Halek's Stories and Evensongs

Front matter

by

W. W.

B. ., . /

Preface

IF THE reader will take a map of the world and draw three lines, one from Venice to Danzig, another from Constantinople to the White Sea, and a third from the Erz Mountains, west of Prague, to Kamchatka, he will be able to form some idea of the vast stretch of territory affected by Slavonic civilization.

No confraternity of nations, not even the Anglo-Saxon, occupies so large a portion of the earth’s surface as the rapidly-increasing Slavonic brotherhood.

On this account alone, if for no other reason, any attempt to bring home to English readers something of the inner life of some of these peoples is worthy of attention. Bohemian literature, moreover, has several special claims upon English readers. In the first place more than once the royal families of England and Bohemia have been united. Then again the country to some extent in its configuration and the variety of its strata, still more in its plethora of coal, iron-stone, and other minerals has much in common with England. Bohemia has never broken entirely with the traditions of feudalism, and in the flourishing condition of its principalities and great estates, the richness of its woodland, the abundance of its game, its fine breed of horses, and the excellence of its beer, we seem to see a copy of old England, and are reminded that similar causes produce similar effects: not that this is exactly true of the last item, however, which is at once milder and of purer quality than our own. Lastly, the religious struggles of the Reformation were fought out in Bohemia much on the same lines as in England, and while we may proudly claim some spiritual affinity between our own Protestant martyrs and the victims of papal power in Prague, we are also reminded that in the national hero of Bohemia, John Hus, more than in any other of the great Protestant martyrs, were exhibited the most spotless purity of life, the most complete absence of self-seeking or worldly ambition, the most loyal devotion to duty, and the most simple and ready self-sacrifice in the cause of truth. The literature of a country which has produced the most perfect type of Christian piety which the world has yet seen, a man who of all others approximates most in his life and death to the originator of the Christian cult, merits something better than neglect at the hands of Christians steeped in the flimsy rhetoric of French triviality; and the latest production of a civilization which was of no mean order while England still revelled in barbarism, might occasionally be exchanged with advantage for the endless verbiage of our own school of novels or the edifying lucubrations of Emile Zola. Goethe, in a conversation with Eckermann, speaks with admiration of the simplicity and purity of the Bohemian writers, and since his time there has been a great reawakening of the national spirit, and the language which had sunk to be a despised dialect of the common people of the towns and the peasantry of the rural districts, now claims half of the University of Prague, has its seat in one of the finest theatres in Europe, and is once more the proud mouthpiece of art and science.

The writer, some of whose stories are here brought to the notice of the English reading public, was one of those who helped on the attainment of this proud result. Palacky and Jungmann aroused the interest of the people in their own history by publishing historical and antiquarian works in the vernacular. Cajetan Tyl is still remembered as a patriotic dramatist and writer of fiction, and Erben’s Slavonic folk-lore has a general interest, but none of the Bohemian writers has caught so speaking a likeness of the inner life of the Bohemian people as Viteslav Halek, no one is remembered with such enthusiastic affection by all classes, or strikes so responsive a chord in the feelings of high and low. Already throughout Bohemia societies have been formed for the reading of his works, although he has not been dead fifteen years, and when I lodged in Smichoff with an honest Bohemian stonemason and his wife, I found it difficult to keep their hands off my copy of his stories. The more cultivated classes admire him for the simplicity of his style, and even the Germans are constrained grudgingly to acknowledge his merits. A complete edition of his works has, indeed, been lately published in the original language edited by a writer, whom from his name (Ferdinand Schulz), I should judge to be a German.

These works consist of some half-dozen dramas drawn chiefly from Slavonic history. The first of these, Czarevic Alecsej, was acted about the year 1860, and is modelled to some extent on Goethe’s Egmont. For another, composed and brought out about the same time, Kral Rudolf, the author had the honour of a short imprisonment at the hands of the Austrian Government. Sergius Catiline, Zavis z Falkenštejna, Kral Vukasin (dealing with Serbian history), and Amnon and Tamar are the names of his other dramas. They are all tragedies, and somewhat heavy-reading. Amnon and Tamar, written in 1874, is the most powerful of them, but the subject is objectionable.

