No More Learning

(16)

[Note 16: Apropos of this somewhat ungallant sentiment, a Russian
scholiast remarks:--"The whole of this ironical stanza is but a
_refined eulogy_ of the excellent qualities of our countrywomen.
Thus Boileau, in the guise of invective, eulogizes Louis XIV.
Russian ladies unite in their persons great acquirements,
combined with amiability and strict morality; also a species of
Oriental charm which so much captivated Madame de Stael. " It will
occur to most that the apologist of the Russian fair "doth
protest too much. " The poet in all probability wrote the offending
stanza in a fit of Byronic "spleen," as he would most likely
himself have called it. Indeed, since Byron, poets of his school
seem to assume this virtue if they have it not, and we take their
utterances under its influence for what they are worth. ]

XXXVII

And you, my youthful damsels fair,
Whom latterly one often meets
Urging your droshkies swift as air
Along Saint Petersburg's paved streets,
From you too Eugene took to flight,
Abandoning insane delight,
And isolated from all men,
Yawning betook him to a pen.
He thought to write, but labour long
Inspired him with disgust and so
Nought from his pen did ever flow,
And thus he never fell among
That vicious set whom I don't blame--
Because a member I became.

XXXVIII

Once more to idleness consigned,
He felt the laudable desire
From mere vacuity of mind
The wit of others to acquire.
A case of books he doth obtain--
He reads at random, reads in vain.
This nonsense, that dishonest seems,
This wicked, that absurd he deems,
All are constrained and fetters bear,
Antiquity no pleasure gave,
The moderns of the ancients rave--
Books he abandoned like the fair,
His book-shelf instantly doth drape
With taffety instead of crape.

XXXIX

Having abjured the haunts of men,
Like him renouncing vanity,
His friendship I acquired just then;
His character attracted me.
An innate love of meditation,
Original imagination,
And cool sagacious mind he had:
I was incensed and he was sad.
Both were of passion satiate
And both of dull existence tired,
Extinct the flame which once had fired;
Both were expectant of the hate
With which blind Fortune oft betrays
The very morning of our days.

XL

He who hath lived and living, thinks,
Must e'en despise his kind at last;
He who hath suffered ofttimes shrinks
From shades of the relentless past.
No fond illusions live to soothe,
But memory like a serpent's tooth
With late repentance gnaws and stings.
All this in many cases brings
A charm with it in conversation.
Oneguine's speeches I abhorred
At first, but soon became inured
To the sarcastic observation,
To witticisms and taunts half-vicious
And gloomy epigrams malicious.

XLI

How oft, when on a summer night
Transparent o'er the Neva beamed
The firmament in mellow light,
And when the watery mirror gleamed
No more with pale Diana's rays,(17)
We called to mind our youthful days--
The days of love and of romance!
Then would we muse as in a trance,
Impressionable for an hour,
And breathe the balmy breath of night;
And like the prisoner's our delight
Who for the greenwood quits his tower,
As on the rapid wings of thought
The early days of life we sought.

[Note 17: The midsummer nights in the latitude of St. Petersburg
are a prolonged twilight. ]

XLII

Absorbed in melancholy mood
And o'er the granite coping bent,
Oneguine meditative stood,
E'en as the poet says he leant. (18)
'Tis silent all! Alone the cries
Of the night sentinels arise
And from the Millionaya afar(19)
The sudden rattling of a car.
Lo! on the sleeping river borne,
A boat with splashing oar floats by,
And now we hear delightedly
A jolly song and distant horn;
But sweeter in a midnight dream
Torquato Tasso's strains I deem.

[Note 18: Refers to Mouravieff's "Goddess of the Neva. " At St.
Petersburg the banks of the Neva are lined throughout with
splendid granite quays. ]

[Note 19:
A street running parallel to the Neva, and leading from
the Winter Palace to the Summer Palace and Garden.