Explore "The Gaul in the Capitol" by Willa Cather on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The murmur of old, old water, / The yellow of old, old stone, / The fountain that sings through the silence, / The river-god, dreaming alone; / The Antonine booted and mounted / In his sun-lit, hill-top place, / The Julians, gigantic in armour, / The low-browed Claudian race.
The wolf and the twin boys she suckled, / And the powerful breed they bred; / Caesars of duplicate empires, / All under one roof-stead. / Fronting these fronts triumphant, / Conquest on conquest pressed / By these marching, arrogant masters, / Who could have hoped for the West?
At the feet of his multiple victors, / Beaten and dazed and dumb, / One, from the wild new races, / Clay of the kings to come. / Hail, in the halls of the Caesars! / Hail, from the thrones oversea! / Sheath of the sword-like vigour, / Sap of the kings to be!