TO HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.

Pensive within the Coliseum's walls I stood with thee, O Poet of the West!— The day when each had been a welcome guest In San Clemente's venerable halls:— With what delight my memory now recalls That hour of hours, that flower of all the rest, When, with thy white beard falling on thy breast, That noble head, that well might serve as Paul's In some divinest vision of the saint By Raffael dreamed—I heard thee mourn the dead— The martyred host who fearless there, though faint, Walked the rough road that up to heaven's gate led: These were the pictures Calderon loved to paint In golden hues that here perchance have fled.