Chapter V (1)

Unto Kiev went a kobzar,
Sat him down to rest him;
And his escort was well burdened
With a pile of baskets.
For a little child was escort.
Now he drops to slumber.
At that moment the old kobzar
Sings a song of Jesus.
All who pass, come up and offer
One, a roll; one, money
To the old man and the children
Come to the young escort.
All the beauties look and marvel
When they see him ragged:
“See what wondrous hair fate gave him,
But it gave no fortune!”
Then along the road to Kiev
Comes a coach resplendent,
In the coach there is a lady
With her lord and family.
See, it stopped beside the beggars
And the dust soon settles.
Ivas ran up. Through the window
A soft hand has beckoned.
Then the lady looks at Ivas
And she gives him money.
The man looked--but turned so quickly--
For he recognized him,
Recognized the black eyes sparkling
And the black hair also,
Knew his son stood there before him
And he would not take him.
For his name the lady asked him.
“Ivas”--“That is pretty!”
Then the coach moved on and Ivas
In the dust was hidden.
They picked up the things they’d gathered,
Stood up, both poor devils,
Made their prayers at sunset hour,
Went along the highway.

[1] The kalyna, Viburnum opulus, is used extensively to mark graves and memorials in Ukraine.

[2] Brovary is on the boundary separating Muscovy from Ukraine.

THE HAYDAMAKI

The _Haydamaki_ is the longest of all the poems of Shevchenko and the most striking historical epic in Ukrainian literature. It describes the bloody revolt of the Koliishchina which broke out under the leadership of Maksim Zaliznyak and Gonta in 1768 and culminated in the massacre of the Poles at Uman. It was the last and one of the most terrible convulsions that shook Ukraine in its relations with Poland.

Shevchenko lays great stress upon the murder of the sexton which actually took place in 1766 and throughout the poem there are similar cases where he has changed the historical course of events for a better artistic effect but this is common to all epic poems.

The story is briefly this: a group of Polish szlachta attack a Jew and to save himself he tells them stories of the wealth of the Orthodox sexton in Vilshany. They go there and torture him and he dies under their ministrations. In the meanwhile his daughter Oksana, who loves the poor orphan Yarema, comes to the aid of her father and is carried off. Yarema, knowing nothing of the fate of his beloved, goes to seek his fortune at the Sich. He joins the forces of Zaliznyak and his fury is redoubled when he learns of the fate of his beloved. The Haydamaki with the aid of the Zaporozhians rise in revolt. For his desperate and ferocious bravery, Yarema receives the name Halayda, “the homeless one.” He succeeds in rescuing his beloved from a tower where the Haydamaki are besieging her captors and finally takes to a convent and returns to marry her. The Haydamaki continue their course and capture Uman, and savagely destroy their foes.

The poem is a true expression of the wild and merciless character of these peasant revolts against the hardships and oppressions inflicted upon them by brutal and careless masters. Shevchenko could feel this popular frenzy and describe it but he was not himself primarily a soldier and the finest parts of the poem are the lyrical descriptions of Ukrainian nature and the pictures of Ukrainian peasant life, even under the utmost hardships. He was too humane and cultured to enter fully into the wild emotions of the revolting people and to revel in the details of the battles. We could not imagine him enjoying the society of the atamans and hetmans of the past whom he consistently tried to applaud.

Rather he was deeply moved by their successes and failures. His heart was in the glorious past and the terrible present but it is of the latter that he sings the most sweetly, as he pleads also for the development of a new and better Ukraine. Yet this does not make him any the less rebellious that his people have been overthrown and are now in poverty and misery. It does not make him any milder to their oppressors. The _Haydamaki_ is his last great outburst of hatred against the Poles and really it completes the cycle of the _Kobzar_ which aims to picture Ukraine in the past and present through the Romantic tradition.

We include here the poet’s preliminary description of himself and of Ukraine.

+The Haydamaki--Prelude+

All things ever come, ever pass, without ending ...
Oh! whence are they coming? And whither they go?
The fool and the wise man know naught of the future.
Each lives and each dies.... One plant bursts into bloom,
Another has faded, has faded forever ...
The winds spread abroad all the yellowing leaves,
The sun still arises, as in the past ages,
The stars are as bright as they were in the past,
And so will they be.... Come thou, moon, with thy white face,
Come out to make merry across the blue sky,
Come out to admire the stream and the fountain,
The infinite sea; thou still dost shine on
As o’er ancient Babylon and its fair gardens,
So over the fate that will call to our sons.

Eternal and endless!... I love to hold converse
With thee just as if thou wert brother or sister,
And sing to thee tales thou hast whispered to me.
Oh! teach me once more how to deal with my burden!
I am not alone, and no orphan am I;
For I have my children, what fate will they suffer?
To bury them with me? My soul is alive!
Perhaps it will find that life there is less bitter,
If some one repeats all those bitter sweet words
Which it has so generously poured out with weeping
And which it so humbly has sobbed o’er their cradles.
No, I will not hide them, my soul is alive!
As heaven is blue and it has no fixed limit,
The soul also has no beginning or ending.
And what will it be? Not mere words of deceit.
Oh! let some one cite them again in this world,--
The unknown dread always to pass to the future.
So speak up, my maidens, for you need to speak!
It loved you, my maidens, the world’s pretty flowers,
And it loved without ceasing to sing of your fate.
Until it is sunrise, feast on, all my children,
And I shall think how I can find you a host.

