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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Russia: Vol. XX. 1876–79.

Bessarabia

Bessarabia

By Edna Dean Proctor (1829–1923)

HERE the white cattle graze that feed

The Austrian Kaiser’s towns,

Close-watched by dogs alert to leap

If but the herder frowns;

And here the shepherd tends his flock

While the long days go by,—

Now couched beside them in the plain,

Now on the khourgans high.

The plover calls across the steppe;

The stork, with snowy breast,

Flies northward to the kindly roof

That holds her summer nest;

But nothing stirs his drowsy blood

Unless a lamb should stray,

Then woe to wolf or gypsy thief

That lurks beside the way.