The Bakchesarian Fountain and Other Poems

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Poems by Alexander Pushkin and other authors
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Title: The Bakchesarian Fountain and Other Poems
Author: Alexander Pushkin and other authors
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0. START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE

BAKCHESARIAN FOUNTAIN ***
Produced by David Starner, Robert Connal
and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team.
THE BAKCHESARIAN FOUNTAIN.
BY
ALEXANDER POOSHKEEN.
AND OTHER POEMS, BY VARIOUS AUTHORS,
TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL RUSSIAN,
BY
WILLIAM D. LEWIS.
TO
MY RUSSIAN FRIENDS,
THE FOLLOWING EFFORT TO RENDER INTO THE
ENGLISH LANGUAGE A FAVOURITE POEM OF ONE OF
THEIR MOST ADMIRED BARDS, AND SOME SHORTER
PRODUCTIONS OF OTHER RUSSIAN POETS,
IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED,
AS A SMALL TESTIMONIAL OF GRATITUDE FOR THE
MANY KINDNESSES OF WHICH I WAS THE OBJECT IN
THEIR MOST HOSPITABLE COUNTRY, IN EARLY LIFE.
THE TRANSLATOR.
Philadelphia, July, 1849.
THE BAKCHESARIAN FOUNTAIN.

A TALE OF THE TAURIDE.
Mute sat Giray, with downcast eye,
As though some spell in sorrow
bound him,
His slavish courtiers thronging nigh,
In sad expectance
stood around him.
The lips of all had silence sealed,
Whilst, bent on
him, each look observant,
Saw grief's deep trace and passion fervent

Upon his gloomy brow revealed.
But the proud Khan his dark eye
raising,
And on the courtiers fiercely gazing,
Gave signal to them to
begone!
The chief, unwitnessed and alone,
Now yields him to his
bosom's smart,
Deeper upon his brow severe
Is traced the anguish
of his heart;
As full fraught clouds on mirrors clear
Reflected
terrible appear!
What fills that haughty soul with pain?
What thoughts such
madd'ning tumults cause?
With Russia plots he war again?
Would
he to Poland dictate laws?
Say, is the sword of vengeance glancing?

Does bold revolt claim nature's right?
Do realms oppressed alarm
excite?
Or sabres of fierce foes advancing?
Ah no! no more his
proud steed prancing
Beneath him guides the Khan to war,--
Such
thoughts his mind has banished far.
Has treason scaled the harem's wall,
Whose height might treason's
self appal,
And slavery's daughter fled his power,
To yield her to
the daring Giaour?
No! pining in his harem sadly,
No wife of his would act so madly;

To wish or think they scarcely dare;
By wretches, cold and heartless,
guarded,
Hope from each breast so long discarded;
Treason could
never enter there.
Their beauties unto none revealed,
They bloom
within the harem's towers,
As in a hot-house bloom the flowers

Which erst perfumed Arabia's field.

To them the days in sameness
dreary,
And months and years pass slow away,
In solitude, of life
grown weary,
Well pleased they see their charms decay.
Each day,
alas! the past resembling,
Time loiters through their halls and bowers;


In idleness, and fear, and trembling,
The captives pass their joyless
hours.
The youngest seek, indeed, reprieve
Their hearts in striving
to deceive
Into oblivion of distress,
By vain amusements, gorgeous
dress,
Or by the noise of living streams,
In soft translucency
meand'ring,
To lose their thoughts in fancy's dreams,
Through
shady groves together wand'ring.
But the vile eunuch too is there,

In his base duty ever zealous,
Escape is hopeless to the fair
From
ear so keen and eye so jealous.
He ruled the harem, order reigned

Eternal there; the trusted treasure
He watched with loyalty unfeigned,

His only law his chieftain's pleasure,
Which as the Koran he
maintained.
His soul love's gentle flame derides,
And like a statue
he abides
Hatred, contempt, reproaches, jests,
Nor prayers relax his
temper rigid,
Nor timid sighs from tender breasts,
To all alike the
wretch is frigid.
He knows how woman's sighs can melt,
Freeman
and bondman he had felt
Her art in days when he was younger;
Her
silent tear, her suppliant look,
Which once his heart confiding shook,

Now move not,--he believes no longer!
When, to relieve the noontide heat,
The captives go their limbs to
lave,
And in sequestered, cool retreat
Yield all their beauties to the
wave,
No stranger eye their charms may greet,
But their strict guard
is ever nigh,
Viewing with unimpassioned eye
These beauteous
daughters of delight;
He constant, even in gloom of night,
Through
the still harem cautious stealing,
Silent, o'er carpet-covered floors,

And gliding through half-opened doors,
From couch to couch his
pathway feeling,
With envious and unwearied care
Watching the
unsuspecting fair;
And