Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17.djvu/21

1866.] I looked, and I exulted; yet I longed

For Nature's grander aspects, and I plied

The slender rod again; and then arose

Woods tall and wide, of odorous pine and fir,

And every noble tree that casts the leaf

In autumn. Paths that wound between their stems

Led through the solemn shade to twilight glens,

To thundering torrents and white waterfalls,

And edge of lonely lakes, and chasms between

The mountain-cliffs. Above the trees were seen

Gray pinnacles and walls of splintered rock.

But near the forest margin, in the vale,

Nestled a dwelling half embowered by trees,

Where, through the open window, shelves were seen

Filled with old volumes, and a glimpse was given

Of canvas, here and there along the walls,

On which the hands of mighty men of art

Had flung their fancies. On the portico

Old friends, with smiling faces and frank eyes,

Talked with each other: some had passed from life

Long since, yet dearly were remembered still.

My heart yearned toward them, and the quick, warm tears

Stood in my eyes. Forward I sprang to grasp

The hands that once so kindly met my own,—

I sprang, but met them not: the withering wind

Was there before me. Dwelling, field, and brook,

Dark wood, and flowery garden, and blue lake,

And beetling cliff, and noble human forms,

All, all had melted into that pale sea

Of billowy vapor rolling round my feet.

E are about to relate a story of mingled fact and fancy. The facts are borrowed from the Russian author, Petjerski; the fancy is our own. Our task will chiefly be to soften the outlines of incidents almost too sharp and rugged for literary use, to supply them with the necessary coloring and sentiment, and to give a coherent and proportioned shape to the irregular fragments of an old chronicle. We know something, from other sources, of the customs described; something of the character of the people from personal observation, and may therefore the more freely take such liberties as we choose with the rude, vigorous sketches of the Russian original. One who happens to have read the work of Villebois can easily comprehend the existence of a state of society, on the banks of the Volga, a hundred years ago,