Gloomily

His recent glory he invokes.

Here, drunk with his late victory,

Napoleon tarried till it please

Moscow approach on bended knees,

Time-honoured Kremlin's keys present.

Not so! My Moscow never went

To seek him out with bended head.

No gift she bears, no feast proclaims,

But lights incendiary flames

For the impatient chief instead.

From hence engrossed in thought profound

He on the conflagration frowned.[77]

Adieu, thou witness of our glory,

Petrovski Palace; come, astir!

Drive on! the city barriers hoary

Appear; along the road of Tver

The coach is borne o'er ruts and holes,

Past women, sentry-boxes, rolls,

Past palaces and nunneries,

Lamp-posts, shops, sledges, families,

Bokharians, peasants, beds of greens,

Boulevards, belfries, milliners,

Huts, chemists, Cossacks, shopkeepers

And fashionable magazines,

Balconies, lion's heads on doors,

Jackdaws on every spire—in scores.[78]

The weary way still incomplete,

An hour passed by—another—till,

Near Khariton's in a side street

The coach before a house stood still.

At an old aunt's they had arrived

Who had for four long years survived

An invalid from lung complaint.

A Kalmuck gray, in caftan rent

And spectacles, his knitting staid

And the saloon threw open wide;

The princess from the sofa cried

And the newcomers welcome bade.

The two old ladies then embraced

And exclamations interlaced.

"Princesse, mon ange!"—"Pachette!"—

"Aline!"

"Who would have thought it? As of yore!

Is it for long?"—"Ma chere cousine!"

"Sit down. How funny, to be sure!

'Tis a scene of romance, I vow!"

"Tania, my eldest child, you know"—

"Ah! come, Tattiana, come to me!

Is it a dream, and can it be?

Cousin, rememb'rest Grandison?"

"What! Grandison?"—"Yes, certainly!"

"Oh! I remember, where is he?"—

"Here, he resides with Simeon.

He called upon me Christmas Eve—

His son is married, just conceive!"

"And he—but of him presently—

To-morrow Tania we will show,

What say you? to the family—

Alas! abroad I cannot go.

See, I can hardly crawl about—

But you must both be quite tired out!

Let us go seek a little rest—

Ah! I'm so weak—my throbbing breast!

Oppressive now is happiness,

Not only sorrow—Ah! my dear,

Now I am fit for nothing here.

In old age life is weariness!"

Then weeping she sank back distressed

And fits of coughing racked her chest.

By the sick lady's gaiety

And kindness Tania was impressed,

But, her own room in memory,

The strange apartment her oppressed:

Repose her silken curtains fled,

She could not sleep in her new bed.

The early tinkling of the bells

Which of approaching labour tells

Aroused Tattiana from her bed.

The maiden at her casement sits

As daylight glimmers, darkness flits,

But ah! discerns nor wood nor mead—

Beneath her lay a strange courtyard,

A stable, kitchen, fence appeared.

To consanguineous dinners they

Conduct Tattiana constantly,

That grandmothers and grandsires may

Contemplate her sad reverie.

We Russians, friends from distant parts

Ever receive with kindly hearts

And exclamations and good cheer.

"How Tania grows! Doth it appear"

"Long since I held thee at the font—

Since in these arms I thee did bear—

And since I pulled thee by the ear—

And I to give thee cakes was wont?"—

Then the old dames in chorus sing,

"Oh! how our years are vanishing!"

But nothing changed in them is seen,

All in the good old style appears,

Our dear old aunt, Princess Helene,

Her cap of tulle still ever wears:

Luceria Lvovna paint applies,

Amy Petrovna utters lies,

Ivan Petrovitch still a gaby,

Simeon Petrovitch just as shabby;

Pelagie Nikolavna has

Her friend Monsieur Finemouche the same,

Her wolf-dog and her husband tame;

Still of his club he member was—

As deaf and silly doth remain,

Still eats and drinks enough for twain.

Their daughters kiss Tattiana fair.

In the beginning, cold and mute,

Moscow's young Graces at her stare,

Examine her from head to foot.

They deem her somewhat finical,

Outlandish and provincial,

A trifle pale, a trifle lean,

But plainer girls they oft had seen.

