Sonorous tongue, thy broad and unctuous speech
Sounds like soft summer winds through spicy trees,
Or like the languid plash of idle seas
That kiss the luminous sand on Nauplia's beach.

Fit for a god in prayer, in love to teach
Warm, amorous hearts serenest mysteries,
Thy beauty blossomed in Demosthenes,
And placid Plato could thy glories reach.

Yea, even in tame, degenerate Romaic,
Thy primal grandeur still augustly flows,
And wondrous sounds of melody awake
Visions of sun-kissed Archipelagoes,
Where hoary Homer, for the future's sake,
Sang his grand Iliad of sublimest woes.