Sons of mine, O haydamaki,
Broad’s the world, and freedom,
Sons of mine, go out to revel
And to try your fate!
Sons of mine, who still are youthful,
Children still untutored!
Who in all the world will greet you,
If you have no mother?
Sons of mine! My little eaglets!
Fly to Ukraina!
Though the evil spreads around you,
Still you’re not ’mid strangers.
There a soul sincere will meet you,
’Twill not let you perish.
There, O there ... ’tis hard, my children!
When they let you in a cabin,
They will meet you, ridicule you,--
Those, you know, are people;
They are learned, reading, cultured,
And the sun they censure,
“For it rises where it shouldn’t,
Shineth incorrectly.
It should change its stupid doings.”
What can you do with them?
You must listen; perhaps truly
The sun never rises
As in books the learned read it ...
Surely they are clever.
But what will they say then of you?
Yes, I know your glory.
They know how to scoff and mock you,
Hurl you ’neath the benches.
--“Let them stay there,”--they will answer,
“Till the father rises
And will tell us in our language
Of his famous hetmans,
Or the fool will sing unto us
In dead words that bore us
And present some old Yarema
In his sandals. Fool! They beat him
But they taught him nothing.
Of the Kozaks, of the hetmans,
Lofty tombs are with us--
Nothing else remains among us,
And these too they ruin.
And he wishes us to hearken
To the elders chanting.
Vain the labor, O sir brother!
If you wish for money,
You will sing what they desire!
Sing about Matyosha
Or Parasha, who’s our pleasure,
Sultan, spurs, and parquet.
There is glory! But he’s singing
‘The blue sea is playing.’
And he’s weeping, and your hearers
In their peasant costumes
Weep with you.” ’Tis true, O wise man!
Thank you for the counsel!
Warm’s the furcoat, but I’m sorry
That it doesn’t fit me.
And your wise words are embroidered
With a lie accursed.
Pardon me--shout for your pleasure,
I will still not hearken,
Will not call you to my circle;
You are wise, good people,
I’m a fool and unattended
In my little cabin
I will sing and sob unceasing
Like a child unhappy.
I will sing; the blue sea’s playing,
And the wind is blowing,
Black’s the steppe and with the breezes
Speaks the tomb forsaken.
I will sing--and then there opens
Wide that tomb so spacious.
To the sea the Zaporozhtsy
The broad steppes all cover.
Atamans on swift black horses
With their banners waving
Dash ahead; the thundering rapids
’Mid the reeds all hidden
Howl and groan and rage in fury
And their roar strikes terror.
Yes, I hearken and I worry
And I ask the elders:
“Why are you so sad, my fathers?”
“Son, it is not cheerful,
For the Dniper’s angry at us;
Ukraina’s weeping.”
I weep too. That selfsame hour
In their shining squadrons
Atamans set out a-marching,
Captains with their nobles,
And the hetmans, gold-attired;
To my humble cabin
They have come, they sit around me
And of Ukraina
They will speak and tell me stories,
How the Sich was founded,
How the Kozaks boldly traversed
Rapids, rafting downwards,
How they revelled on the blue sea,
Dashed into Skutari,
How they lit their pipes beloved
At the Polish fires;
Then came back to Ukraina,
How they nobly feasted ...
“Play, kobzar! Pour out, O tapster!--
Let the feast continue!
Minstrel, sing!” and all the Kozaks--
As Hortitsa’s bending--
Leap erect and never stopping
Start their joyous dances.
Pitchers come and pass around them,
Till they all are empty.
“Revel, sir, throw off your zhupan,
Revel, wind, a-blowing!
Play, kobzar! Pour out, O tapster,
Till our fortune cometh!”
Young and old, the Kozak heroes
Dance the native dances.
“Fine, O children; good, O children!
We will be the masters!”
Atamans at the rich banquet
Act as in the council.
They are walking, are conversing,
But the noble heroes
Feel the spell and join the others
Though their legs are aging.
And I marvel, I am looking,
Smiling, while I’m weeping,--
I marvel, I’m smiling, I’m wiping my eyelids--
I’m not all alone, for I live with those men!
In my little cabin as on the steppes boundless,
The Kozaks are sporting and singing their pride;
In my little cabin, the blue sea is playing,
The tomb sadly sobs, while the poplar is rustling,
The maiden is singing, Hritsa, very softly,
I’m not all alone! I can live with those men!
These are all my blessings, money,
These are all my glory,
And for counsel I will thank you,
For the counsel evil!
Stay with me, while I am living,
O dead words that bore you,
To pour out my tears and sorrow.
Comrades, now farewell!
I must go and speed my children
On a distant journey.
Let them go--they may be meeting
Some revered old Kozak,
Who will greet my little children
With his aged weeping.
That suffices. I will tell you,
Lord of lords it makes me.
So I’m sitting at the table,
Singing, meditating;
Whom to ask? Who is the leader?
Outdoors it grows lighter.
Fades the moon, the sun is blazing,
And the boys are rising,
They have prayed, have donned their clothing,
They now stand around me.
Sadly, sadly, just as orphans,
They have bowed in silence;
“Bless us, father,”--so they beg me,
“While we have the power,
Bless us that we find our future
In the wide expanses.”
--Keep on waiting. Life’s no cabin,
You are little children,
Foolish too. For who will lead you
As his gallant comrades?
Who will lead you? And I suffer,
Suffer with you near me!
I have fed you, have caressed you,
You have grown a little.
Now be people; there you’ll notice
All is clearly written.
Pardon me that I learned nothing,
For you beat me roundly,
Beat me well and much you’ve taught me
Of a certain order.
_Tma_ and _mna_ I know, but _oksiyu_
I cannot explain it.
What will men remark? My children,
We will go and ask them.
I have now an aged father
(Kin I have none living)
He will give me counsel with you,
For he in his wisdom
Knows how hard it is to wander
As a homeless orphan;
And he is a noble spirit,
Kozak through and through.
He is not ashamed to utter
Words his mother taught him,
When she reared him in his cradle,
Trained him as a youngster;
He is not ashamed to utter
Tales of Ukraina
Which the blind old bards repeated,
Singing in the evening.
And he loves the old true legends,
Sings the Kozak glory,
Loves them. Come, my little children,
To his kindly counsel.
Had he years ago not met me
In the worst of seasons,
Long ago would I be buried
In a foreign country,
Buried and all men would scorn me.
“He was good for nothing.”
Hard it is to fight and conquer,
If you have no motive.
Times have changed, till dreams are useless.
Let us go, my children!
If he did not let me perish
In a foreign country,
So he will accept and greet you
Just as his own children,
And from him, with pious praying,
Start for Ukraina!