It is difficult for a foreigner with an imperfect knowledge of the language to judge correctly, but I should say that none of the other plays rise much above the level of Tennyson’s and Swinburne’s dramatic efforts. Most of them, however, are the work of the poet’s earlier years as a writer, and it is noteworthy that his latest works are far above those of a more youthful period, and this makes his somewhat premature death the more regrettable. These dramas fill two volumes.

Another volume is devoted to lyrical pieces, ballads, and romances, written at different times between 1854 and 1870. A few samples are given in the present book of translations. These were most of them written in 1858. They are very popular in Bohemia. In fact a large number of them have been set to music and are now the volkslieder of the people. The student of Heine will observe that several of the ideas in these Bohemian poems have been adapted from the Jewish writer. For example, one of Halek’s lyrics beginning:— Nay, marvel not if thou shouldst hear Schweigt still! Wenn mein Herz es höret, is a very close copy of Heine’s Wer hat euch dies Wörtlein gelehret, Ihr Vöglein in lustiger Höh? Schweigt still! Wenn mein Herz es höret, Dann tut es noch einmal so weh.

Es kam ein Jungfräulein gegangen, Sie sang es immerfort, Da haben wir Vöglein gefangen Das hübsche, goldene Wort.

A wild poem by Heine, beginning, Ich kam von meiner Herrin Haus, in which the dead are supposed to rise from their graves and recount to one another what brought them there is also twice imitated by Halek in his idyllic poems. Once in a scene in a poem called Alfred (1858) and again most elaborately in a poetical historical retrospect, Dedicove bile hory (1869).

This brings me to mention his volume of Idyllic poems written at different times between 1858 and 1871, some of which I judge to be the most perfect of his works. In the latest of these idylls Devce z Tater [A maiden of the Carpathians] the splendour of the language and melody of the verse outshine that of any modern poet, Leopardi not excepted. The story is simple and interesting, the sentiment healthy, and the characters life-like; could it be adequately translated English critics would, I think, admit it to be one of the most perfect idylls in any language. Krasna Lejla and Mejrima and Husejn, Turkish stories in verse (1859), and Alfred (a Czech romance) are also readable and highly poetical. Goar and Cerny prapor [The black flag] are the names of two others.

A volume of prose stories written between 1857 and 1859 is of less interest. The stories are diffuse, full of criticisms about art and Wagner’s music, the plot is slight and the characters commonplace. Two volumes of prose stories written at a much later period, a story called In the cottage and on the estate, and a volume or two of criticism comprise the rest of Halek’s works.

One of these volumes of stories is here presented to the public in an English dress and of their merits the English reading public can therefore form its own opinion. The stories are for the most part translated literally and I must apologize for retaining here and there Bohemian words, sometimes where an English equivalent is wanting, sometimes, in order to give an idea of the character of the original language, which also means the character of the people who speak it. The stories ave been twice revised. Once by a learned Bohemian Jew in Prague, to whom I read them aloud and who was kind enough to appreciate them in their English dress. “They are written from the heart to the heart”, he said. And again a second time by an English literary man to whom the sentiment of the stories was so obnoxious that he put his pen through about one third part of them. Most of his excisions I have rejected. In spite of these revisions I cannot hope to have avoided many errors of translation which I hope may be corrected by the critical reader, nor can I expect a wide circle of English readers. The stories appeal to a civilization developing on different lines from our own, and, although they are a true picture of Slavonic life and sentiment, they will no doubt often appear to English readers fantastic and overstrained. It may be worth noticing, in passing, that Poldik, the name of a character in one of the stories, is the diminutive of Leopold, and that of Bartos, in another of them, stands for Bartholomew.

