CHAPTER I.
And it hurries to live and it hastens to feel.
Prince Vyazemsky1.
I.
My uncle is a man of honour, When in good earnest he fell ill, He won respect by his demeanour And found the role he best could fill.
Let others profit by his lesson, But, oh my G.o.d, what desolation To tend a sick man day and night And not to venture from his sight!
What shameful cunning to be cheerful With someone who is halfway dead, To prop up pillows by his head, To bring him medicine, looking tearful, To sigh a while inwardly you think: When will the devil let him sink?
2.
Reflecting thus, a youthful scapegrace, By lofty Zeus"s2 will the heir Of all his kinsfolk, in a post-chaise, Flew headlong through the dusty air.
Friends of Ruslan and of Lyudmila3 Let me acquaint you with this fellow, The hero of my novel, pray, Without preamble or delay: My friend Onegin was begotten By the Neva, where maybe you Originated, reader, too Or where your l.u.s.tre"s not forgotten: I liked to stroll there formerly, But now the North"s unsafe for me.4
3.
Having retired from n.o.ble service, His father lived on borrowed cash, He gave three b.a.l.l.s a year, impervious And lost all in a final crash.
Eugene was saved by fate"s decision: Madame took on his supervision, Then to Monsieur pa.s.sed on her trust.5 The child had charm, though boisterous.
Monsieur l"Abbe, a threadbare Frenchman, Made light of everything he taught For fear of getting Eugene fraught; Of stern morality no henchman, He"d mildly check a boyish lark And walked him in the Summer Park.6
4.
But when young Eugene reached the morrow Of adolescent turbulence, Season of hopes and tender sorrow, Monsieur was straightway driven hence.
Behold my Eugene"s liberation: With hair trimmed to the latest fashion, Dressed like a London dandy, he At last saw high society.
In French, which he"d by now perfected, He could express himself and write, Dance the mazurka, treading light And bow in manner unaffected.
What more? Society opined: Here was a youth with charm and mind.
5.
We"ve all learned through our education Some few things in some random way; Thank G.o.d, then, it"s no tribulation To put our knowledge on display.
Onegin was to many people (Who judged him by the strictest scruple) A pedant, yet an able lad.
He was by fortune talented At seeming always to be curious, At touching lightly on a thing, At looking wise and listening, When argument became too serious, And, with a sudden epigram, At setting ladies" smiles aflame.
6.
Custom no longer favours Latin: The truth, therefore, was plain enough a That he was able with a smattering To puzzle out an epigraph, To talk of Juvenal7 or set a Concluding vale to a letter; From the Aeneid8 a verse or two, Not without fault, he also knew.
He did not have the scholar"s temper In dusty chronicles to trace The story of the human race: But anecdotes he did remember Of bygone times, which he"d relay, From Romulus until this day.
7.
The lofty pa.s.sion not possessing, That sacrifices life to rhyme, He could, no matter how we pressed him, Not tell a trochee from an iamb, Homer,9 Theocritus10 he rubbished, But Adam Smith11 instead he relished, And was a great economist.
That is, he knew how states subsist, Acquire their wealth, and what they live on And why they can dispense with gold, When, in the land itself they hold The simple product12 ready given.
His father could not understand, And mortgaged, therefore, all his land.
8.
What Eugene knew of in addition I have no leisure to impart, But where he showed true erudition, More than in any other art, What from his early adolescence Had brought him bliss and painful lessons, What all day long would occupy His aching inactivity a This was the art of tender pa.s.sion, That Ovid13 sang and paid for dear, Ending his brilliant, wild career In banishment and deportation To far Moldavia"s steppes, where he Pined for his native Italy.
[9]14.
10.
How soon he learned the skill of feigning, Of seeming jealous, hiding hope, Inspiring faith and undermining, Appearing sombre and to mope, Now acting proud and now submissive, By turns attentive and dismissive!
How languid, when no word he said, How fiery, when he spoke, instead, In letters of the heart how casual!
Loving one thing exclusively, How self-forgetting he could be!
How rapid was his look and bashful, Tender and bold, while off and on With an obedient tear it shone.
11.
What talent for appearing novel, Causing with feigned despair alarm, Jesting to make the guileless marvel, Flattering to entertain and charm, Pouncing upon a moment"s weakness, Subduing innocence and meekness With pa.s.sion and intelligence, Expecting certain recompense, Begging, demanding declarations, Eavesdropping on the heart"s first sound, Chasing his love, and, in a bound, s.n.a.t.c.hing clandestine a.s.signations...
And later in tranquillity Giving her lessons privately!
12.
How soon he knew how to bedevil The heart of a professed coquette!
Or, to annihilate a rival, How bitingly he would beget A train of malice, spite and slander!
What snares he"d set to make him founder!
But you, blest husbands, you remained His friends and kept him entertained: The cunning spouse, a Faublas15 pupil, Was eager to become his man, So, too, the wary veteran, And the grand cuckold, without scruple, Forever satisfied with life, His dinner and adoring wife.
[13, 14].
15.