Explore "The Siege of Kazan" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Black are the moors before Kazan, / And their stagnant waters smell of blood: / I said in my heart, with horse and man, / I will swim across this shallow flood.
Under the feet of Argamack, / Like new moons were the shoes he bare, / Silken trappings hung on his back, / In a talisman on his neck, a prayer.
My warriors, thought I, are following me; / But when I looked behind, alas! / Not one of all the band could I see, / All had sunk in the black morass!
Where are our shallow fords? and where / The power of Kazan with its fourfold gates? / From the prison windows our maidens fair / Talk of us still through the iron grates.
We cannot hear them; for horse and man / Lie buried deep in the dark abyss! / Ah! the black day hath come down on Kazan! / Ah! was ever a grief like this?