ars of triumph:
because his government was so modelled that with him every thing must be
swept away, and that a reaction, proportioned to the violence of the
action, must burst forth at once both within and without. But Napoleon
saw, without illusion, to the bottom of things. The nation, wholly
occupied in prosecuting the designs of its chief, had previously not had
time to form any plans for itself. The day on which it should have
ceased to be stunned by the din of arms, it would have called itself to
account for its servile obedience. It is better, thought he, for an
absolute prince to fight foreign armies than to have to struggle against
the energy of the citizens. Despotism had been organized for making war;
war was continued to uphold despotism. The die was cast--France must
either conquer Europe, or Europe subdue France. Napoleon fell--he fell,
because with the men of the nineteenth century he attempted the work of
an Attila and a Genghis Khan; because he gave the reins to an
imagination directly contrary to the spirit of his age; with which,
nevertheless, his reason was perfectly acquainted; because he would not
pause on the day when he felt conscious of his inability to succeed.
Nature has fixed a boundary, beyond which extravagant enterprises cannot
be carried with prudence. This boundary the Emperor reached in Spain,
and overleaped in Russia. Had he then escaped destruction, his
inflexible presumption would have caused him to find elsewhere a Bayleu
and a Moscow.

GENERAL FOY.

* * * * *

ROME.

[Illustration]

I am in Rome! Oft as the morning ray
Visits these eyes, waking at once, I cry,
Whence this excess of joy? What has befallen me?
And from within a thrilling voice replies--
Thou art in Rome! A thousand busy thoughts
Rush on my mind--a thousand images;
And I spring up as girt to run a race!

Thou art in _Rome!_ the city that so long
Reign'd absolute--the mistress of the world!
The mighty vision that the Prophet saw
And trembled; that from nothing, from the least,
The lowliest village (what, but here and there
A reed-roof'd cabin by a river side?)
Grew into everything; and, year by year,
Patiently, fearlessly working her way
O'er brook and field, o'er continent and sea;
Not like the merchant with his merchandise,
Or traveller with staff and scrip exploring;
But hand to hand and f