Ivan Dmitriev

In consequence of the revolt of Yemelyan Pugachev, the family had to flee to Saint Petersburg, and there Ivan was entered at the school of the Semenov Guards, and afterwards obtained a post in the military service.

On the accession of Paul I to the imperial throne, he quit the army with the rank of colonel; and his appointment as procurator for the senate was soon after renounced for the position of privy councillor.

His poems include songs, odes, satires, tales, epistles, and others, as well as the fables—partly original and partly translated from La Fontaine, Florian and Arnault—on which his fame chiefly rests.

[1] Translation of long poem "Liberation of Moscow" (1795) in Four Centuries 16[2] ...And you, our champion, will live for the ages, As our honor, our glory, and a paragon to all!

There, where the mountains prop up the clouds, A multitude of sonorous rivers will spring up, And from the millstone a mighty forest emerge; Verdant gardens will burgeon upon the plains And cities will arise and vanish, with time; An infinity of new marvels nature will create; Be they revealed to our astonished gaze; A new light will illuminate the cosmos, And the warrior, heartened by your blood, Remembering you, will become in his pride Greater ingrained, and further, further confirmed In his unshakable love for our fatherland!