on by.

First came Osiris, with his Memphian band
Of swarth Egyptians, darkening all the land;
With heads downcast they dragged their limbs along,
Laden with chains, and torn by lash and thong.
From morn till eve they toiled and bled and died,
And stained with blood the Nile's encroaching tide.
Slowly upon the Theban plain there rose
Old Cheop's pride, a pyramid of woes;
And millions sank unpitied in their graves,
With tombs inscribed--"Here lies a realm of slaves."

Next came great Nimrod prancing on his steed,
His serried ranks, Assyrian and Mede,
By bold Sennacherib moulded into one,
By bestial Sardanapalus undone.
He saw the walls of Babylon arise,
Spring from the earth, invade the azure skies,
And bear upon their airy ramparts old
Gardens and vines, and fruit, and flowers of gold.
Beneath their cold and insalubrious shade
All woes and vices had their coverts made;
Lascivious incest o'er the land was sown,
From peasant cabin to imperial throne,
And that proud realm, so full of might and fame,
Went down at last in blood, and sin, and shame.

Then came the Persian, with his vast array
Of armed millions, fretting for the fray,
Led on by Xerxes and his harlot horde,
Where billows swallowed, and where battle roared.
On every side there rose a bloody screen,
Till mighty Alexander closed the scene.
Behold that warrior! in his pomp and pride,
Dash through the world, and over myriads ride;
Plant his proud pennon on the Gangean stream,
Pierce where the tigers hide, mount where the eagles scream,
And happy only amid war's alarms,
The clank of fetters, and the clash of arms;
And moulding man by battle-fields and blows,
To one foul mass of furies, fiends and foes.
Such, too, the Roman, vanquishing mankind,
Their fields to ravage, and their limbs to bind;
Whose proudest trophy, and whose highest good,
To write his fame with pencil dipped in blood;
To stride the world, like Ocean's turbid waves,
And sink all nations into servient slaves.

As passed the old, so modern realms swept by,
Woe in all hearts, and tears in every eye;
Crimes stained the noble, famine crushed the poor;
Poison for kings, oppression for the boor;
Force by the mighty, fraud by the feebler shown;
Mercy a myth, and charity unknown.

The Dreame