He who can read between the lines will perceive in both these stories ingenious political allegories. These I will leave him to discover for himself, premising that in both the main idea is the maintenance of the Bohemian nationality against the encroachments of the centralizing Austrian power. The last story is based on a strange institution in the rural districts of Bohemia—that of vejminkar. In the case of small freehold estates or farms held on a long lease, the owner, as his sons grow up, pensions himself off; or, to put it differently, retires upon a settlement from the active management of the estate, in order that the eldest, youngest, or favourite son may marry and have the enjoyment of it. The pathetic fate of the village Lear in this story is an eloquent exposition of the abuses of the system which exists to this day in some parts of Bohemia.

I began this preface by pointing out what an immense portion of the globe forms the nidus of Slavonic civilization, and as many people have very indefinite ideas about Slavism and its languages, it may not be amiss to conclude with a few remarks upon the Czech or Bohemian language and its relation to other Slavonic dialects. As I do not profess to be a learned man, I have extracted the little I have to say on the subject from Mikes’s Russo-Czech grammar.

The Slavonian nation, he writes, now contains eighty million souls, and is divided by its position into Southern, Eastern, and Western.

I.—In Eastern Slavonic we find

(1) The Cyrillian or Ancient Slavonic, used, like the Latin, but very much modified, as the language of the Church, by Russians, Serbians, Bulgarians, and part of the Dalmatians;

II. South Slavonic is divided into

III. Western Slavonic is divided into

I will not weary the reader by going over in detail the relationship of these languages to one another; suffice it to say that the Czech or Bohemian is most closely related to the Upper Lusatian, the Croatian, and the Little Russian dialects. The Bohemians, like most of the Catholic and Western Slavonians, use the Latin characters, and thus their language forms a good introduction to the study of the rest.

York, 1886

Author

Publisher's introduction to the edition of 1923

PUBLISHER’S INTRODUCTION to the edition of 1923

The Evening Songs of Halek, like the song of the nightingale,” says Richard Badger, the Boston publisher, “sweetest in the quietness of eventide, are songs of youth and love, glorifying the spring, the flowers, the birds, the heavens and the stars, speaking to the human heart whether wrapped in happiness or sorrow. As effusions of feelings from a heart laden with love’s sweet passion, they appeal, above all, to the erotic spring of life. They are a bouquet of charming lyrics, full of light, colour, and fragrance, breathing spring, love, and poesy.”

Halek was born in 1835 and died in 1874. He commenced his literary career in 1858 and was the leader of the romantic and lyric school of Czech poesy. The present translation of the Evening Songs was published by Sir Walter Strickland in 1886, at York. Another translation by Dr. Joseph Stybr was published at Boston in 1920. It is not too much to claim for Strickland’s translation epic superiority over the American version. Compare Strickland’s lines:—

Spring flutters home from far away, And Nature’s children, touched with longing, Woke from their long, long winter’s dream, To meet the sun are thronging.

The chaffinch flutters from the nest Fresh children from their cottage sally, And varied flowerets on the lees, Scent all the neighbouring valley.

Bursts forth the leaf upon the bough, And from the young bird’s throat are ringing The first shy notes, and in young hearts The germs of love are springing.

with Stybr’s version of the same song:—

The spring came flying from afar; And from the young bird’s throat are ringing All things pressed forward to the sun— So long all had been dreaming!

The finches flew out of their nest And children from their bowers, And on the meadows sweetest scents Breathe countless little flowers.

Young leaves press their way from the twigs And from birds’ throats their voices, And in the heart with budding love The youthful breast rejoices.

Again, take Strickland’s magnificent version of Halek’s versified form of the legend that the life of every human being is bound up with a star in heaven:—

There were two thoughts, two thoughts of God, In heaven’s divine communion, To shine of all the starry choir, In fondest union.

Till one of them fell prone from heaven And left its mate to languish, Till God excused her, too, the skies Pitying her anguish.

And many a night on earth they yearned— Sad earth for their lost Eden, Till once again they met as men, As youth and maiden.

And looking in each others eyes They recognized straightway, And lived thrice blest till heaven to rest Called one away.

Who dying out of earth recalled Her love to heaven’s fair shore, And God forbade it not, and now They’re stars once more.

