Текст книги "Комментарии к «Евгению Онегину» Александра Пушкина"

Автор книги: Владимир Набоков

CHAPTER SEVEN

 
Moscow! Russia's favorite daughter!
Where is your equal to be found?
 

Dmitriev

 
How not to love one's native Moscow?
 

Baratïnski

 
“Reviling Moscow! This is what
comes from seeing the world! Where is it better, then?”
“Where we are not.”
 

Griboedov

 

I

   Chased by the vernal beams,
   down the surrounding hills the snows already
   have run in turbid streams
 ⁴ onto the inundated fields.
   With a serene smile, nature
   greets through her sleep the morning of the year.
   Bluing, the heavens shine.
 ⁸ The yet transparent woods
   as if with down are greening.
   The bee flies from her waxen cell
   after the tribute of the field.
¹² The dales grow dry and varicolored.
   The herds are noisy, and the nightingale
   has sung already in the hush of nights.
 
 

II

   How sad your apparition is to me,
   spring, spring, season of love!
   What a dark stir there is
 ⁴ in my soul, in my blood!
   With what oppressive tenderness
   I revel in the whiff
   of spring fanning my face
 ⁸ in the lap of the rural stillness!
   Or is enjoyment strange to me,
   and all that gladdens, animates,
   all that exults and gleams,
¹² casts spleen and languishment
   upon a soul long dead
   and all looks dark to it?
 
 

III

   Or gladdened not by the return
   of leaves that perished in the autumn,
   a bitter loss we recollect,
 ⁴ harking to the new murmur of the woods;
   or with reanimated nature we
   compare in troubled thought
   the withering of our years,
 ⁸ for which there is no renovation?
   Perhaps there comes into our thoughts,
   midst a poetical reverie,
   some other ancient spring,
¹² which sets our heart aquiver
   with the dream of a distant clime,
   a marvelous night, a moon....
 
 

IV

   Now is the time: good lazybones,
   epicurean sages; you,
   equanimous fortunates;
 ⁴ you, fledglings of the Lyóvshin⁴¹ school;
   you, country Priams;
   and sentimental ladies, you;
   spring calls you to the country,
 ⁸ season of warmth, of flowers, of labors,
   of inspired rambles,
   and of seductive nights.
   Friends! to the fields, quick, quick;
¹² in heavy loaden chariots;
   with your own horses or with posters;
   out of the towngates start to trek!
 
 

V

   And you, indulgent reader,
   in your imported calash, leave
   the indefatigable city
 ⁴ where in the winter you caroused;
   let's go with my capricious Muse
   to hear the murmur of a park
   above a nameless river, in the country place,
 ⁸ where my Eugene, an idle and despondent
   recluse, but recently
   dwelt in the winter, in the neighborhood
   of youthful Tanya,
¹² of my dear dreamer;
   but where he is no longer now...
   where a sad trace he left.
 
 

VI

   'Mid hills disposed in a half circle,
   let us go thither where a rill,
   winding, by way of a green meadow,
 ⁴ runs to the river through a linden bosquet.
   The nightingale, spring's lover,
   sings there all night; the cinnamon rose
   blooms, and the babble of the fount is heard.
 ⁸ There a tombstone is seen
   in the shade of two ancient pines.
   The scripture to the stranger says:
   “Here lies Vladimir Lenski,
¹² who early died the death of the courageous,
   in such a year, at such an age.
   Repose, boy poet!”
 
 

VII

   On the inclined bough of a pine,
   time was, the early breeze
   above that humble urn
 ⁴ swayed a mysterious wreath;
   time was, during late leisures,
   two girl companions hither used to come;
   and, by the moon, upon the grave,
 ⁸ embraced, they wept;
   but now... the drear memorial is
   forgot. The wonted trail to it,
   weed-choked. No wreath is on the bough.
¹² Alone, beneath it, gray and feeble,
   the herdsman as before keeps singing
   and plaiting his poor footgear.
 
