"Danube, Danube! wherefore com'st thou

Red and raging to my caves?

Wherefore leap thy swollen waters

Madly through the broken waves?

Wherefore is thy tide so sullied

With a hue unknown to me;

Wherefore dost thou bring pollution

To the old and sacred sea?"

"Ha! rejoice, old Father Euxine!

I am brimming full and red;

Noble tidings do I carry

From my distant channel-bed.

I have been a Christian river

Dull and slow this many a year,

Rolling down my torpid waters

Through a silence morne and drear;

Have not felt the tread of armies

Trampling on my reedy shore;

Have not heard the trumpet calling,

Or the cannon's gladsome roar;

Only listened to the laughter

From the village and the town,

And the church-bells, ever jangling,

As the weary day went down.

So I lay and sorely pondered

On the days long since gone by,

When my old primÆval forests

Echoed to the war-man's cry;

When the race of Thor and Odin

Held their battles by my side,

And the blood of man was mingling

Warmly with my chilly tide.

Father Euxine! thou rememb'rest

How I brought thee tribute then—

Swollen corpses, gashed and gory,

Heads and limbs of slaughter'd men?

Father Euxine! be thou joyful!

I am running red once more—

Not with heathen blood, as early,

But with gallant Christian gore!

For the old times are returning,

And the Cross is broken down,

And I hear the tocsin sounding

In the village and the town;

And the glare of burning cities

Soon shall light me on my way—

Ha! my heart is big and jocund

With the draught I drank to-day.

Ha! I feel my strength awakened,

And my brethren shout to me;

Each is leaping red and joyous

To his own awaiting sea.

Rhine and Elbe are plunging downward

Through their wild anarchic land,

Everywhere are Christians falling

By their brother Christians' hand!

Yea, the old times are returning,

And the olden gods are here!

Take my tribute, Father Euxine,

To thy waters dark and drear.

Therefore come I with my torrents,

Shaking castle, crag, and town;

Therefore, with the shout of thunder,

Sweep I herd and herdsman down;

Therefore leap I to thy bosom,

With a loud triumphal roar—

Greet me, greet me, Father Euxine,

I am Christian stream no more!"