hen most its sounds would court thy ears,
Let not my shell's misguided power[22] 15
E'er draw thy sad, thy mindful tears.
No, Freedom, no, I will not tell
How Rome, before thy weeping face,
With heaviest sound, a giant-statue, fell,
Push'd by a wild and artless race 20
From off its wide ambitious base,
When Time his northern sons of spoil awoke,
And all the blended work of strength and grace,
With many a rude repeated stroke,
And many a barbarous yell, to thousand fragments broke. 25

EPODE.

Yet, even where'er the least appear'd,
The admiring world thy hand revered;
Still, 'midst the scatter'd states around,
Some remnants of her strength were found;
They saw, by what escaped the storm, 30
How wondrous rose her perfect form;
How in the great, the labour'd whole,
Each mighty master pour'd his soul!
For sunny Florence, seat of art,
Beneath her vines preserved a part, 35
Till they,[23] whom Science loved to name,
(O who could fear it?) quench'd her flame.
And lo, an humbler relic laid
In jealous Pisa's olive shade!
See small Marino[24] joins the theme, 40
Though least, not last in thy esteem:
Strike, louder strike the ennobling strings
To those,[25] whose merchant sons were kings;
To him,[26] who, deck'd with pearly pride,
In Adria weds his green-hair'd bride; 45
Hail, port of glory, wealth, and pleasure,
Ne'er let me change this Lydian measure:
Nor e'er her former pride relate,
To sad Liguria's[27] bleeding state.
Ah no! more pleased thy haunts I seek, 50
On wild Helvetia's[28] mountains bleak:
(Where, when the favour'd of thy choice,
The daring archer heard thy voice;
Forth from his eyrie roused in dread,
The ravening eagle northward fled:) 55
Or dwell in willow'd meads more near,
With those to whom thy stork[29] is dear:
Those whom the rod of Alva bruised,
Whose crown a British queen[30] refused!
The magic works, thou feel'st the strains, 60
One holier name alone remains;
The perfect spell shall then avail,
Hail, nymph, adored by Britain, hail!

ANTISTROPHE.

Beyond the measure vast of thought,
The works the w