 

X

   My poor Lenski! Pining away,
   she did not weep for long.
   Alas! The young fiancée
 ⁴ is to her woe untrue.
   Another ravished her attention,
   another managed with love's flattery
   to lull to sleep her suffering:
 ⁸ an uhlan knew how to enthrall her,
   an uhlan by her soul is loved;
   and lo! with him already at the altar
   she modestly beneath the bridal crown
¹² stands with bent head,
   fire in her lowered eyes,
   a light smile on her lips.
 
 

XI

   My poor Lenski! Beyond the grave,
   in the confines of deaf eternity,
   was the despondent bard perturbed
 ⁴ by the fell news of the betrayal?
   Or on the Lethe lulled to sleep,
   blest with insensibility, the poet
   no longer is perturbed by anything,
 ⁸ and closed and mute is earth to him?...
   'Tis so! Indifferent oblivion
   beyond the sepulcher awaits us.
   The voice of foes, of friends, of loves abruptly
¹² falls silent. Only over the estate
   the angry chorus of the heirs
   starts an indecent squabble.
 
 

XII

   And soon the ringing voice of Olya
   was in the Larin family stilled.
   A captive of his lot, the uhlan
 ⁴ had to rejoin his regiment with her.
   Bitterly shedding floods of tears,
   the old dame, as she took leave of her daughter,
   seemed scarce alive,
 ⁸ but Tanya could not cry;
   only a deadly pallor covered
   her melancholy face.
   When everybody came out on the porch,
¹² and one and all, taking leave, bustled
   around the chariot of the newly wed,
   Tatiana saw them off.
 
 

XIII

   And long did she, as through a mist,
   gaze after them...
   And now Tatiana is alone, alone!
 ⁴ Alas! Companion of so many years,
   her youthful doveling,
   her own dear bosom friend,
   has been by fate borne far away,
 ⁸ has been from her forever separated.
   She, like a shade, roams aimlessly;
   now into the deserted garden looks.
   Nowhere, in nothing, are there joys for her,
¹² and she finds no relief
   for tears suppressed,
   and torn asunder is her heart.
 
 

XIV

   And in the cruel solitude
   stronger her passion burns,
   and louder does her heart of distant
 ⁴ Onegin speak to her.
   She will not see him;
   she must abhor in him
   the slayer of her brother;
 ⁸ the poet perished... but already none
   remembers him, already to another
   his promised bride has given herself.
   The poet's memory has sped by
¹² as smoke across an azure sky;
   perhaps there are two hearts that yet
   grieve for him.... Wherefore grieve?
 
 

XV

   'Twas evening. The sky darkened. Waters
   streamed quietly. The beetle churred.
   The choral throngs already were dispersing.
 ⁴ Across the river, smoking, glowed already
   the fire of fishermen. In open country
   by the moon's silvery light,
   sunk in her dreams,
 ⁸ long did Tatiana walk alone. She walked,
   she walked. And suddenly before her from a hill
   she sees a manor house, a village,
   a grove below hill, and a garden
¹² above a luminous river.
   She gazes, and the heart in her
   faster and harder has begun to beat.
 
 

XVI

   Doubts trouble her:
   “Shall I go on? Shall I go back?... He is not here.
   They do not know me.... I shall glance
 ⁴ at the house, at that garden.”
   And so downhill Tatiana walks,
   scarce breathing; casts around
   a gaze full of perplexity...
 ⁸ and enters a deserted courtyard.
   Dogs toward her
   dash, barking… At her frightened cry
   a household brood of serf boys
¹² has noisily converged. Not without fighting
   the boys dispersed the hounds,
   taking the lady under their protection.
 
 

XVII

   “I wonder, can one see the master house?”
   asked Tanya. Speedily
   the children to Anisia ran
 ⁴ to get the hallway keys from her.
   Anisia came forth to her promptly, and the door
   before them opened,
   and Tanya stepped into the empty house,
 ⁸ where recently our hero had been living.
   She looked: in the reception room forgotten,
   a cue reposed upon the billiard table;
   upon a rumpled sofa lay
¹² a riding crop. Tanya went on.
   The old crone said to her: “And here's the fireplace;
   here master used to sit alone.
 
