Classic Poem

EPILOGUE

What year it was, — you figure out!
What land it was, — you guess yourself!
Upon a level country road
Were gathered seven muzhiks:
They all had masters whom they served
I' the Government of Strained-too-hard,
The county called Enduring-much,
The district Fallowlandedness,
In villages hard by:
In Patchedupville and Raggedtown,
In Emptyville and Freezingtown,
In Burnedupville, and Hungerville,
And in Cropfailingthorpe;
They met and quarrelled straight away:
" Who lives in Russia happily
And to his heart's content? "

Roman declared — " The landowner, "
Demyan declared — " The bureaucrat, "
Luka declared — " The priest. "
" The merchant with his goodly paunch, "
The Gubin brothers both declared,
Ivan and Mitrodor.
But old Pakhom looked gloomily
Upon the ground, and said at last:
" The gentleman of noble birth,
The minister of the Emperor, "
While Prov declared: " The Tsar. " — —

Muzhiks are stubborn like the ox:
Let any nonsense fill their heads,
You cannot pound it out of them,
Each one sticks to his mind.
They started such a loud dispute
That all the passers-by averred
They must have found a treasure-trove,
The fuss is — to divide.

That forenoon each had left his house,
On business each had sallied out:
One to the blacksmith's shop was bound,
One to the town Ivankovo
To call the priest Prokopius,
His baby to baptise.
Pakhom was taking honeycombs
To market in Velikoi,
And both the brothers Gubin had
With bridle started out to catch
The wild horse of the herd.
'T were better that they long ago
Had gone each one where business called,
Yet they together keep!
They walk as if there were grey wolves
Behind them, chasing after them, —
The farther, quicker still;
They walk, they brawl unceasingly;
They cry and do not come to sense,
But time waits not for them.
They quarrelled on, they did not see
The sun was red, was sinking fast, —
The evening had set in.
In faith, they would have walked all night,
They would have walked not knowing where,
If pockmarked old Durandikha
Had not addressed them, meeting them,
And spoken to them: " Gentlemen!
As night has come upon you, where
Do you intend to go? " — —

The old witch asked, then laughed aloud;
She struck her gelding with a whip,
And galloped out of sight.
Where were they? As they gazed around,
They did not know themselves;
They stood, they paused, they drooped their heads, — —
'T was night-time long ago,
The stars were twinkling way above
Upon the vaulted sky.
The moon swam out, the shadows dark
Stopped further headlong gait.
O shadows, shadows black and thick!
Who is there that you will not catch?
Of whom will you not get ahead?
And yet there 's no one, shadows black,
Can seize you and embrace!

Into the wood and down the road
Pakhom looked round him silently;
He looked, he pondered in his mind,
And then at last he said:

" The wood spirit has played on us
A pretty joke to-night!
Indeed we must have surely tramped
Some thirty versts at least;
And, as for walking home again, —
We 're tired, we should peter out.
Sit down — there 's nothing to be done —
Let 's rest till break of day! " — —
Then blaming loud the wood spirit,
Beside the road, right in the wood,
The peasants sat them down.
They made a fire, each did his part,
And two of them for vodka went,
The while the others to the wood
Repaired to make a drinking cup
Of bark stripped from the birch.
The vodka came in proper time;
There also somehow came some food, —
A feast for the muzhiks!
Three glasses each man had to drink;
They ate, — they quarrelled once again:
" Who lives in Russia happily
And to his heart's content? "
Roman cried out: " The landowner, "
Demyan cried out: " The bureaucrat, "
Luka cried out: " The priest " ;
" The merchant with his goodly paunch, " —
The Gubin brothers both cried out,
Ivan and Mitrodor.
Pakhom cried out: " His Excellence,
The gentleman of noble birth,
The minister of the Emperor, "
And Prov cried out: " The Tsar! "

Thus worse than ever brawled again
The quarrelsome muzhiks;
They cursed, they called each other names,
Till soon enough they came to blows,
And grabbed each other's hair.
Look! as each one has grabbed the next,
Roman is hitting at Pakhom,
Demyan hits at Luka,
And both the brothers Gubin hit
At Prov — while each one yells.

The far-resounding echo woke,
And rolling wandered on and on,
And louder cried from side to side,
As if to tease, to imitate,
The obstinate muzhiks.
" The Tsar! " it spoke to the right of them,
But to the left the answer came:
" The priest! The priest! The priest! "
Then all the wood was full of fright:
The very birds that flit about,
The very beasts, the swift-footed,
The very crawling, creeping things, —
'T was groan and roar and bawl.

The grey-haired rabbit, first of all,
From out the bush jumped suddenly
And looked around distractedly, —
He jumped and disappeared.
The youthful jackdaws perched aloft
Upon a birch-tree standing near
Set up a piteous squeak.
And in the neighbouring peewit's home
The baby from its mother's nest
Was scared and tumbled out.
The little peewit chirped and wept:
Where is her birdie gone?
The old and feeble cuckoo woke,
Awoke and sat there wondering
If she should cuckoo now;
Ten times, at least, she made a start,
But every time she lost the beat,
And had to start again — —
You cuckoo, cuckoo, dear old bird!
As soon as wheat is in the ear
You 'll choke yourself with wheaten ears,
You 'll cuckoo then no more.
Next, seven horncoots from all sides
Have gathered to enjoy the fight, —
They peer from seven trees:
These midnight ones are laughing loud;
Their large round eyes of yellow hue
Are burning just like fourteen lights
Of pure and virgin wax.
The raven, bird of common-sense,

Is here and sitting on a tree
Beside the burning fire;
He sits and to the devil prays
That they may somehow pound to death
At least one of the lot.
The cow, that with her bell had strayed
Away that evening from the herd,
Approached, attracted by the sound
Of human voices' tones.
She slowly walked up to the fire,
She stared at the muzhiks.
She listened to their foolish talk,
And then began with all her might
To low, to low, to low.

The silly cow is lowing loud,
The youthful jackdaws squeak and pipe,
The seven muzhiks are boisterous, —
The echo seconds all.
The echo has but this desire:
To tease an honest man, to scare
A woman or a child.
No one has ever seen it yet,
But all have heard it more than once:
Without a body — yet it lives,
Without a tongue — it cries.

The owl, a Moscow princess once,
Is flitting here from side to side;
She flies above the peasants' heads,
Or with her wings sweeps o'er the ground
Or o'er the bush nearby.

The fox himself, of crafty mind,
With womanish curiosity
Crept close to the muzhiks.
He listened, listened carefully,

And went away at last convinced —
" The Deuce can't make it out " ;
The brawlers hardly knew themselves, —
They had forgotten by that time
The cause of all the row.

They hit each other lustily,
Came to their senses finally, —
Agreed to strike no more.
They drank some water from the pool,
They washed themselves, refreshed themselves,
And sleepiness set in.