XXI

Or turn to the patrician's marble hall,
Where the slave chainless now, doth sit alone,
Vengeance and his red hand have burst his thrall;
Lifeless his slaughtered victims round are thrown,
Wild his fierce triumph, all is now his own
Save freedom, how escape the ash-heaped door?
Through one thick wall his cleaving axe hath flown,
The roof yields, overwhelming, and crushed o'er
The murderer sinks entombed beneath the buried floor.

XXII

On roll the rushing myriads through the gate;
But the red mountain, blazing, with stern view
The Roman sentinel doth contemplate;
Motionless as a statue there he grew,
Composed his face, though livid in its hue,
Sternness with awe in his undaunted eye!
Vainly the fiery tempest round him flew:
He had not like the herd been taught to fly:
Scorched, blasted in his place, the warrior stood to die.

XXIII

Pass not the mouldering amphitheatre;
Within that grass-grown circle Nero bound
His happiness, while turned idolater
To the base herd, his false ambition crowned
By their licentious shouts, whose venal sound
Was fame that gave him rapture undisguised.
Were they accorded meed for deeds renowned?
No, the hired singer's fame alone he prized;
For this he bowed a slave, by slaves themselves despised.

XXIV

Burner of Rome and mask of the hour;
Now man, now woman, god, or brute, whose name
By-word became for infamy, whom power
Changed into monster, yet the wretch sought fame;
Even he that bright abstraction dared to claim,
Stained with each foul pollution which to hear
Was crime, and in its tainted utterance shame;
Even he could die a hero, and endear
One heart to strew with flowers the unconsecrated bier.

XXV

Lo, where unfolds the spot of earth, a vision
Of immaterial beauty even now,
Though fled the life that filled that haunt Elysian!
States cloud-like pass, man leaves no track below,
But beauty's undecaying outlines show,
Though worn and rent each once harmonious line.
The shore of Baiae! and the curving brow
Of these low swelling hills that still confine
That spirit-peopled spot, now, as of old, divine.

XXVI

The Paradise of Italy! the bower
And throne of luxury, where life was love
And passionate feeling, making that brief hour
One long enjoyment; where the seasons strove
In rivalry, and braided roses wove,
Whose blossoming renewed mocked summer's flight;
Where the enamoured Morn each myrtle grove
Tinted with glory; o'er each wooded height,
Pausing as pauses love o'er her own tranced delight.

XXVII

Where twilight's beauty gathered earth with heaven;
The substance with the holy vision blended,
In the pure sea's reflecting bosom given;
Where myrtle-groves in tenderest gloom impended,
From whose rich bowers with evening's shade ascended
Songs that expired in eloquent passion's sighs,
To lutes whose latest lingering cadence ended
In the deep waters' slumberous melodies,
Whose azure hues beneath were mirrored from the skies!

XXVIII

Look round ye now! say where hath change thus wrought?
The fall from Paradise where worthier shown?
Where desolation more her vials fraught
With wrath, its deep pollutions to atone?
Lightnings have scathed, earth heaved, the thunder-stone
Rent, and war's footsteps blasted where they pressed.
The breezes that were once Elysium's own
Are tainted, there where life was love confessed,
When death was sleep reclined on beauty's heavenly breast!

XXIX

Who wrought save men themselves the infamy?
Who desecrated vestal earth with crime,
Till God avenged her outraged majesty,
Leaving the moral as the deed sublime.
Then solitude sate there, and from the slime
Plague reeked; but nature's undecaying soul
Looked heavenward, unchanged as in her prime;
Fallen man alone pollutes the glorious whole,
Sunkfrom his state, when slaved to passion's brute control.

XXX

Turn to where patriarchal Cuma rears
The shattered columns of her giant gate:
What spectacle behind its arch appears?
No majesty of ruin to elate
The aspiring soul, or tone its thought sedate;
Elysium's brightest scenes are there renewed,
Where an undying life we contemplate;
Where nature sits alone with solitude,
Hiding the grave where once a mighty city stood.