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Home  »  Poems of Places An Anthology in 31 Volumes  »  The River Amazon

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Americas: Vol. XXX. 1876–79.

South America: Amazon, the River (Orellana)

The River Amazon

By Joseph Warton (1722–1800)

(From Ode Occasioned by Reading Mr. West’s Translation of Pindar)

IN roaring cataracts down Andes’ channelled steeps

Mark how enormous Orellana sweeps!

Monarch of mighty floods! supremely strong,

Foaming from cliff to cliff, he whirls along,

Swoln with an hundred hills’ collected snows:

Thence over nameless regions widely flows,

Round fragrant isles, and citron-groves,

Where still the naked Indian roves,

And safely builds his leafy bower,

From slavery far, and curst Iberian power.