Stybr renders this beautiful poem after the manner of a catalogue recital, as follows:—

There were two thoughts, two thoughts of God, Two stars beside each other, And from all of the heaven’s stars They most loved one another.

Once one of them fell to the earth— The other pined in sorrow, And God, touched by her grief and love, Sent her down on the morrow.

They sought each other many nights As lonely souls their Eden, Until one day they chanced to meet As a young man and maiden.

Their eyes met, and they recognized Each other, tender-hearted, And lived together in great bliss Till one of them departed.

And when she died, she always called And languished for the other, Till God summoned the other one, And they’re again together.

After which comparison I invite the reader to enjoy the fragrant sadness of Halek’s eventide musings in the knowledge that they owe their beauty not less to translator than to author. A word about the translator will not be out of place.

In appreciation of his services to Czech literature the translator has been made a citizen of the Czech Republic and has formally repudiated his baronetcy so far as the title applies to himself.

Evensongs

<> I am that knight of fairy-lore Who rode so boldly into the world, To see the maiden whose beauty Like a rose on its bush is unfurled.

And they said that who so beheld her With an endless curse was opprest, Either changed to a stony statue Or his heart torn out of his breast.

But I thought in my pride and madness Some haply escape sometimes, Forth rode I, and, for my presumption, Am changed to a rhymer of rhymes.

<> All on earth is lapped in slumber, All save the heart in my breast; Tell me, Lord of the firmament, Why hath that heart no rest.

This world so divine is silent all, All save my heart that throbbeth ever, Tell me, Lord of the firmament, Why doth it tire never?

Thought is lulled to rest on the lap of slumber, Day and night alternate watch are keeping, But the heart, true guardian of love eternal, Throbs on for ever unsleeping.

<> The brightness of the sun at noon, That is my love to thee, And night, fair shadow of the day, Thy silent love for me.

Thou litst in me a fire as hot, As burns earth’s central zone, But now that fire unfed by thee, Feeds on itself alone.

I thought with thee on love to feast, Now crumbs are all my share, What wonder if in lonely grief, My face is shrunk with care.

But human hearts can suffer much, And sickness tames their might, And I, i’ faith, can scarcely say, If mine be day or night.

Thus is it writ. And day and night Eternally are fleeting, And only one brief kiss is theirs, In twilight’s hour of meeting.

<> What boots it that yon nightingale So sweetly sings to me, love, When this estranged heart of mine, Dallies alone with thee, love?

Ah! were his song that charms the sense, The sweetest e’er created, What boots it—when my soul with thee, And thy sweet soul is sated?

Ah! little mortal man suspects, How sweet ’tis thus to adore thee, I’d drag the stars from heaven to thee, And sell my soul, love, for thee.

<> It seemed to me that thou wert dead, I heard the death-knell tolling, And through the air a voice of woe, And lamentation rolling.

How strange a couch they strewed thee there, A stone the coverlid, And bade me write a verse thereon In memory of thy shade.

Oh! people! people! hearts of stone, Here take my heart among you, Be graven on the funeral slab, What yet I have not sung you.

My living love ye trusted not, My words were for your jeering, Now shall the stones cry out on you, And win my words a hearing.

<> When to the earth I yield my dust, My soul to God from whom it came, I pray that I may buried be, As best befits a poet’s fame.

Around my brows the laurel wreath, And lodge the lyre within my hands, That my new neighbours well may know, Who entereth last their silent lands.

Sacred to me my lyre hath been, And not the plaything of an hour, Then let it rest upon my breast, When death’s long shadows lower.

And when it irks us in the grave, I’ll wreath a song around their heart, And sing them songs of such delight, The dead to life shall start.

But if ye living idly dream Good ne’er achieved, reforms unsped, I’ll rouse the dead against you, ay! I’ll wake the living with the dead!

<> Ye little birds upon the tree Whose very dreams are song, Which of you thinks of me, your friend, Who dies of cruel wrong?

Thou little moon ride high in heaven, I hail thee for my brother, My passion’s beam is chill as thine, We suit with one another.

The last faint flickering warmth is quenched, And only words remain, Yet, could I fan them into life, I’d live my griefs again.

