Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Americas: Vol. XXX. 1876–79.
The Revenge of America
By Joseph Warton (1722–1800)W
O’er ravaged fields of rich Peru,
Struck with his bleeding people’s woes,
Old India’s awful Genius rose.
He sat on Andes’ topmost stone,
And heard a thousand nations groan;
For grief his feathery crown he tore,
To see huge Plata foam with gore;
He broke his arrows, stamped the ground,
To view his cities smoking round.
“What woes,” he cried, “hath lust of gold
O’er my poor country widely rolled;
Plunderers, proceed! my bowels tear,
But ye shall meet destruction there;
From the deep-vaulted mine shall rise
The insatiate fiend, pale Avarice,
Whose steps shall trembling Justice fly,
Peace, Order, Law, and Amity!
I see all Europe’s children cursed
With lucre’s universal thirst;
The rage that sweeps my sons away,
My baneful gold shall well repay.”