 

XVIII

   “Here in the winter the late Lenski,
   our neighbor, used to dine with him.
   This way, please, follow me.
 ⁴ This was the master's study;
   he used to sleep here, take his coffee, listen
   to the steward's reports,
   and in the morning read a book....
 ⁸ And the old master lived here too;
   on Sundays, at this window here,
   time was, donning his spectacles,
   he'd deign to play ‘tomfools’ with me.
¹² God grant salvation to his soul
   and peace to his dear bones
   in the grave, in damp mother earth!”
 
 

XIX

   Tatiana looks with melting gaze
   at everything around her,
   and all to her seems priceless,
 ⁴ all quickens her languorous soul
   with a half-painful joyance:
   the desk with its extinguished lamp,
   a pile of books, and at the window
 ⁸ a carpet-covered bed, and from the window
   the prospect through the lunar gloom,
   and this pale half-light, and Lord Byron's portrait,
   and a small column
¹² with a cast-iron statuette
   with clouded brow under a hat,
   with arms crosswise compressed.
 
 

XX

   Tatiana in the modish cell
   stands long as one bewitched.
   But it is late. A cold wind has arisen.
 ⁴ It's dark in the dale. The grove sleeps
   above the misted river;
   the moon has hid behind the hill,
   and it is time, high time,
 ⁸ that the young pilgrimess went home;
   and Tanya, hiding her excitement,
   and not without a sigh,
   starts out on her way back;
¹² but first she asks permission
   to visit the deserted castle
   so as to read books there alone.
 
 

XXI

   Beyond the gate Tatiana parted
   with the housekeeper. A day later,
   early at morn this time, again she came
 ⁴ to the abandoned shelter,
   and in the silent study, for a while
   to all on earth oblivious, she
   remained at last alone,
 ⁸ and long she wept.
   Then to the books she turned.
   At first she was not in a mood for them,
   but their choice seemed to her
¹² bizarre. Tatiana fell to reading
   with avid soul; and there revealed itself
   a different world to her.
 
 

XXII

   Although we know that Eugene
   had long ceased to like reading,
   still, several works
 ⁴ he had exempted from disgrace:
   the singer of the Giaour and Juan
   and, with him, also two or three
   novels in which the epoch is reflected
 ⁸ and modern man
   rather correctly represented
   with his immoral soul,
   selfish and dry,
¹² to dreaming measurelessly given,
   with his embittered mind
   boiling in empty action.
 
 

XXIII

   Many pages preserved
   the trenchant mark of fingernails;
   the eyes of the attentive maiden
 ⁴ are fixed on them more eagerly.
   Tatiana sees with trepidation
   by what thought, observation
   Onegin would be struck,
 ⁸ what he agreed with tacitly.
   The dashes of his pencil she
   encounters in their margins.
   Unconsciously Onegin's soul
¹² has everywhere expressed itself —
   now by a succinct word, now by a cross,
   now by an interrogatory crotchet.
 
 

XXIV

   And my Tatiana by degrees
   begins to understand
   more clearly now – thank God —
 ⁴ him for whom by imperious fate
   she is sentenced to sigh.
   A sad and dangerous eccentric,
   creature of hell or heaven,
 ⁸ this angel, this proud fiend, what, then, is he?
   Can it be, he's an imitation,
   an insignificant phantasm, or else
   a Muscovite in Harold's mantle,
¹² a glossary of alien vagaries,
   a complete lexicon of words in vogue?...
   Might he not be, in fact, a parody?
 
 

XXV

   Can she have solved the riddle?
   Can “the word” have been found?
   The hours run; she has forgotten
 ⁴ that she is long due home —
   where two neighbors have got together,
   and where the talk is about her.
   “What should one do? Tatiana is no infant,”
 ⁸ quoth the old lady with a groan.
   “Why, Olinka is younger.... It is time,
   yea, yea, the maiden were established;
   but then – what can I do with her?
¹² She turns down everybody with the same
   curt ‘I'll not marry,’ and keeps brooding,
   and wanders in the woods alone.”
 
