When over Litwa cometh plague and death,
The bard’s prophetic eye beholds, afraid.
If to the Wajdelote’s word be given faith,
On desert plains and churchyards, sayeth fame,
Stands visibly the pestilential maid,10
In white, upon her brow a wreath of flame,—
Her brow the trees of Bialowiez11 outbraves,—
And in her hand a blood-stained cloth she waves.
The castle guards in terror veil their eyes,
The peasants’ dogs, deep burrowing in the ground,
Scent death approaching, howl with fearful cries
The maid’s ill-boding step, o’er all is found;
O’er hamlets, castles, and rich towns she goes.
Oft as she waves the bloody cloth, no less
A palace changes to a wilderness;
Where treads her foot a recent grave up-grows.
O woeful sight! But yet a heavier doom
Foretold to Litwa from the German side,—
The shining helmet with the ostrich plume,
And the wide mantle with the black cross dyed.
For where that spectre’s fearful step has passed,
Nought is a hamlet’s ruin or a town,
But a whole country to the grave is cast
O thou to whom is Litwa’s spirit dear!
Come, on the graves of nations sit we down;
We’ll meditate, and sing, and shed the tear.
O native song! between the elder day,
Ark of the Covenant, and younger times,
Wherein their heroes’ swords the people lay,
Their flowers of thought and web of native rhymes.
Thou ark! no stroke can break thee or subdue,
While thine own people hold thee not debased.
O native song! thou art as guardian placed,
Defending memories of a nation’s word.
The Archangel’s wings are thine, his voice thine too,
And often wieldest thou Archangel’s sword.
The flame devoureth story’s pictured words,
And thieves with steel wide scatter treasure hoards.
But scatheless is the song the poet sings.
And should vile spirits still refuse to give
Sorrow and hope, whereby the song may live,
Upward she flieth and to ruins clings,
And thence relateth ancient histories.
The nightingale from burning dwellings flits,
But on the roof, a moment yet she sits;
When falls the roof she to the forest flies,
And from her laden breast o’er dying embers,
Sings a low dirge the passer-by remembers.
I heard the song! An ancient peasant swain,
When over bones his iron ploughshare rang,
Stood, and on flute of willow played a strain,
Prayers for the dead, or, with a rhymed lament,
Of you, great childless fathers, then he sang.
The echoes answered. I from far did hear,
And sorrow brought the sight and song more near;
In eyes and ears my spirit all was bent.
As on the judgment-day the dead past all
The Archangel’s trumpet from the tomb shall call,
So from the song the dead bones upward grew
To giant forms, from sleep of death awake,
Pillars and arches from their ruin anew,
And countless oars splashed in the desert lake;
And soon the castle-gates wide open seemed,
And princes’ crowns and warriors’ armour gleamed.
Now sing the bards, the dance the maidens weave;
I dreamed of marvels,—and awoke to grieve.
Forests and native hills are vanished,
And thought doth fail, on weary pinions fled,
And sinketh in a hidden stillness drear.
The lute is silent in my stiffened hand,
And ’mid the groan of comrades of my land,
The voices of the past I may not hear.
Still something of that youthful fire once mine
Smoulders within me, and at times its light
Wakens the soul and maketh memory bright.
Then memory, like a lamp of crystalline,
The pencil has with painted colours decked,
Although by dust bedimmed, with scars beflecked;
Place but within its heart a little light,
With freshness of its colours eyes are lured,
On palace walls yet gleaming fair and bright,
Lovely, though yet with dusty cloud obscured.
O could I but this fire of mine impart
To all my hearers’ breasts, the shapes upraise
Of those dead times, and reach the very heart
Of all my brothers with my burning lays!
But haply even in this passing hour,
Now when their native song their hearts can move,
The pulses of those hearts may beat more strong,
Their souls may feel the ancient pride and love;
And live one moment in such noble power,
As lived their forefathers their whole life long.
But why invoke the ages long gone by,
And for the present’s glory find no voice?
For in your midst a great man liveth nigh—
I sing of him. Ye, Litwini, rejoice!
Silent the old man was, and hearkened round,
If still the Germans will permit his song.
Around the hall there reigned a silence deep;
This warms all poets to a newer zeal.
Once more he raised his song, but other theme;
O’er freer cadences his voice did range.
More rarely he, and lighter, touched the strings,
Descending from the hymn to simple story.