<> Ah! marvel not if thou shouldst hear, The birds sing songs of thee, love, Since once they came at eventide, To hear and look on me, love.

And once they came and yet again, As to an elder brother, For I am free as they, and we Are kin to one another.

And many a song I sang of thee, Songs full of love and passion, To which those small birds tuned their throat, And sang them in their fashion.

So when I visited the copse, Where those sweet birds were singing, I marvelled much to hear the grove, With my own love-notes ringing.

<> Your arm about some supple waist, To thread the waltz—what joyous pleasure! Come, pale-face, join the dance with us, I’ll bid them play a measure.

But pale-face shivered e’en as though Chill frost was o’er his limbs congealing, And o’er that pale wan face of his, I saw the hot tears stealing.

<> The greatest hero is not he, Who being struck returns the blow, But he is great who, though deceived, Will not his faith forgo.

He never knew love’s holiest flame, Who dares her sacred shrine defame, Love learns forgiveness unto men, And, cursed, curseth not again.

Who cannot sacrifice himself, Shall ne’er to love’s pure empire rise, And false the priest who loveth self, More than the sacrifice.

Ah! sweetheart, taught by thee to love, Earth’s joys I’d give e’en heaven above. Meek as the lamb submissive dies, If love demand the sacrifice.

<> Spring flutters home from far away, And Nature’s children, touched with longing, Woke from their long, long winter’s dream, To meet the sun are thronging.

The chaffinch flutters from the nest, Fresh children from their cottage sally, And varied flowerets on the lees, Scent all the neighbouring valley.

Bursts forth the leaf upon the bough, And from the young bird’s throat are ringing The first shy notes, and in young hearts The germs of love are springing.

<> I am like the tufted linden All in gala dress arrayed, Thou art the lovely rose of May, Come, seat thee in my shade.

Here every leaf is breathing sweetly, Here the buzzing swarm resorts, Hither fly the birds at even, And the birds they are my thoughts.

And far away, away they fly, As children from their home they flee, But they will fly away no more, When thou seatst thyself by me.

<> Full oft I think—so oft as e’er I press thy heart to me, love, That thou for me alone art here On earth, and I for thee, love.

’Tis hard to journey in the world, And never be benighted, And the best bliss on earth is this, When kindred hearts are plighted.

And hath the king his coronal, And God his heaven above, The little bird his bower of spring, Oh! I have thee, my love.

<> Come, sweetheart, ’tis the very hour, For holiest prayer on bended knee, The moon is rising o’er the tower. Time flies—oh! loved one, come to me.

Nay, do not clasp thy hands, my sweet, But clasp me, love, as I clasp thee, And ’stead of hands—two hearts shall meet, In prayer to heaven eternally.

Be lip to lip, love, thine to mine, That from one mouth our prayers may rise. I’ll breath the words, dear, into thine, Thy breath shall waft them to the skies.

And thus our mutual prayer shall rise, The purest truest sacrifice. For thus united seraphs raise, Eternal prayer, eternal praise.

<> Fair, passing fair, my Lord, is all, In love that’s o’er us beaming, All lives for love and would dissolve In love’s poetic dreaming.

Yon cloudlet hastening o’er the skies, Love’s messenger is wending, The bird that’s dozing on the bough Still dreams of love unending.

Man here on earth, till death shall bow His head—’tis love supplieth The theme of all his joys and tears, For love he lives and dieth.

Ay! heavenly angels when from harps Of gold their songs are springing, What could they sing of, being forbade Love’s music for their singing.

<> To Paradise God summoned me, There to learn songs of heavenly might, ’Tis ill for man alone to be, And God formed Eve for my delight.

No rib he chose from out my side, My very heart he did divide, And therefore doth this heart of mine, So fondly nestle, love to thine.

And therefore yearnings passing strange Are lodged within this heart so lone, As tho’ ’twere fain our hearts again, Should grow together into one.

And therefore when afar I roam, My feet unbidden turn to home, And ’stead of blood this heart supplies, Only the tear drop to my eyes.

