He meant to go down on his knees, but floundered and just escaped tumbling into the water. He was not over steady on his feet, owing to the continual sipping of the sour wine from a bottle, which he modestly tried to conceal under the lapel of his coat. One of the oarsmen, a half-naked, fine, dark fellow seemed to understand his request, for he smiled at Afrossinia, beckoned Æsop and handed him a guitar. The latter started jingling on it as on some three-stringed balalaïka.
Afrossinia smiled, glanced at the Tsarevitch and suddenly began her song in a loud, slightly shrieking voice, just as she used to sing in the choir on dusky spring evenings near the birch grove which overshadowed the banks of the river. The shores of Naples, antique Parthenope, resounded with the unwonted alien strains:—
“Oh my pretty balcony, newly
Built with maple tree, latticed fair!”
Infinite yearning for the past—the distant—breathed in the Italian song:—
Chi vuol esser lieto, sia;
Di doman non c’è certezza.
Infinite desire for the future breathed in the Russian:—
Fly my falcon fair, far away from here,
To that country dear, which was once mine own!