 

XXVI

   “Might she not be in love?” “With whom, then?
   Buyánov offered: was rejected.
   Same thing with Ivan Petushkóv.
 ⁴ There guested with us a hussar, Pïhtín;
   oh my, how sweet he was on Tanya,
   how he bestirred himself, the coax!
   Thought I: perchance, she will accept;
 ⁸ far from it! And again the deal was off.”
   “Why, my dear lady, what's the hindrance?
   To Moscow, to the mart of brides!
   One hears, the vacant places there are many.”
¹² “Och, my good sir! My income's scanty.”
   “Sufficient for a single winter;
   if not, just borrow – say, from me.”
 
 

XXVII

   Much did the old dame like
   the sensible and sound advice;
   she checked accounts – and there and then decided
 ⁴ in winter to set out for Moscow;
   and Tanya hears this news....
   Unto the judgment
   of the exacting beau monde to present
 ⁸ the clear traits of provincial
   simplicity, and antiquated finery,
   and antiquated turns of speech;
   the mocking glances
¹² of Moscow fops and Circes to attract....
   O terror! No, better and safer,
   back in the woods for her to stay.
 
 

XXVIII

   With the first rays arising
   she hastens now into the fields
   and, with soft-melting eyes
 ⁴ surveying them, she says:
   “Farewell, pacific dales,
   and you, familiar hilltops,
   and you, familiar woods!
 ⁸ Farewell, celestial beauty,
   farewell, glad nature!
   I am exchanging a dear quiet world
   for the hum of resplendent vanities!...
¹² And you, my freedom, farewell, too!
   Whither, wherefore, do I bear onward?
   What does my fate hold out for me?”
 
 

XXIX

   Her walks last longer.
   At present, here a hillock, there a brook,
   cannot help stopping
 ⁴ Tatiana with their charm.
   She, as with ancient friends,
   with her groves, meadows,
   still hastens to converse.
 ⁸ But the fleet summer flies.
   The golden autumn has arrived.
   Nature, tremulous, pale,
   is like a victim richly decked....
¹² Now, driving clouds along, the North
   has blown, has howled, and now herself
   Winter the sorceress comes.
 
 

XXX

   She came, scattered herself; in flocks
   hung on the limbs of oaks;
   in wavy carpets lay
 ⁴ amid the fields, about the hills;
   the banks with the immobile river
   made level with a puffy pall.
   Frost gleamed. And we are gladdened
 ⁸ by Mother Winter's pranks.
   By them not gladdened is but Tanya's heart:
   she does not go to meet the winter,
   inhale the frostdust,
¹² and with the first snow from the bathhouse roof
   wash face, shoulders, and breast.
   Tatiana dreads the winter way.
 
 

XXXI

   The day of leaving is long overdue;
   the last term now goes by. Inspected,
   relined, made solid is the sledded coach
 ⁴ that to oblivion had been cast.
   The usual train of three kibitkas
   carries the household chattels:
   pans, chairs, trunks, jams in jars,
 ⁸ mattresses, feather beds,
   cages with roosters, pots,
   basins, et cetera —
   well, plenty of all kinds of goods.
¹² And now, among the servants in the log hut,
   a hubbub rises, farewell weeping:
   into the courtyard eighteen nags are led.
 
 

XXXII

   They to the master coach are harnessed;
   men cooks prepare lunch; the kibitkas
   are loaded mountain-high;
 ⁴ serf women, coachmen brawl.
   Upon a lean and shaggy jade a bearded
   postilion sits. Retainers at the gate
   have gathered, running,
 ⁸ to bid their mistresses farewell. And now
   they've settled, and the venerable sleigh-coach
   beyond the gate creeps, gliding.
   “Farewell, pacific sites!
¹² Farewell, secluded refuge!
   Shall I see you?” And from the eyes
   of Tanya flows a stream of tears.
 