Greetings, father, in the cabin!
On your ancient threshold
Give a blessing to my children
For a distant journey.

TO THE ETERNAL MEMORY OF KOTLYAREVSKY

This is one of the earliest poems of Shevchenko and was apparently written soon after he had learned of the death of Ivan Kotlyarevsky which took place in 1838. Kotlyarevsky with his parody of the _Aeneid_ published in 1798 had commenced the modern Ukrainian literature in the vernacular. He had transformed Aeneas and his companions into typical exiled Ukrainian Kozaks and had used every opportunity to call back memories of the past. It was a frivolous but yet absolutely serious piece of work and it aroused an interest in Ukrainian history and manners that had been long forgotten. Kotlyarevsky followed his poem in after years with the first Ukrainian dramas of peasant life, _Natalka Poltavka_ and _Moskal Charyvnyk_. These two became popular and the young Shevchenko on receiving the news of the death of the poet poured out his lamentation that the one great Ukrainian poet had passed away. It is a sincere tribute to the founder of the literature from the man who was to be its greatest exponent. There is the same mixture of elements of nature and of history that the poet was to employ so often later and it marks that union of social and historical themes under the influence of which Shevchenko began his work.

+To the Eternal Memory of Kotlyarevsky+

Warm’s the sun, the breeze is blowing
From the field to valley,
O’er the water bend the willows
With the red kalyna.
In a bush all solitary
There’s a nest a-swaying.
Where’s the nightingale a-straying?
Ask it not, it knows not!
For the evil, it is absent.
It is gone and perished
For the good, their heart is pining.
Why did it not stay here?
So I look and think about it;
When the eve was coming
It would sing in the kalyna.
No one could ignore it:
For the rich who had good fortune
Like a loving mother,
Would steal up and look upon it,
Never pass, unseeing;
And the orphan who at dawning
Rose to go to labor,
Would awake and listen to it,
As if his dear parents
Were alive and talking to him,
And his heart beat gaily,
And the world seemed like an Easter,
People all were people;
Or the maiden seeking daily
For her lover’s coming,
Pines away just as an orphan,
Knows not where to seek him,
Goes to wander o’er the pathway,
Weeping ’mid the thicket,
Then the nightingale would warble,
Stop her bitter weeping.
She would listen and then smiling,
Walk through the dark thicket,
As if she spoke to her lover.
And the bird was singing.
So softly, so calmly, as if he were praying,
Until a foul villain came out to do harm
With knife in his boot-top--his steps echo dully,
They come and they stop; but the song’s to no purpose.
It cannot restrain the cruel heart of the villain.
He ruins his voice, but can teach nothing good.
Let him go on raging, until he shall perish,
Until the crow caws with hoarse voice at his death.
The vale will sleep; in the kalyna
The nightingale sleeps too.
The wind blows softly through the valley,
The echo passes in the grove.
The echo, like God’s voice, is fading,
The poor arise to go to work,
The cows come out into the thicket,
The maidens after water come,
The sun is shining--all seems happy!
The willow smiles--and all is good.
The villain weeps, the savage villain.
It was so once--now look and see:
Warm’s the sun, the breeze is blowing
From the field to valley,
O’er the water bend the willows
With the red kalyna.
In a bush all solitary
There’s a nest a-swaying.
Where’s the nightingale a-straying?
Ask it not; it knows not!

So recently, recently here, in Ukraina
The old Kotlyarevsky sang sweetly to us;
The poor man is silent, has left just as orphans
The mountains and sea, where he formerly dwelt,
Where he led his bands of outcasts,
Taking them to travel,
All is left, and all is saddened,
As Troy’s ancient ruins.
All is grieving--but his glory
Like the sun is shining,
For the kobzar dies not. Glory
Ever will proclaim him.
Father, you will reign forever,
While mankind is living.
While the sun shines in the heavens,
Men will not forget you.

O spirit most righteous! accept my poor tribute,
Accept it as stupid and yet as sincere!
Leave me not an orphan as you left the forest,
Fly to me and help me, if but for one moment,
And sing to me songs of my own dear Ukraine.

O grant that my soul may yet smile in its exile,
May smile even once, as it hears how you brought
The whole Kozak glory in words so appealing
Into the poor hut where an orphan did dwell.
Fly here, O gray eagle, for I am an orphan
Alone in the world, in a land that is strange;
I look at the sea which is deep and far spreading,
And seek to go over it--there is no boat!
I think of Aeneas, I think of my country,
I think and I weep, as a child that is grieving.
The waves come and roar and they break over there,
And perhaps I am dull and there’s naught that I notice,
Perhaps a bad fate on that side is a-weeping?
The orphan is mocked by all people he meets!
Let them keep on mocking, for there the sea’s playing,
For there is the moon, and the sun brighter shines,
The grave with the wind on the steppe is conversing;
Were I with them there, I’d be no more alone.

O spirit most righteous! accept my poor tribute,
Accept it as stupid and yet as sincere!
Leave me not an orphan as you left the forest,
Fly to me and help me, if but for one moment,
And sing to me songs of my own dear Ukraine!

