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Translated by W. C. Bryant
FABIUS, this region, desolate and drear, | |
| These solitary fields, this shapeless mound, | |
| Were once Italica, the far-renowned; | |
| For Scipio, the mighty, planted here | |
| His conquering colony, and now, o’erthrown, | 5 |
| Lie its once dreaded walls of massive stone. | |
| Sad relics, sad and vain, | |
| Of those invincible men | |
| Who held the region then. | |
| Funereal memories alone remain | 10 |
| Where forms of high example walked of yore. | |
| Here lay the forum, there arose the fane, | |
| The eye beholds their places and no more. | |
| Their proud gymnasium and their sumptuous baths, | |
| Resolved to dust and cinders, strew the paths. | 15 |
| Their towers, that looked defiance at the sky, | |
| Fallen by their own vast weight, in fragments lie. | |
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| This broken circus, where the rock weeds climb, | |
| Flaunting with yellow blossoms, and defy | |
| The gods to whom its walls were piled so high, | 20 |
| Is now a tragic theatre, where Time | |
| Acts his great fable, spreads a stage that shows | |
| Past grandeur’s story and its dreary close. | |
| Why, round this desert pit, | |
| Shout not the applauding rows | 25 |
| Where the great people sit? | |
| Wild beasts are here, but where the combatant, | |
| With his bare arms, the strong athleta where? | |
| All have departed from this once gay haunt | |
| Of noisy crowds, and silence holds the air. | 30 |
| Yet on this spot Time gives us to behold | |
| A spectacle as stern as those of old. | |
| As dreamily I gaze, there seem to rise, | |
| From all the mighty ruin, wailing cries. | |
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| The terrible in war, the pride of Spain, | 35 |
| Trajan, his country’s father, here was born; | |
| Good, fortunate, triumphant, to whose reign | |
| Submitted the far regions, where the morn | |
| Rose from her cradle, and the shore whose steeps | |
| O’erlooked the conquered Gaditanian deeps. | 40 |
| Of mighty Adrian here, | |
| Of Theodosius, saint, | |
| Of Silius, Virgil’s peer, | |
| Were rocked the cradles, rich with gold, and quaint | |
| With ivory carvings; here were laurel boughs | 45 |
| And sprays of jasmine gathered for their brows | |
| From gardens now a marshy, thorny waste. | |
| Where rose the palace, reared for Cæsar, yawn | |
| Foul rifts, to which the scudding lizards haste. | |
| Palaces, gardens, Cæsars, all are gone, | 50 |
| And even the stones their names were graven on. | |
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| Fabius, if tears prevent thee not, survey | |
| The long dismantled streets, so thronged of old, | |
| The broken marbles, arches in decay, | |
| Proud statues, toppled from their place and rolled | 55 |
| In dust, when Nemesis, the avenger, came, | |
| And buried, in forgetfulness profound, | |
| The owners and their fame. | |
| Thus Troy, I deem, must be, | |
| With many a mouldering mound; | 60 |
| And thou, whose name alone remains to thee, | |
| Rome, of old gods and kings the native ground; | |
| And thou, sage Athens, built by Pallas, whom | |
| Just laws redeemed not from the appointed doom. | |
| The envy of earth’s cities once wert thou,— | 65 |
| A weary solitude and ashes now. | |
| For fate and death respect ye not: they strike | |
| The mighty city and the wise alike. | |
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| But why goes forth the wandering thought to frame | |
| New themes of sorrow, sought in distant lands? | 70 |
| Enough the example that before me stands; | |
| For here are smoke-wreaths seen, and glimmering flame, | |
| And hoarse lamentings on the breezes die; | |
| So doth the mighty ruin cast its spell | |
| On those who near it dwell. | 75 |
| And under night’s still sky, | |
| As awestruck peasants tell, | |
| A melancholy voice is heard to cry, | |
| “Italica is fallen”; the echoes then | |
| Mournfully shout, “Italica” again. | 80 |
| The leafy alleys of the forest nigh | |
| Murmur “Italica,” and all around, | |
| A troop of mighty shadows, at the sound | |
| Of that illustrious name, repeat the call, | |
| “Italica!” from ruined tower and wall. | 85 |
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