No, no! still--still--still were all these! still as death!
Chapter IV.
Rome
"Woe unto us, not her; for she sleeps well."
"The Niobe of nations! there she stands,
Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe;
An empty urn within her wither'd hands,
Whose holy dust was scatter'd long ago.
The Scipios' tomb contains no ashes now;
The very sepulchres lie tenantless
Of their heroic dwellers; dost thou flow,
Old Tiber! through a marble wilderness?
Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle her distress."
Undertakers! not one word shall henceforth pass our lips in your dispraise!
An useful and meritorious tribe are you!
What! though sleek and rosy cheeked, you seem to have little in common with the wreck of our hopes?
What! if our ears be shocked by profane jests on the weight of your burden, as you bear away from the accustomed mansion, what was its light and its load star--but what is--pent up in your dark, narrow tenement, but--