 

XXXIII

   When we the boundaries of beneficial
   enlightenment move farther out,
   in due time (by the computation
 ⁴ of philosophic tabulae,
   in some five hundred years) roads, surely,
   at home will change immeasurably.
   Paved highways at this point and that
 ⁸ uniting Russia will traverse her;
   cast-iron bridges o'er the waters
   in ample arcs will stride;
   we shall part mountains; under water
¹² dig daring tunnels;
   and Christendom will institute
   at every stage a tavern.
 
 

XXXIV

   The roads at home are bad at present;⁴²
   forgotten bridges rot;
   at stages the bedbugs and fleas
 ⁴ do not give one a minute's sleep.
   No taverns. In a cold log hut
   there hangs for show a highfalutin
   but meager bill of fare, and teases
 ⁸ one's futile appetite,
   while the rural Cyclopes
   in front of a slow fire
   treat with a Russian hammer
¹² Europe's light article,
   blessing the ruts
   and ditches of the fatherland.
 
 

XXXV

   Now, on the other hand, driving in winter's
   cold season is agreeable and easy.
   As in a modish song a verse devoid of thought,
 ⁴ smooth is the winter track.
   Alert are our Automedons,
   our troikas never tire,
   and mileposts, humoring the idle gaze,
 ⁸ before one's eyes flick like a fence.⁴³
   Unluckily, Dame Larin dragged along,
   fearing expensive stages,
   with her own horses, not with posters,
¹² and our maid tasted
   viatic tedium in full:
   they traveled seven days and nights.
 
 

XXXVI

   But now 'tis near. Before them
   the ancient tops of white-stone Moscow
   already glow
 ⁴ with golden crosses, ember-bright.
   Ah, chums, how pleased I was
   when, all at once, the hemicircle
   of churches and of belfries,
 ⁸ of gardens, domes, opened before me!
   How often during woeful separation,
   in my wandering fate,
   Moscow, I thought of you!
¹² Moscow!... How much within that sound
   is blended for a Russian heart!
   How much is echoed there!
 
 

XXXVII

   Here is, surrounded by its park,
   Petrovskiy Castle. Somberly
   it prides itself on recent glory.
 ⁴ In vain Napoleon, intoxicated
   with his last fortune, waited
   for kneeling Moscow with the keys
   of the old Kremlin: no,
 ⁸ to him my Moscow did not go
   with craven brow;
   not revelry, not gifts of bienvenue —
   a conflagration she prepared
¹² for the impatient hero.
   From here, in meditation sunk,
   he watched the formidable flame.
 
 

XXXVIII

   Good-by, witness of fallen glory,
   Petrovskiy Castle. Hup! Don't stop,
   get on! The turnpike posts already
 ⁴ show white. Along Tverskaya Street
   the coach now hies across the dips.
   There flicker by: watch boxes, peasant women,
   urchins, shops, street lamps,
 ⁸ palaces, gardens, monasteries,
   Bokharans, sledges, kitchen gardens,
   merchants, small shacks, muzhiks,
   boulevards, towers, Cossacks,
¹² pharmacies, fashion shops,
   balconies, lions on the gates,
   and flocks of jackdaws on the crosses.
 
 

XL

   In this exhausting promenade
   an hour elapses, then another,
   and in a lane hard by St. Chariton's
 ⁴ the sleigh-coach at a gate before a house
   now stops. To an old aunt,
   for the fourth year ill with consumption,
   at present they have come.
 ⁸ The door is opened wide for them
   by a bespectacled gray Kalmuk,
   in torn caftan, a stocking in his hand.
   There meets them in the drawing room
¹² the cry of the princess
   on a divan prostrated. The old ladies,
   weeping, embrace, and exclamations pour:
 
 

XLI

   “Princess, mon ange!” “Pachette!” “Aline!”
   “Who would have thought?” “How long it's been!”
   “For how much time?” “Dear! Cousin!”
 ⁴ “Sit down – how queer it is!
   I'd swear the scene is from a novel!”
   “And this is my daughter Tatiana.”
   “Ah, Tanya! Come up here to me —
 ⁸ I seem to be delirious in my sleep.
   Coz, you remember Grandison?”
   “What, Grandison? Oh, Grandison!
   Why, yes, I do, I do. Well, where is he?”
¹² “In Moscow – dwelling by St. Simeon's;
   on Christmas Eve he called on me:
   got a son married recently.
 
