Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Africa: Vol. XXIV. 1876–79. | | | | Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia: Assouan (Syene) | | Juvenal at Syene | | Thomas Gold Appleton (1812–1884) |
| | | HERE at the utmost bound of Roman power, | |
| Thy prison walls the Arabian Libyan waste, | |
| Slave over slaves, thy tyrant bade thee cower, | |
| Even by the soldier’s office more disgraced, | |
| Eating thy indignant heart out through each hour, | 5 |
| And every drop of Exile’s chalice taste. | |
| Take comfort, noble heart, for while the hand | |
| Which held thee loosens in the charnel’s dust, | |
| That shameless forehead bears its eternal brand | |
| Yet in thy living page, and cruelty’s lust | 10 |
| Cut into deathless adamant shall stand,— | |
| So that Oblivion spare its pitying rust,— | |
| But thy name, brightening through these Christian years, | |
| Virtue shall speak it but with grateful tears. | | | | |
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