+Dumka+

Water flows into the blue sea,
But it never leaves it.
A young Kozak seeks his fortune,
Seeks, but does not find it.
He has gone where chance has beckoned,
Where the sea is playing,
And his Kozak heart is playing,
But his thoughts arouse him:
“Where have you not gone, a stranger?
To what hands entrusting
Father and your aged mother
And your smiling sweetheart?
People there are not your family,
Life with them is very hard.
With them there you cannot weep,
Cannot freely talk.”
Far from home the Kozak’s sitting,
While the sea is playing,
Thinking, he will find good fortune
But he meets with sorrow.
And the cranes hie homeward swiftly
In their ordered row.
Weeps the Kozak,--on life’s pathway
Piercing thorns have grown.

HAMALIYA

During the early part of the seventeenth century, the Zaporozhian Kozaks, especially under the ataman Peter Sahaydachny, made many raids into the Black Sea and there was hardly a single city of importance, even including Constantinople itself, which was not the victim of their attacks. They showed to the full the weakness of the shore defences of the Ottoman Empire and the defects of its navy. In their small boats, hastily constructed below the rapids of the Dniper, they dared to put to sea in the middle of the wildest storms that raged on the Black Sea and their courage and seamanship stood them in good stead against the superior arms and inferior morale of their enemies.

This poem seems to be an independent poetical creation of Shevchenko to bring out this period of Kozak history and to picture the naval exploits of the Zaporozhians. It is in a way a continuation and amplification of the poem _Ivan Pidkova_ but it presents a rounded picture in concise form of one of these expeditions. The name of the leader Hamaliya seems to have been created by the poet, and while the sequence of events described is true to history, the poem is not based on any specific historical event.

+Hamaliya+

“Oh, there’s no wind and there’s no wave now coming
From our own Ukraina.
Do they gather and prepare the Turk to battle?
We hear not in foreign prison.
Oh, blow, Oh blow, O wind, across the waters,
From Great Luh bring tidings.
Dry our tears and mute our clanging fetters,
Scatter all our sorrow!
Oh, play on, play on gaily, sparkling blue sea,
And beneath the sturdy barges
Which the Kozaks sail, scarcely can their caps be seen,
And they will come for us.
Oh, God, our God! E’en if they fail us,
Carry them from Ukraina,
We will hear the glory, all the Kozak glory,
We will hear and then we’ll perish!”

So sang the Kozaks in Skutari’s strong prison,
So sang the poor devils and loudly they wept,
They pour out their tears and they uttered their sorrow.
The Bosphorus trembled, for never before
Had it heard laments of Kozaks; with great groaning,
It roused itself mightily like a gray bull,
And roaring aloud, it sent out to the distance
A wave which resounded upon the blue sea.
The sea then reechoed the Bosphorus message
And bore it to Lyman, and Lyman repeated
Unto the Dnipro the sad voice of the wave.
Our mighty sire ’gan to laugh
Till from his mustache foam ran down.
“O brother Luh, don’t sleep but listen!
Khortitsa sister?”
Both replied,
Luh and Khortitsa, “Yes, I hear it.”
Dnipro was covered with the barges
And thus the Kozaks loudly sang:

“Over there the Turk is happy
In a well built palace.
Hay, Hay! Sea, play on,
Roar and break the cliffs.
We will go as guests!

“There the Turk has in his pockets
Talars, yes, and ducats,
We won’t rob his pockets,
We’ll tear them and burn them,
And we’ll free our brothers.

“There the Turk has janissaries,
A pasha’s their leader.
Hay, there, look out foemen,
We know not to waver!
That’s our strength and glory!”

So they sail; they’re gaily singing,
Winds hear all the waters;
In the van sails Hamaliya,
Guiding his boat wisely.
Hamaliya, you are anxious--
Then the sea is maddened,
He heeds not. They soon are hidden
By great waves like mountains.

All sleep in the harem. As if in high heaven
Skutari, Byzantium sleep! There’s a roar
Of terror from Bosphorus, groaning and tossing.
It seeks to awake the great city from sleep.
“Disturb it not, Bosphorus; you will be sorry!
I’ll break your white cliffs into powdery sand,
And hide them away.” Thus the blue sea was roaring.--
“Pretend you don’t know what fine guests I now bring
Unto the great Sultan.” When thus the sea threatened,
(For it loved the stedfast, the brave tufted Slavs)
The Bosphorus feared. So the Turk kept on sleeping
And in his rich harem the Sultan dozed on.
Alone in Skutari in prison the Kozaks,
Poor devils, sleep not. But for what do they wait?
They pray to their God in the midst of their fetters,
The waves pass along and reecho their song.

“O God, dear God of Ukraina,
Let us not die in foreign prison,
Us, free Kozaks, in fetters bound!
’Twill be a shame both here and there
To rise from out a foreign coffin
And to Thy righteous judgement come,
With our strong hands encased in iron
And there in fetters before all
Stand out as Kozaks!”
“Slash and kill!
Destroy the unbeliever foul!”
The cry’s outside. What can it be?
Hamaliya, your heart’s anxious.
Now Skutari’s raging!
“Slash and kill”--upon the ramparts
Thus shouts Hamaliya.

Skutari thunders with its cannon,
The foemen roar and rage apace;
The Kozaks charge without a waver,
The janissaries fall in heaps.
Hamaliya’s in Skutari,
Through the hell he wanders,
He, himself, breaks in the prison,
Shatters all the fetters.
“Fly, you birds, fly for your fortune
To the wide bazaar!”
Then the falcons spread their winglets,
Long time none had told them
Such fine words of Christian speech.
Then the night was startled;
The old mother had ne’er noticed
How the Kozaks paid.
Do not fear, but cast your glances
On the Kozak banquet.
It is dark as on a workday
But it is a banquet.
The bold boys with Hamaliya
Eat not leavings calmly
Without meat. “We want good lighting!”
To the clouds above them
With the many masted schooners
All Skutari’s burning.
Then Byzantium was startled,
Rubbed its sleepy eyelids,
And it crossed to bring assistance,
With its teeth a-gnashing.

