Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee-- Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage,--what are they? Thy waters wasted them while they were free, And many a tyrant since; their shores obey The stranger, slave or savage; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts;--not so thou, Unchangeable, save to thy wild waves' play- Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-- Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. V. Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests; in all time, Calm or convulsed--in breeze, or gale, or storm, Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime Dark-heaving;--boundless, endless, and sublime-- The image of Eternity--the throne Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee: thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. VI. And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy Of youthful sport was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy I wantoned with thy breakers--they to me Were a delight; and if thy freshening sea Made them a terror, 'twas a pleasing fear; For I was, as it were, a child of thee, And trusted to thy billows far and near, And laid my hand upon thy mane--as I do here. LORD BYRON. SPARTACUS TO THE GLADIATORS AT CAPUA. 1. Ye call me chief; and ye do well to call him chief who for twelve long years has met upon the arena every shape of man or beast the broad Empire of Rome could furnish, and who never yet lowered his arm. If there be one among you who can say that ever, in public fight or private brawl, my actions did belie my tongue, let him stand forth and say it. If there be three of all your company dare face me on the bloody sand, let them come on. 2. And yet I was not always thus,--a hired butcher, a savage chief of still more savage men. My ancestors came from old Sparta, and settled among the vine-clad rocks and citron groves of Syrasella. My early life ran quiet as the brooks by which I sported; and when, at noon, I gathered the sheep beneath the shade, and played upon the shepherd's flute, there was a friend, the son of a neighbor, to join me in the pastime. We led our flocks to the same pasture, and partook together our rustic meal. 3. One evening, after the sheep were folded, and we were all seated beneath the myrtle which shaded our cottage, my grandsire, an old man, was telling of Marathon and Leuctra; and how, in ancient times, a little band of Spartans, in a defile of the mountains, had withstood a whole army. I did not then know what war was; but my cheeks burned, I know not why, and I clasped the knees of that venerable man, until my mother, parting the hair from off my forehead, kissed my throbbing temples, and bade me go to rest, and think no more of those old tales and savage wars.