By wave or grot might Fancy linger, dreaming
Of old Arcadia’s woodland deities.
Wild visions!—there no sylvan powers convene:
Death reigns the genius of th’ Elysian scene.
Ye, too, illustrious hills of Rome! that bear
Traces of mightier beings on your brow,
O’er you that subtle spirit of the air
Extends the desert of his empire now;
Broods o’er the wrecks of altar, fane, and dome,
And makes the Cæsars’ ruin’d halls his home.