Byzantium awakes and rages
And gains the bank with eager hands,
She reached it, screamed, and started back,
Grew mute before the bloody knives.
Skutari’s blazing like a hell;
Through the bazaar red blood is flowing
And turning red the Bosphorus;
Like black birds gathered in a grove,
The Kozaks fly without a care.
No one dares now to interfere,
The fire burns not these brave men.
They wreck the walls. The Kozaks bear
The gold and silver in their caps
And load with spoils the heavy boats.
Skutari blazes, work abates,
The brave boys meet, they gather round
And light their pipes from blazing fires.
Upon the boats--they lounge around
And cleave the mountain-high red waves.

They sail forth as from their homeland--
Just as if they’re playing,
That is like the Zaporozhtsy,
And they’re sailing, singing:
“Our otaman Hamaliya,
He’s a worthy leader,
He got boys and then he started
O’er the sea to revel--
O’er the sea to revel
And to gather glory
And release from Turkish prison
All his captive brothers.
Oh, then sailed up Hamaliya
Right into Skutari.
There he found the Zaporozhtsy
Facing bitter sentence.
Ho! then cried out Hamaliya,
‘Brothers, we’ll be living,
We’ll be living, wine be drinking,
Killing janissaries,
And we’ll deck our homes in velvet
And with costly kilims.’
So the Zaporozhtsy sallied
To sow well their meadows,
Sowed them well and reaped the harvest,
And they sang together:
‘Glory be to Hamaliya,
Through the world he’s famous--
Through the world he’s famous,
Through all Ukraina,
For he did not let his comrades
Die in foreign prison.’”

They sail and sing. Behind them there
Courageous Hamaliya’s sailing,
Just as an eagle guards its eaglets.
The wind blows from the Dardanelles,
Byzantium can find no rest,
For it still fears that once again
Chernets may light up Galata
Or the hetman Ivan Pidkova
May summon them to give a present.
So they sail. Behind the billows
Reddens all the sun.
And before them the kind waters
Murmur on and call.
Hamaliya, winds are blowing.
Here, O here, the sea is ours.
And they hid behind the billows--
And the rosy mountains.

TO OKSANA K ...

This was long supposed to be a complete poem written by Shevchenko in memory of his first love. Only in 1914 was it fully realized that it was the preface to an unfinished poem _Maryana Chernetsa_ (Maryana the Nun) and a considerable part of this poem was then published. Unfortunately Shevchenko did not complete it and efforts to determine the definite form of the poem have been in vain. The text as we have it opens with the love of a peasant girl Maryana for a poor boy Petrus. He leaves to seek his fortune. The girl promises to be true to him, although her mother is determined that she will marry a rich old man. The poem was then another in the series dealing with the poor girl condemned to marry someone whom she did not love, one of the favorite themes of Shevchenko.

+To Oksana K ...+

(_In memory of what was long ago_)

In the forest winds toss wildly
Branches and the poplars,
Break the oaks, and o’er the meadows
Sweep the tumbleweed.
So is fate: one man it crushes,
And another tosses,
Me it carries off; its purpose
It can never vision.
In what distant land am I destined to perish?
Where shall I lie down for my last endless sleep?
If there is no fortune and there is no joy,
There’s no one to feel. There’s no one to remember
Or say, e’en in jest, “Let him rest in his slumber,
It was his good fortune to perish so young.”
It’s true, O Oksana, O black-haired young stranger,
You do not remember that orphan of yore,
In his ragged coat, but who always was happy,
If he could but look at your beauty divine.
When you without speech, without words him instructed
To speak with his eyes, with his soul, with his heart,
With whom you have smiled and have wept and have sorrowed,
To whom you have sung the sad tale of Petrus?
You do not remember! Oksana! Oksana!
But I am still weeping, still sorrow till now.
I pour out my tears when I think of Maryana.
I look unto you and for you do I pray.
Remember, Oksana, O black-haired young stranger,
And deck your Maryana with blooms bright and gay,
And smile at Petrus, smile at him and be happy,
And be it a joke, yet remember the past.

THE DREAM

After Shevchenko’s return from Ukraine in 1843, he had changed his mind as to the vital needs of his country. Henceforth Poland takes a secondary place among the oppressors and his wrath is concentrated more on Russia and the Russian monarchy. It was difficult and dangerous to express this opinion in St. Petersburg and almost impossible to secure the publication of works which criticized the imperial regime. Yet Shevchenko did not hesitate and in a series of poems, partly mystical, partly ethical, he spoke out against the oppression of his native land.

The _Dream_ which he labels a comedy and to which he prefixes a passage from the Gospels is one of the bitterest of these attacks. He introduces it with a series of criticisms against various types of selfish and unpatriotic people and contrasts himself, shedding his own blood for his native land and weeping day and night, with these self-satisfied and self-righteous egotists. Then he passes to what purports to be a drunken dream for reality is so ghastly that he feels it necessary to be in an unusual state to dare to notice it.

First he visits Ukraine, the poor and helpless widow, who has been abandoned with her population to the mad whims of an autocratic despot and the feudal lords. The misery of the people is overwhelming beneath the exactions of the upper classes.

In his attempts to flee from the world he is carried to Siberia and here he is no more happy for the sound of the fettered prisoners working in the mines brings home to him again man’s inhumanity to man. He probably alludes to Ukrainian exiles but it is possible that he is citing the example of the Decembrists who suffered for their ideals and of the Polish revolutionists of 1831.

