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Onegin then visits the Tauris [Crimea]:

[XV]

   land sacred unto the imagination:    there with Orestes argued Pylades;    there Mithridates stabbed himself; ¹² there sang inspired Mickiéwicz    and in the midst of coastal cliffs    recalled his Lithuania.

[XVI]

   Beauteous are you, shores of the Tauris,    when from the ship one sees you by the light    of morning Cypris, as I saw you  ⁴ for the first time.    You showed yourselves to me in nuptial splendor.    Against a blue and limpid sky    shone the amassments of your mountains.  ⁸ The pattern of valleys, trees, villages    was spread before me.    And there, among the small huts of the Tatars...    What ardency awoke in me! ¹² With what magical yearnfulness    my flaming bosom was compressed!    But, Muse, forget the past!

[XVII]

   Whatever feelings then lay hidden    within me — now they are no more:    they went or changed....  ⁴ Peace unto you, turmoils of former years!    To me seemed needful at the time    deserts, the pearly rims of waves,    and the sea's rote, and piles of rocks,  ⁸ and the ideal of “proud maid,”    and nameless pangs.    Other days, other dreams;    you have become subdued, ¹² my springtime's high-flung fancies,    and unto my poetic goblet    I have admixed a lot of water.

[XVIII]

   Needful to me are other pictures:    I like a sandy hillside slope,    before a small isba two rowans,  ⁴ a wicket gate, a broken fence,    up in the sky gray clouds,    before the thrash barn heaps of straw,    and in the shelter of dense willows  ⁸ a pond — the franchise of young ducks.    I'm fond now of the balalaika    and of the trepak's drunken stomping    before the threshold of the tavern; ¹² now my ideal is a housewife,    my wishes, peace    and “pot of shchi but big myself.”

[XIX]

   The other day, during a rainy spell,    as I had dropped into the cattle yard —    Fie! Prosy divagations,  ⁴ the Flemish School's variegated dross!    Was I like that when I was blooming?    Say, Fountain of Bahchisaray!    Were such the thoughts that to my mind  ⁸ your endless purl suggested    when silently in front of you    Zaréma I imagined?...    Midst the sumptuous deserted halls ¹² after the lapse of three years, in my tracks    in the same region wandering, Onegin    remembered me.

[XX]

   I lived then in dusty Odessa....    There for a long time skies are clear.    There, stirring, an abundant trade  ⁴ sets up its sails.    There all exhales, diffuses Europe,    all glitters with the South, and brindles    with live variety.  ⁸ The tongue of golden Italy    resounds along the gay street where    walks the proud Slav,    Frenchman, Spaniard, Armenian, ¹² and Greek, and the heavy Moldavian,    and the son of Egyptian soil,    the retired Corsair, Moralí.

[XXI]

   Odessa in sonorous verses    our friend Tumanski has described,    but at the time with partial eyes  ⁴ he gazed at it.    Upon arriving, he, like a true poet,    went off to roam with his lorgnette    alone above the sea; and then  ⁸ with an enchanting pen    he glorified the gardens of Odessa.    All right — but there, in point of fact,    is a bare steppe around; ¹² in a few places recent labor    has forced young boughs on sultry days    to give compulsory shade.

[XXII]

   But where, pray, was my rambling tale? “In dusty    Odessa,” I had said.    I might have said “in muddy  ⁴ Odessa” — and indeed would not have lied there either.    For five-six weeks a year    Odessa, by the will of stormy Zeus,    is flooded, is stopped up,  ⁸ is in thick mud immersed.    Some two feet deep all houses are embedded.    Only on stilts does a pedestrian    dare ford the street. Chariots and people ¹² sink in, get stuck; and hitched to droshkies    the ox, horns bent, replaces    the debile steed.

[XXIII]

   But the sledge-hammer breaks up stones already,    and with a ringing pavement soon    the salvaged city will be covered  ⁴ as with an armor of forged steel.    However, in this moist Odessa    there is another grave deficiency,    of — what would you think? Water.  ⁸ Grievous exertions are required....    So what? This is not a great sorrow!    Particularly since wine is    imported free of duty. ¹² But then the Southern sun, but then the sea...    What more, friends, could you want?    Blest climes!

[XXIV]

   Time was, no sooner did the sunrise gun    roar from the ship    than, down the steep shore running,  ⁴ I would be on my way toward the sea.    Then, sitting with a glowing pipe,    enlivened by the briny wave,    like in his paradise a Moslem, coffee  ⁸ with Oriental grounds I quaff.    I go out for a stroll. Already the benevolent    Casino's open: the clatter of cups    resounds there; on the balcony ¹² the marker, half asleep, emerges    with a broom in his hands, and at the porch    two merchants have converged already.

[XXV]

   Anon the square grows freaked [with people].    All is alive now; here and there    they run, on business or not busy;  ⁴ however, more on businesses.    The child of Calculation and of Venture,    the merchant goes to glance at ensigns,    to find out — are the skies  ⁸ sending to him known sails?    What new wares have    entered today in quarantine?    Have the casks of expected wines arrived? ^12> And how's the plague, and where the conflagrations,    and is not there some famine, war,    or novelty of a like kind?

[XXVI]

   But we, fellows without a sorrow,    among the careful merchants,    expected only oysters  ⁴ from Tsargrad's shores.    What news of oysters? They have come. O glee!    Off flies gluttonous juventy    to swallow from their sea shells  ⁸ the plump, live cloisterers,    slightly asperged with lemon.    Noise, arguments; light wine    onto the table from the cellars ¹² by complaisant Automne is brought.    The hours fly by, and the grim bill    meantime invisibly augments.

[XXVII]

   But the blue evening grows already darker.    Time to the opera we sped:    there 'tis the ravishing Rossini,  ⁴ darling of Europe, Orpheus.    To severe criticism not harking, he    is ever selfsame, ever new;    he pours out melodies, they effervesce,  ⁸ they flow, they burn    like youthful kisses, all    in mollitude, in flames of love,    like the stream and the golden spurtles of Ay ¹² starting to fizz; but, gentlemen,    is it permitted to compare    do-re-mi-sol to wine?

[XXVIII]

   And does that sum up the enchantments there?    And what about the explorative lorgnette?    And the assignments in the wings?  ⁴ The prima donna? The ballet?    And the loge where, in beauty shining,    a trader's young wife, vain    and languorous,  ⁸ is by a crowd of thralls surrounded?    She lists and does not list    the cavatina, the entreaties,    the banter blent halfwise with flattery, ¹² while in a corner naps behind her    her husband; wakes up to cry “Fuora!”; yawns,    and snores again.

[XXIX]

   There thunders the finale. The house empties;    with noise the outfall hastes;    the crowd onto the square  ⁴ runs by the gleam of lamps and stars.    The sons of fortunate Ausonia hum    a playful tune    involuntarily retained  —  ⁸ while we roar the recitative.    But it is late. Sleeps quietly    Odessa; and breathless and warm    is the mute night. The moon has risen, ¹² a veil, diaphanously light,    enfolds the sky. All's silent;    only the Black Sea sounds.

[XXX]

   And so I lived then in Odessa.