<> Thine eye is a beautiful lake, lady, That glitters all bright in the gloaming. In it bathes the fond light of the stars of the night. Of the stars in the azure sky roaming.

And ’tis clear as the crystal of ice, lady, And its depths are transparent as ether. Youth, gaze not too deep, tho’ the sea seem asleep, There are many lie buried beneath her.

<> Come, sweetheart, and sit beside me, With my arms let me enshroud thee. With a spirit as fair as an angel’s Out of heaven, hath God endowed thee.

And oft I would make confession, And give thee some secret token, But the words, like a corpse in the grave enclosed, Remain by my lips unspoken.

And what I so oft would tell thee, Oh! no syllables can spell it, My spirit is full of it, But my lips refuse to tell it.

But when my spirit melts in thine, And heart unto heart is pressing, Oh! then methinks that thou knowest all That I would be confessing.

<> If all the sweet delights of life Should turn to dreary slaving, And only love were left to cheer, Still life were worth the having.

If truth were everything on earth And love were only dreaming, I’d shun this waking life and plunge In dreams where love was beaming.

And granted it were all a dream, Still ever I’d remember, That sweet fond dream, that shed a beam, O'er waking life’s November.

<> Dark as is heaven’s blue azure vault So golden is the starlight, Strange fancies fill the heart of him Who gazes on that far light,

Of star dust eddying far and far Beyond the range of seeing, Where yet not one small star reveals The secret of its being.

Only when in two virgin hearts. Love’s earliest breath is breathing, Yon heaven, ’tis said, another star Among her orbs is wreathing.

And if in one of those two hearts Untimely fades love’s blossom, Also a golden star falls prone From heaven’s eternal bosom.

<> That birdie that sings in the tree As himself were the song that he singeth— Hearts wonder not that he so sings Where love’s divine harmony springeth.

Oh! that bird he so sings from the heart To the heart of the hearer believe it, He might force e’en a mortal to weep With a heart that’s attuned to receive it.

And methinks that his plaintive refrain To my own songs is closely related, For this the light foam of my lyre Is only a dirge iterated.

<> What silence reigns around as when A dream o’er weary eyes descends, As when the bird in downy nest Her callow offspring tends.

So gently night her pinions fold Above the star-bespangled skies, And haply many a heart shall gain What carking day denies.

And haply many a heart shall win What envious earth no more may give, And kindly dreams make real the gleams That scarce in memory live.

<> I tried to think how life would be Were love from this world banished, Earth would be but a naked waste Whence every flower had vanished.

The heart would wander through the world Till canker care decayed it, And gloomier than this world itself, Ere God in light arrayed it.

So gloomy that terrestrial man Would loath the earth he cherished, And God himself would abdicate A heaven where love had perished.

<> Fair was the night and transparent, You might look into heaven’s portals, And the scent and the song and the murmur, Enchanted the hearts of mortals.

Alas! that thou wert not beside me To list, love, beside me staying. How the oak-leaves whisper together, And the wind with the woodbine is playing.

How the universe is but a song From the bosom of Nature springing. And how weak is the echo in human hearts Of the star music round us ringing.

<> Those stars who scattered through the sky With their own beauty strew it. Look fondly down as they would fain Have called me to it.

Ah! no ye little twinkling stars Yours be the circling heaven, Dearer to me this earth-its joys And woes—earth’s leaven.

Ye have no notion, loved stars, Through your chill ether racing. How fair a heaven unfold’s o’er earth At love’s embracing.

<> I know not whether it were dream or no, But still in memory linger night’s creations, How on the judgment page of God I gazed And read the fate of nations,

Thoughts weighty as the mind of God himself Above his head a hundredfold were streaming, And beauteous as a starlit night of spring O’er his fair body gleaming.

Many a thought—the germ of a whole world— And many like some song of gentlest being, Many the history of a coming race— Still hid from human seeing.

There, too, I found the type of my own passion. And thy sweet heart with every charm invested. There, too, our mutual loves in heaven’s pure ray Like two bright cloudlets rested.