The capitals are the next places which he visits in his imagination and here he is completely disillusioned. He condemns the Muscovite slavery to the Tsar, the power of the Tsar to beat the highest members of his organization and their corresponding right to tyrannize over their subordinates, until the lowest of the people, the common man, is proud and happy to be beaten indirectly by the Tsar. It is another example of Shevchenko’s belief that the Moskals were incapable of appreciating liberty and that this sharply differentiated them from the people of Ukraine, the worthy sons of which were ready to sacrifice themselves for their ideals and for the truth.

Then when he sees the statue of Peter the Great erected by Catherine, the two monarchs who had ruined Ukraine, he turns to the misery and captivity of Polubotok and the Kozaks who were sent to St. Petersburg to build the capital and to perform other severe labor under which they died in great numbers between 1720 and 1725. Polubotok, the acting Hetman, was himself arrested and died in prison in 1724.

He sees the poverty of the people, even the Russians, the girls forced by poverty to enter upon prostitution, and he returns to the palace where he beholds the ridiculous character of the Tsar and the subservient manners even of the Imperial Family, who are unworthy to acquire such power and unable to hold it.

Then he wakes up with the renewed explanation that it was all a dream.

The poem is a violent attack upon the lack of truth and righteousness in the Russian dealings with Ukraine and the injustice which emanates from the throne. The attack upon the Imperial Family and in particular the Empress whom he called a dry mushroom so infuriated Alexander II that the poet was excluded from the general amnesty on his accession to the throne. It is the one of the series which emphasizes specially the political side of the Russian domination and it contains some of the most powerful denunciations of political oppression of all of Shevchenko’s work.

+The Dream+

_A Comedy_

_The Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it
seeth him not, neither knoweth him._

--St. John, 14, 17.

Each man’s fate is special to him,
And his own broad highway;
One man builds, another ruins,
Or with eye unsated
Looks a third beyond th’ horizon
Seeking to discover
What to seize and carry with him
To his grave as booty.
This man counts as lawful victims
Kinsmen in his cabin;
This one, crouching in the corner,
Aims to kill his brother;
While another, mild and sober,
With a pious feeling,
Stealthily as any kitten,
Sees when a misfortune
Strikes you and he slyly buries
Deadly knife within you.
Ask no mercy! He will hearken
To no wife or children.
And another, rich and gen’rous,
Builds the churches richly
And he loves so well his country
That he sorrows for it,
And he therefore most sincerely
Sheds its blood like water,
And the company all silent
With their eyes wide open
Like the lambs--say, “Let him do it!
It perhaps is needed!”

It is needed! For there is not
Any Lord in heaven!
You beneath the yoke are falling,
And you’re still believing
There is paradise above you?
No, there’s not! There’s not!
Vain’s your effort! Just think sanely,
All upon this planet,--
Be they tsars or be they beggars--
All are Adam’s children.
He ... and he ... what do I matter?
Not a bit, good people;
For I feast and have a banquet
Sundays and on work days.
Are you bored? Are you complaining?
Heavens, I don’t hear it.
Do not shout!--My blood I’m drinking,
Not the blood of others!

One time returning home unsteady
From a rich banquet late at night,
I thought upon this all my journey
Until I came unto my cabin.
At me the children do not shout,
A wife’s never scolding,--
’Tis calm as in heaven.
On all is the blessing of God--
In heart as in cabin.
So I could sleep calmly;
But when a drunken man once sleeps,
E’en though the guns roared loudly,
He would not stir a hair.
A dream, a dream unprecedented
Disturbed my slumbers.
A sober man would gladly tipple,
A miser Jew would give a penny
To have a glimpse of what I saw.
Yes, devils two.
I see as if it were an owl
A-flying over fields and banks and thickets,
And o’er deeply cut ravines,
And across the steppes unbounded,
And the forests.
And I fly after her unceasing.
I fly and bid the earth farewell.

“World, farewell! Farewell, O earth,
Cruel and unkind land!
All my bitter torments cruel
I’ll hide in the cloud.
Greetings, my dear Ukraina,
Poor and helpless widow!
I will fly to you and meet you,
From the cloud will speak,
In a quietly sad meeting
Seek advice from you.
I will fall on you at midnight
Like the dew of morning.
Let us talk and let us counsel
Till the sun arises,
Till your poor and little children
Stand upon the threshold.
Then farewell, my darling mother,
Poor and helpless widow!
Help your children, truth is living
At the throne of God!”
I fly and look. The dawn is breaking
And the sky grows brighter;
Nightingales in the dark forest
Greet the rising sun;
Softly blow the morning breezes,
Steppes and fields are clearer;
’Mid ravines above the waters
Willows seem far greener;
Flowers bend beneath the dewdrops;
Poplars just as sentinels
Stand apart and separated,
Talking with the meadows.
Everything upon the landscape
Is all wreathed in beauty,
Growing green, and being freshened
By the morning dewdrops;
Nature all is being freshened
And the sun is greeting ...
Nowhere is there a beginning,
And there is no ending.
No one can perfect its beauty,
No one can it ruin, ...
It is full and fair.... My spirit!
What do you know of it?
Oh my poor and wretched spirit,
Why do you weep vainly?
Why do you complain? For the ills you don’t notice?
When you cannot hear how the people do weep?
Then look and look well! For I now shall be flying
Above, far above the swift-moving blue clouds.
No rulers are there, nor are punishments known.
The people’s loud cries and their laughs are not heard.
But see, in that paradise which you are leaving,
They strip the patched clothing from off of the beggars,
They strip with the hides--for the poor must find shoes
For youthful young princes. They pummel the widow
To pay her poll taxes; they fetter her son,
Her son, her one son, the one child which she has,
Her hope--and they send him away to the army!
’Tis but for a while--but in mud and in filth
The boy soon is bloated,--from hunger he dies,
His mother is reaping the wheat at forced labor.
Do you see him? Eyes, my poor eyes!
Why do you have vision?
Why did you not dry to blindness,
Washed out by your weeping?
Here a ruined maiden wanders,
Wanders with her bastard.
Both her parents cast her off,
Strangers will not take her!...
All the elders flee her presence,
The young lord rejects her,
With the twentieth libation
Drinks away their souls.

