The poor soldiers have no rest,
Neither night nor day!
Late at evening the word was given
To the soldiers gay;
All night long their weapons cleaning,
Were the soldiers good;
Ready in the morning dawn,
All in ranks they stood.

Not a golden trumpet is it,
That now sounds so clear;
Nor the silver flute's tone is it,
That thou now dost hear.
'T is the great White Tsar who speaketh,
'T is our father dear.
“Come, my princes, my boyárs,
Nobles, great and small!
Now consider and invent
Good advice, ye all,
How the soonest, how the quickest,
Fort Azov may fall!”

The boyárs, they stood in silence,—
And our father dear,
He again began to speak,
In his eye a tear:
“Come, my children, good dragoons,
And my soldiers all,
Now consider and invent
Brave advice, ye all,
How the soonest, how the quickest,
Fort Azov may fall!”

Like a humming swarm of bees,
So the soldiers spake,
With one voice at once they spake:
“Father dear, great Tsar!
Fall it must! and all our lives
Thereon we gladly stake.”
Set already was the moon,
Nearly past the night;
To the storming on they marched,
With the morning light;
To the fort with bulwarked towers
And walls so strong and white.

Not great rocks they were, which rolled
From the mountains steep;
From the high, high walls there rolled
Foes into the deep.
No white snow shines on the fields,
All so white and bright;
But the corpses of our foes
Shine so bright and white.
Not upswollen by heavy rains
Left the sea its bed;
No! In rills and rivers streams
Turkish blood so red!