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Title: The Ancient Ballad [from The Malo Russian]
Author: George Borrow [
More Titles by Borrow]
From the wood a sound is gliding,
Vapours dense the plain are hiding,
How yon Dame her son is chiding.
"Son, away! nor longer tarry!
Would the Turks thee off would carry!"
"Ha; the Turkmen know and heed me;
Coursers good the Turkmen breed me."
From the wood a sound is gliding,
Vapours dense the plain are hiding,
Still that Dame her son is chiding:
"Hence, begone! nor longer tarry!
Would the Horde {1} thee off would carry!"
"Ha! the Horde has learnt to prize me;
"'Tis the Horde with gold supplies me."
Brings his horse his eldest sister,
And the next his arms, which glister,
Whilst the third, with childish prattle,
Cries, "when wilt return from battle?"
"Fill thy hand with sands, ray blossom!
Sow them on the rock's rude bosom,
Night and morning stroll to view them,
With thy briny tears bedew them,
And when they shall sprout in glory
I'll return me from the foray."
From the wood a sound is gliding,
Vapours dense the plain are hiding,
Cries the Dame in anxious measure:
"Stay, I'll wash thy head, my treasure!"
"Me shall wash the rains which splash me,
Me shall comb the thorns which gash me,
Me shall dry the winds which lash me."
FOOTNOTE
{1} The Tartar Horde,--generally known by the appellation of "The Golden," which, some centuries since, was the dreaded and terrible scourge of Southern Russia.
[The end]
George Borrow's poem: Ancient Ballad [from The Malo Russian]
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