Does God from behind the clouds
See our tears and sorrow?
He may see it but he helps us
Like the giant mountains
Of past ages which were flowing
With the blood of humans.
Oh my sad and troubled spirit,
You are sad and wretched.
Let us drink the bitter poison,
Lie down on the ice,
Let us send our thoughts to God,
Tell them to inquire
How much longer it is fated
Hangmen rule this world!
Fly across the world, my thought, my bitter sorrow!
Gather all the sorrows and the evils too
As your ancient comrades!--You were reared to know them,
You have loved them truly; and their heavy arms
Wrapped themselves around you. Pick them up and fly
And then scatter them throughout th’ entire sky.
Let them turn it black or red,
Let them fan the flames,
Let again the serpent’s venom
Fill the earth with corpses.
And without you I shall somehow
Bury all my heart
And shall seek that selfsame moment
Paradise apart.

Again I fly above the earth,
Again I say farewell to it.
It is hard to leave the mother
In her roofless cabin,
But it is still worse to notice
Both her tears and rags.
I fly, I fly, the wind is howling;
Before me is the snowbank white;
Around me are the woods and marshes,
The fog, the fog, a boundless waste.
No human sound, there is no trace
Of any human footstep here....

Ye foes, and ye who are not foes,
Farewell! I shall not come as guest!
Go on feasting, have your banquets,
I shall yet not notice--
All alone for evermore
I’ll rest in the snowbank--
But until you know for certain
That there is a country
Not bedrenched with tears and blood,
I will rest here gladly ...
I shall rest.... But yet I’m hearing
Sounds of fetters clanking
’Neath the earth.... And I will notice.
Oh, the wretched people!
Where are you? What are you doing?
What are you now seeking
’Neath the earth? No, no, perhaps,
I cannot be hidden
In the heavens! Why this torture?
Why these woes I feel?
Who has suffered ill from me?
Whose harsh arms have fettered
My poor soul within my body,
Have inflamed my heart
And my birdlike strength--
Have disturbed my thoughts?
For what,--I know not, but I suffer,
Bitterly I suffer.
And when I repent my evil?
When will be the end?
I don’t see, don’t know.

The wilderness has roused itself,
As from its last and narrow dwelling
For that dread final judgement day
When all the dead for truth arise.
These are not the dead, the murdered,
And not asking judgement,--
They are people, living people,
Stricken down in chains,
From deep holes the gold they’re fetching
To pour down the lusty throats
Of the greedy. They are convicts.
Why? Almighty God alone
Can reply.... Perhaps He also
Has not noticed this!
Here the branded convict stumbles
With his heavy fetters;
He, a tortured ugly bandit,
Grits his teeth in anger--
Tries to kill his lucky fellow
Who has suffered less!
And among them in their torture,
Wrapped in fetters heavy,
Is th’ almighty tsar of freedom
Branded with the selfsame mark!
In the prison torture quiet,
Weeping not or groaning;
Once your heart is warmed with blessing--
It will never cool.

But where are your thoughts, O ye flowers of roses?
Admired and bold, well beloved little children?
To whom did you give them, my friend, to whose hands?
Or are they forever sunk deep in your heart?
O brother, don’t hide them! No, spread them abroad!
They’ll gather and grow and go out in the world!

What is this trial, what will it be?
It is coming, for it’s chilly,--
Frost the mind awakens.

Again I fly. The earth grows darker.
My mind’s asleep. My heart is aching.
I look--the houses o’er the roadways,
The cities with their hundred churches
And in the cities like the cranes.
The Moskals formed in solid lines;
Well fed, in splendid boots arrayed,
And laden down with heavy chains,
They are drawn up; again I look;
Down in the valley like a pit,
The city glows as in a fire;
Above it hangs a heavy fog
Black as a cloud--To it I fly ...
A city without end.
But is it Turkish?
Or is it German?
Or yet it may belong to Moscow ...
Palaces and churches
And pot-bellied lords,
But not a single peasant cabin.
It has grown dark.... The fire’s blazing
And spreading all around,--
I was afraid.... “Hurrah! Hurrah!
Hurrah!”--they all did shout.
“Well, well, you fools! Where is your mind?
Why are you glad at this?
What are you burning?”--“Hey, khokhol!
He does not know parades.
We are parading! For He deigns
Himself to sport to-day!”
“But what is this amazing toy?”
“You see the palace there ...”
I push my way; a turncoat there,
(I thank you, he confessed!)
With all his gaudy uniform;
“Where did you come from, man?”
--“From Ukraina!”--“So that you
Do not know how to speak
Like people here?”--“Oh, yes,”--I say,--
“I do know how to speak,
I do not wish to.”--“What a crank!
I know the entrance here;
I serve within, and if you wish,
I’ll try to take you in
Into the palace. Only, see,
We are enlightened, friend,--
Don’t spare your cash for what you’ll get.”
“Be gone, you fool accursed!”
Once more I made a sudden change
And was invisible,
And so I boldly walked within.
My God, my only God!
It was a heaven! Parasites
Were there, all wreathed in gold!
And then He, tall and angry too
Strode out among the crowd.
Beside him came the empress too,
On whom his love did rest.
She seemed just like a dry mushroom,
So thin and long of leg,
And constantly she nods her head
To bring both good and woe.
“Is that a goddess, there, I see?
The devil take you now!
And I, a fool, who had not seen
This game a single time,
Believed your stupid, ignorant
Verse hucksters as they are.
O what a fool! And what a price!
I dared to trust as pledge
A Moskal’s word! Go on and read,
And see the faith they have!”
Like gods, the nobles are around,
In silver and in gold,
Like well-matured and aged boars
With muzzles and with fat.
Like them they shove, like them they push
To be the nearest ones
Unto the Persons; They may give
Or deign to offer fruit.
It may be small but yet it’s fine,
E’en though but half a pear,
If They distribute it.
They stood arranged in solid rows,
All quiet,--not a word--
A bell.--The Tsar then stammers out,
Likewise Her gracious self,
Just like a heron midst the birds,
She hops and struts about.
Long time the two walked back and forth
As pompous as two owls
And they conversed in muttered voice
(Afar I could not hear)
About their country, so it seems,
About the newest ropes,
About the very last parades.
And then the empress took
Her seat upon a little stool.
I look; the Tsar goes up
Unto the oldest man and then
He hits him in the face.
He slapped him and a younger man
Upon the belly struck.
Oh, what a shout! The victim struck
His junior on the back.
He chose another lesser man
And he some one below.
And so it went, till each in turn
Beyond the palace gate
Upon the streets kept up the game
Until they pummeled well
The still unbeaten Orthodox
And they began to yell
And cry; and how they all did roar.
“Our father revels, that is sure!
Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!”
I had to laugh, it was so good.
They even gave to me
The selfsame blessing. Ere the dawn
They all were sound asleep.

