text:  The mighty share which Russia had in overthrowing the gigantic power of the greatest of modern conquerors could not fail of affording to a Russian poet a peculiar source of triumphant yet not too exulting inspiration; and Pushkin in that portion of the following ode in which he is led more particularly to allude to the part played by his country in the sublime drama whose catastrophe was the ruin of Bonaparte's blood-cemented empire has given undeniable proof of his possessing that union of magnanimity and patriotism which is not the meanest characteristic of elevated genius