 

XLII

   “As to the other... But we'll tell it all
   later, won't we? To all her kin
   straightway tomorrow we'll show Tanya.
 ⁴ Pity that paying visits is for me
   too much – can hardly drag my feet.
   But you are worn out from the journey;
   let's go and have a rest together...
 ⁸ Oh, I've no strength... my chest is tired...
   now even joy, not only woe,
   oppressive is to me. My dear,
   I am already good for nothing...
¹² When one starts getting old, life is so horrid.”
   And here, exhausted utterly,
   in tears, she broke into a coughing fit.
 
 

XLIII

   The invalid's kindness and gladness touch
   Tatiana; but in her
   new domicile she's ill at ease,
 ⁴ used as she is to her own chamber.
   Beneath a silken curtain,
   in a new bed sleep does not come to her,
   and the early peal of church bells,
 ⁸ forerunner of the morning tasks,
   arouses her from bed.
   Tanya sits down beside the window.
   The darkness thins; but she
¹² does not discern her fields:
   there is before her a strange yard,
   a stable, kitchen house, and fence.
 
 

XLIV

   And now, on rounds of family dinners
   Tanya they trundle daily to present
   to grandsires and to grandams
 ⁴ her abstract indolence.
   For kin come from afar
   there's everywhere a kind reception,
   and exclamations, and good cheer.
 ⁸ “How Tanya's grown! Such a short while
   it seems since I godmothered you!”
   “And since I bore you in my arms!”
   “And since I pulled you by the ears!”
¹² “And since I fed you gingerbread!”
   And the grandmothers keep repeating
   in chorus: “How our years do fly!”
 
 

XLV

   But one can see no change in them;
   in them all follows the old pattern:
   the spinster princess, Aunt Eléna,
 ⁴ has got the very same tulle mob;
   still cerused is Lukéria Lvóvna;
   the same lies tells Lyubóv Petróvna;
   Iván Petróvich is as stupid;
 ⁸ Semyón Petróvich as tightfisted;
   and Palagéya Nikolávna
   has the same friend, Monsieur Finemouche,
   and the same spitz, and the same husband —
¹² while he is still the sedulous clubman,
   is just as meek, is just as deaf,
   still eats and drinks enough for two.
 
 

XLVI

   Their daughters embrace Tanya.
   Moscow's young graces
   at first in silence
 ⁴ from head to foot survey Tatiana;
   find her somewhat bizarre,
   provincial, and affected,
   and somewhat pale and thin,
 ⁸ but on the whole not bad at all;
   then, to nature submitting, they
   befriend her, lead her to their rooms,
   kiss her, squeeze tenderly her hands,
¹² fluff up her curls after the fashion,
   and in their singsong tones impart
   the secrets of the heart, secrets of maidens,
 
 

XLVII

   conquests of others and their own,
   hopes, pranks, daydreams.
   The innocent talks flow,
 ⁴ embellished with slight calumny.
   Then, in requital for their patter,
   her heart's confession they
   sweetly request.
 ⁸ But Tanya in a kind of daze
   their speeches hears without response,
   understands nothing,
   and her heart's secret,
¹² fond treasure of both tears and bliss,
   she mutely guards meantime
   and shares with none.
 
