XXIII.
On thee! with whom in boyhood I had play’d,
At the grape-gatherings, by my native streams;
And to whose eye my youthful soul had laid
Bare, as to heaven’s, its glowing world of dreams;
And by whose side midst warriors I had stood,
And in whose helm was brought—oh, earn’d with blood!—
The fresh wave to my lips, when tropic beams
Smote on my fever’d brow! Ay, years had pass’d,
Severing our paths, brave friend!—and thus we met at last!