Spring is waking, and the Yokul lifts on high his glittering shield,
Far and wide in sunny splendor gleams the ice-engirded field,
And the swelling freshet murmurs gay spring-ditties as it flows,
Till its noisy life it mingles in the ocean's grand repose;
And in silence,
Dream-fraught silence,
O'er its course the billows close.

On the strand they gayly played, where the trembling birch trees grow,
Children both with golden ringlets and with cheeks like maiden snow,
Wherein blushed fresh spring-like roses--blushed and hid, and blushed again,
While they plucked the shining pebbles, smooth-worn by the stormy main;
And in silence,
Rippling silence,
Chants the sea its old refrain.

She, the fair and gladsome maiden, raised her head and called his name:
He was deep-eyed, light and slender, shy of mien and slight of frame.
Like a laughing brook she skippèd to and fro along the strand;
He was grave, like nodding fern-leaf, gently by the breezes fanned,
Which in silence,
Pensive silence,
Grows upon the brooklet's sand,

"Ragnas," said she, "when God's angels visit will this world of ours,
They descend, so mother told me, on the Yokul's shining towers.
Now, if I should die, then promise thou wilt climb the peaks of ice,
And my hand I'll reach to help thee up to God's bright paradise."
But in silence,