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Anonymous translation
DARK clouds give not forth those specks in the sky | |
| That rise up, Azoff, o’er thy city so fair; | |
| But brethren three, and in secret they fly | |
| From their cruel captivity there. | |
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| The eldest they ride on their coursers fleet, | 5 |
| But the younger brother he has no steed, | |
| The roots and the stones wound his Cossack feet, | |
| And they redden the ground as they bleed. | |
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| To his horsemen brothers then thus spake he: | |
| “Brothers, my brothers, now list what I say; | 10 |
| Give rest to your coursers, and wait for me, | |
| Then to some Christian city direct your way.” | |
| |
| And the second horseman then heard his cry, | |
| And his heart was moved at his brother’s pain; | |
| But the first reproved him with a stern reply, | 15 |
| And said, “Dost thou yearn for thy bondage again? | |
| |
| “Shall we listen now to our brother’s word, | |
| Although the pursuers are on our track, | |
| Fierce bent to slay us with gun and with sword, | |
| Or to bear us with them to bondage back?” | 20 |
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| “If ye will not stay for me, my brethren twain, | |
| Then turn your fleet steeds to the right at least; | |
| And bury my corse in the open plain, | |
| Nor leave me the prey of the bird and the beast.” | |
| |
| But the second said, “Brother, that may not we, | 25 |
| Such a deed has never been heard of yet; | |
| Shall the thrust of a lance our farewell be? | |
| And our swords in our brother’s blood be wet?” | |
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| “Then brothers, since me ye refuse to slay, | |
| When ye reach the wood do this thing for me; | 30 |
| Cut off the thorn-branches, and strew on the way, | |
| And a guide to my wandering steps they ’ll be.” | |
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| The brothers speed fast to the forest gray, | |
| The second wails sadly as on they ride; | |
| And he scatters the thorn-branches all the way, | 35 |
| That they to his brother may serve as a guide. | |
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| They passed the thick forest, and on they went | |
| To the open track where no thorn-bushes grow; | |
| Then the lining red from his vest he rent, | |
| And scattered the fragments the path to show. | 40 |
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| When the younger brother the thorns had passed, | |
| He saw the red fragments all scattered there; | |
| He gathered them up and his tears fell fast, | |
| “Ah! not without cause are these fragments here. | |
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| “Now alas! alas! for my brethren twain! | 45 |
| For surely no more in the world are they! | |
| Their cruel pursuers have found them again, | |
| And me they passed in the thorns as I lay. | |
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| “My brothers with sword and gun they have slain, | |
| May the merciful God but show me where! | 50 |
| I ’ll dig their graves in the steppe’s pure plain, | |
| And I ’ll bury their Cossack bodies there.” | |
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| On his first day’s journey no bread he eats; | |
| The next without water to drink he has past; | |
| On the third the desert’s fleet wind he meets, | 55 |
| And his weary limbs bend to the furious blast. | |
| |
| “O, enough have I followed these horsemen fleet,” | |
| He said as he reached the Samar mountain high: | |
| “’T is time to give rest to my Cossack feet,” | |
| Then he laid him down by the mount to die. | 60 |
| |
| Then swiftly, swiftly the eagles flew down, | |
| And they fiercely stared in his dying eyes: | |
| “Now welcome guests are ye, ye eagles brown; | |
| O, fly to me quickly!” the Cossack cries. | |
| |
| “O eagles, pluck ye these eyes from my head, | 65 |
| When God’s fair world I no longer shall see!” | |
| The expiring Cossack, when thus he had said, | |
| His soul to the merciful God gave he. | |
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| Then the eagles flew down, and they plucked away | |
| His eyes from his head as he bade them do: | 70 |
| The small birds also came down to their prey, | |
| And the gray wolves gathered around him too. | |
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| They tore off the flesh from his yellow bones, | |
| They feasted high midst the thorns by the way; | |
| And with mournful howls, and with fierce low moans, | 75 |
| The dirge of the Cossack was sung that day. | |
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| Whence came the brown cuckoo that sat by his head, | |
| That sat by his head and sang piteously? | |
| As a sister bewails her brother dead, | |
| Or a mother her son, so wailed she! | 80 |
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| And the horsemen twain still sped on their way | |
| To a Christian town where they hoped for rest; | |
| But a heavy grief on their hearts now lay: | |
| “Ah, not without cause are our hearts opprest. | |
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| “Alas! and alas! for our younger brother! | 85 |
| For surely no more in the world is he; | |
| What, when we ’ve greeted our father and mother, | |
| And they ask of him, shall our answer be?” | |
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| The second thus spoke; then the elder said: | |
| “Say he served not the same lord as we; | 90 |
| ’T was night, and he slept when from chains we fled, | |
| We could not awake him with us to flee.” | |
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| The second then answered him, “Brother, nay, | |
| ’T would ill beseem us to say such a thing; | |
| If that which is false unto them we say, | 95 |
| Their prayers upon us will a dark doom bring.” | |
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| The brothers on to the Samar field ride. | |
| They stop to rest by the river Samar; | |
| They water their steeds at the river’s side, | |
| When down came the Moslem riding from far. | 100 |
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| The impious Mussulmans slew them there; | |
| They quartered their bodies, and over the plain | |
| Strewed their Cossack limbs; their heads on a spear | |
| They raised, and long mocked o’er the brethren twain. | |
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