Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 1.djvu/423

Rh there were no pauses or rests at the ends of the lines; and I could not make out any distinctly marked rhythm. The singers seemed to be constantly breaking in upon one another with slightly modulated variations of the same slow, melancholy air, and the effect produced was that of a rude fugue, or of a funeral chant, so arranged as to be sung like a round or catch by a hundred male voices, each independent of the others in time and melody, but all following a certain scheme of vocalization, and taking up by turns the same dreary, wailing theme. The words were as follows:

 Have pity on us, O our fathers! Don't forget the unwilling travelers, Don't forget the long-imprisoned. Feed us, O our fathers—help us! Feed and help the poor and needy! Have compassion, O our fathers! Have compassion, O our mothers! For the sake of Christ, have mercy On the prisoners—the shut-up ones! Behind walls of stone and gratings, Behind oaken doors and padlocks, Behind bars and locks of iron, We are held in close confinement. We have parted from our fathers, From our mothers; We from all our kin have parted, We are prisoners; Pity us, O our fathers!

If you can imagine these words, half sung, half chanted, slowly, in broken time and on a low key, by a hundred voices, to an accompaniment made by the jingling and clashing of chains, you will have a faint idea of the milosérdnaya, or exiles' begging song. Rude, artless, and inharmonious as the appeal for pity was, I had never in my life heard anything so mournful and depressing. It seemed to be the half-articulate expression of all the grief, the misery, and the despair that had been felt by generations