'Twas she who first within his breast

Poetic transport did infuse,

And thoughts of Olga first impressed

A mournful temper on his Muse.

Farewell! thou golden days of love!

'Twas then he loved the tangled grove

And solitude and calm delight,

The moon, the stars, and shining night—

The moon, the lamp of heaven above,

To whom we used to consecrate

A promenade in twilight late

With tears which secret sufferers love—

But now in her effulgence pale

A substitute for lamps we hail!

XXIII

Obedient she had ever been

And modest, cheerful as the morn,

As a poetic life serene,

Sweet as the kiss of lovers sworn.

Her eyes were of cerulean blue,

Her locks were of a golden hue,

Her movements, voice and figure slight,

All about Olga—to a light

Romance of love I pray refer,

You'll find her portrait there, I vouch;

I formerly admired her much

But finally grew bored by her.

But with her elder sister I

Must now my stanzas occupy.

XXIV

Tattiana was her appellation.

We are the first who such a name

In pages of a love narration

With such a perversity proclaim.

But wherefore not?—'Tis pleasant, nice,

Euphonious, though I know a spice

It carries of antiquity

And of the attic. Honestly,

We must admit but little taste

Doth in us or our names appear(26)

(I speak not of our poems here),

And education runs to waste,

Endowing us from out her store

With affectation,—nothing more.

[Note 26: The Russian annotator remarks: "The most euphonious Greek names, e.g. Agathon, Philotas, Theodora, Thekla, etc., are used amongst us by the lower classes only."]

XXV

And so Tattiana was her name,

Nor by her sister's brilliancy

Nor by her beauty she became

The cynosure of every eye.

Shy, silent did the maid appear

As in the timid forest deer,

Even beneath her parents' roof

Stood as estranged from all aloof,

Nearest and dearest knew not how

To fawn upon and love express;

A child devoid of childishness

To romp and play she ne'er would go:

Oft staring through the window pane

Would she in silence long remain.

XXVI

Contemplativeness, her delight,

E'en from her cradle's earliest dream,

Adorned with many a vision bright

Of rural life the sluggish stream;

Ne'er touched her fingers indolent

The needle nor, o'er framework bent,

Would she the canvas tight enrich

With gay design and silken stitch.

Desire to rule ye may observe

When the obedient doll in sport

An infant maiden doth exhort

Polite demeanour to preserve,

Gravely repeating to another

Recent instructions of its mother.

XXVII

But Tania ne'er displayed a passion

For dolls, e'en from her earliest years,

And gossip of the town and fashion

She ne'er repeated unto hers.

Strange unto her each childish game,

But when the winter season came

And dark and drear the evenings were,

Terrible tales she loved to hear.

And when for Olga nurse arrayed

In the broad meadow a gay rout,

All the young people round about,

At prisoner's base she never played.

Their noisy laugh her soul annoyed,

Their giddy sports she ne'er enjoyed.

XXVIII

She loved upon the balcony

To anticipate the break of day,

When on the pallid eastern sky

The starry beacons fade away,

The horizon luminous doth grow,

Morning's forerunners, breezes blow

And gradually day unfolds.

In winter, when Night longer holds

A hemisphere beneath her sway,

Longer the East inert reclines

Beneath the moon which dimly shines,

And calmly sleeps the hours away,

At the same hour she oped her eyes

And would by candlelight arise.

XXIX

Romances pleased her from the first,

Her all in all did constitute;

In love adventures she was versed,

Rousseau and Richardson to boot.

Not a bad fellow was her father