Obedient then to Nature's law,

With her they did associate,

Squeeze tiny hands and osculate;

Her tresses curled in fashion saw,

And oft in whispers would impart

A maiden's secrets—of the heart.

Triumphs—their own or those of friends—

Hopes, frolics, dreams and sentiment

Their harmless conversation blends

With scandal's trivial ornament.

Then to reward such confidence

Her amorous experience

With mute appeal to ask they seem—

But Tania just as in a dream

Without participation hears,

Their voices nought to her impart

And the lone secret of her heart,

Her sacred hoard of joy and tears,

She buries deep within her breast

Nor aught confides unto the rest.

Tattiana would have gladly heard

The converse of the world polite,

But in the drawing-room all appeared

To find in gossip such delight,

Speech was so tame and colourless

Their slander e'en was weariness;

In their sterility of prattle,

Questions and news and tittle-tattle,

No sense was ever manifest

Though by an error and unsought—

The languid mind could smile at nought,

Heart would not throb albeit in jest—

Even amusing fools we miss

In thee, thou world of empty bliss.

In groups, official striplings glance

Conceitedly on Tania fair,

And views amongst themselves advance

Unfavourable unto her.

But one buffoon unhappy deemed

Her the ideal which he dreamed,

And leaning 'gainst the portal closed

To her an elegy composed.

Also one Viazemski, remarking

Tattiana by a poor aunt's side,

Successfully to please her tried,

And an old gent the poet marking

By Tania, smoothing his peruke,

To ask her name the trouble took.[79]

But where Melpomene doth rave

With lengthened howl and accent loud,

And her bespangled robe doth wave

Before a cold indifferent crowd,

And where Thalia softly dreams

And heedless of approval seems,

Terpsichore alone among

Her sisterhood delights the young

(So 'twas with us in former years,

In your young days and also mine),

Never upon my heroine

The jealous dame her lorgnette veers,

The connoisseur his glances throws

From boxes or from stalls in rows.

To the assembly her they bear.

There the confusion, pressure, heat,

The crash of music, candles' glare

And rapid whirl of many feet,

The ladies' dresses airy, light,

The motley moving mass and bright,

Young ladies in a vasty curve,

To strike imagination serve.

'Tis there that arrant fops display

Their insolence and waistcoats white

And glasses unemployed all night;

Thither hussars on leave will stray

To clank the spur, delight the fair—

And vanish like a bird in air.

Full many a lovely star hath night

And Moscow many a beauty fair:

Yet clearer shines than every light

The moon in the blue atmosphere.

And she to whom my lyre would fain,

Yet dares not, dedicate its strain,

Shines in the female firmament

Like a full moon magnificent.

Lo! with what pride celestial

Her feet the earth beneath her press!

Her heart how full of gentleness,

Her glance how wild yet genial!

Enough, enough, conclude thy lay—

For folly's dues thou hadst to pay.

Noise, laughter, bowing, hurrying mixt,

Gallop, mazurka, waltzing—see!

A pillar by, two aunts betwixt,

Tania, observed by nobody,

Looks upon all with absent gaze

And hates the world's discordant ways.

'Tis noisome to her there: in thought

Again her rural life she sought,

The hamlet, the poor villagers,

The little solitary nook

Where shining runs the tiny brook,

Her garden, and those books of hers,

And the lime alley's twilight dim

Where the first time she met with him.

Thus widely meditation erred,

Forgot the world, the noisy ball,

Whilst from her countenance ne'er stirred

The eyes of a grave general.

Both aunts looked knowing as a judge,

Each gave Tattiana's arm a nudge

And in a whisper did repeat:

"Look quickly to your left, my sweet!"

"The left? Why, what on earth is there?"—

"No matter, look immediately.

There, in that knot of company,

Two dressed in uniform appear—

Ah! he has gone the other way"—

"Who? Is it that stout general, pray?"—

Let us congratulations pay

To our Tattiana conquering,

And for a time our course delay,

That I forget not whom I sing.

Let me explain that in my song

"I celebrate a comrade young

And the extent of his caprice;

O epic Muse, my powers increase

And grant success to labour long;

Having a trusty staff bestowed,

Grant that I err not on the road."

Enough! my pack is now unslung—

To classicism I've homage paid,

Though late, have a beginning made.[80]