 

XLVIII

   Tatiana wishes to make out
   the talks, the general conversation;
   but there engages everybody in the drawing room
 ⁴ such incoherent, common rot;
   all about them is so pale, neutral;
   they even slander dully.
   In this sterile aridity of speeches,
 ⁸ interrogations, talebearing, and news,
   not once in four-and-twenty hours does thought
   flash forth, even by chance, even at random;
   the languid mind won't smile,
¹² the heart even in jest won't quiver;
   and even some droll foolishness in you
   one will not meet with, hollow monde!
 
 

XLIX

   The “archival youths” in a crowd
   look priggishly at Tanya
   and about her among themselves
 ⁴ unfavorably speak.
   One melancholy coxcomb finds
   she is “ideal”
   and, leaning 'gainst a doorpost,
 ⁸ prepares an elegy for her.
   At a dull aunt's having met Tanya,
   once V[yazemski] sat down beside her
   and managed to engage her soul;
¹² and, near him having noticed her,
   an old man, straightening his wig,
   inquires about her.
 
 

L

   But where stormy Melpomene's
   protracted wail resounds,
   where she her spangled mantle waves
 ⁴ before the frigid crowd;
   where dozes quietly Thalia
   and hearkens not to friendly plaudits;
   where at Terpsichore alone
 ⁸ the young spectator marvels
   (as it was, too, in former years,
   in your time and in mine),
   toward her did not turn
¹² either jealous lorgnettes of ladies
   or spyglasses of modish connoisseurs
   from boxes or the rows of stalls.
 
 

LI

   To the Sobránie, too, they bring her:
   the crush there, the excitement, heat,
   the music's crash, the tapers' glare,
 ⁴ the flicker, whirl of rapid pairs,
   the light attires of belles,
   the galleries freaked with people,
   of marriageable girls the ample hemicycle,
 ⁸ at once strike all the senses.
   Here finished fops display
   their impudence, their waistcoats,
   and negligent lorgnettes.
¹² Hither hussars on leave
   haste to arrive, to thunder by,
   flash, captivate, and wing away.
 
 

LII

   The night has many charming stars,
   in Moscow there are many belles;
   but brighter in the airy blue
 ⁴ than all her skymates is the moon;
   but she, whom with my lyre
   disturb I dare not,
   like the majestic moon,
 ⁸ 'mid dames and maidens shines alone.
   With what celestial pride
   the earth she touches!
   With what voluptuousness her breast is filled!
¹² How languorous her wondrous gaze!...
   But 'tis enough, enough; do cease:
   to folly you have paid your due.
 
 

LIII

   Noise, laughter, scampering, bows,
   galope, mazurka, waltz... Meantime,
   between two aunts, beside a column,
 ⁴ noted by none,
   Tatiana looks and does not see,
   detests the agitation of the monde;
   she stifles here... she strains in fancy
 ⁸ toward campestral life,
   the country, the poor villagers,
   to that secluded nook
   where flows a limpid brooklet,
¹² toward her flowers, toward her novels,
   and to the gloom of linden avenues,
   thither where he used to appear to her
 
 

LIV

   Thus does her thought roam far away:
   high life and noisy ball are both forgotten,
   but meantime does not take his eyes off her
 ⁴ a certain imposing general.
   The aunts exchanged a wink and both
   as one nudged Tanya with their elbows,
   and each whispered to her:
 ⁸ “Look quickly to your left.”
   “My left? Where? What is there?”
   “Well, whatsoever there be, look....
   In that group, see? In front....
¹² There where you see those two in uniform....
   Now he has moved off... now he stands in profile.”
   “Who? That fat general?”
 
 

LV

   But here we shall congratulate
   my dear Tatiana on a conquest
   and turn our course aside,
 ⁴ lest I forget of whom I sing....
   And by the way, here are two words about it:
   “I sing a youthful pal
   and many eccentricities of his.
 ⁸ Bless my long labor,
   O you, Muse of the Epic!
   And having handed me a trusty staff,
   let me not wander aslant and askew.”
¹² Enough! The load come off my shoulders!
   To classicism I have paid my respects:
   though late, but there's an introduction.