But here and there the Orthodox
Upon the corners groaned
And groaned and groaned and thanked the Lord
For all their father gave.
’Mid tears and laughter I set out
To look around the place.
Night was like day. And so I looked.
So many palaces
Above the quiet river stood.
Its bank was edged with stones
Throughout and so I stood and looked
Like a benighted fool.
The job was done with thoroughness
Amid the mud and slime.
It was a marvel. So much blood
Was shed of human kind--
Without a knife! And on that side
A fortress and a tower
Just like a needle overlong,--
’Twas wonderful to see,
And clocks were striking everywhere.
Then as I turn away--
A horse flies up and with its hoofs
It pounds a mighty rock.
He sits upon the unsaddled horse
In cloak of strange design,
Without a hat--his head is wreathed
As with a sort of leaf.
The horse rears up--and towards the stream
As if it would leap o’er
And he extends his lordly hand
As if he wished to seize
The whole wide world. Who is this man?
I read myself the words
That are engraven on the crag.
“The Second to the First.”
At first it seemed a title strange
But now I know the truth.
It is the first who crucified
Our own Ukraina;
The second stabbed with savage blow
The widow spent and poor.
Oh hangmen! Foes of human kind!
You both have had your fill,
You’ve stolen much! What did you take
Unto that world with you?
It was so hard, so very hard
For me when I did read
Ukraina’s sad history!
I stand and sink in heart....
And still it softly, softly sings
And yet so sadly too
That these were very monstrous deeds.

“From the ancient town of Glukhov
Have the troops departed
With their shovels in due order
And they sent me with them
As appointed hetman.
O our God of love and mercy!
O the tsar of evil!
Cursed tsar, and wicked ruler,
Viper never sated!
What have you done with the Kozaks?
You have filled the marshes
With their skeletons so noble!
You have built a city
On their dead and buried bodies!
And in loathesome prison
Me, a free man and a hetman,
You have killed with hunger
In my chains!... O tsar, O tsar!
God will never sever
You and me. It’s hard and painful
To hang o’er the Neva.
Ukraina is not near me
But it may have perished.
I would fly and look upon it
But God does not will it.
Mayhap Moscow’s burned the region
And has turned our Dnipro
To the blue sea! Has it opened
Lofty tombs, our glory?
It may be, but, Lord of mercy,
Pity us, dear Lord!”
All was still. I saw while looking
How a white cloud covers
The gray sky, and in those clouds
Like a beast that’s roaring.
It’s no cloud, a white bird settled
As a cloud descending
O’er the tsar, the cruel and evil,
And began to speak:

“We are fettered firmly with you,
Murderer and viper!
At the last great day of judgement
We will shelter God
From your always greedy eyes.
Us from Ukraina
You have driven, naked, hungry,
To the foreign snowbanks.
You have slain us and have taken
Our skins for your mantle.
You have sewed it with our sinews
And have clad your city
In new robes. Look and admire!
Palaces and churches.
Revel on, O savage hangman,
Cursed, ever cursed!”

So we flew and so we wandered.
Then the sun was risen,
And I stood and looked with horror
At the scenes occurring,
For the poor were now in motion,
Hurrying to labor,
And the Moskals at the crossroads
Were drawn up in order.
On the streets the girls were running
Homeward, not to labor.
They were sleepy, for their mothers
Sent them out to labor
All night long without a respite
And to earn a living.
And I stood, depressed and troubled,
Thinking and remarking,
How severe a task for mortals
Just to earn their living.

And the brotherhood decided
To join in the senate,
Sign its papers and to plunder
Father, yes, and brother.
And among them all the turncoats
Seek the way of fortune.
So they murder like the Moskals,
Laughing and tirading
At their fathers who neglected
To teach them as children
To speak German,[1] and at present
They exploit their sorrows.
Peacocks, peacocks! Mayhap father
Sold his last poor cow
To the Jews, before you knew well
The new Moscow language.
Ukraina! Ukraina!
These too are your children,
These are your fresh youthful flowers,
Spotted now with ink.
Deafened by the Moscow bleatings
In the German gardens.
Weep, O weep, my poor Ukraina,
As a childless widow!