85
Our afternoon was bright and warm the hour
Lit by the westering sun, now soon to set.
Winter is hard upon us, and a night
Heavy with cloud, and ominous of storm.
Theonöe, I knew you not so near
Theonöe:
I listen'd, for I heard you speak of Rome.
Ah, what a passion of insanity,
Furies more fell than those of Atreus
Beset this poor Tithonus of a world
Which has outliv'd the glory of its prime.
Immortal, Immemorial, Mother Rome,
How can I help but hate your gloomy foes
Who set their little nook of Galilee
Above the Mistress City of the World.
Poor brambles, jealous of the cedar tree,
Beneath whose shade their puny briar sprung.
These weeds wind-borne within our marble fane,
Will work insidious their destructive way
