Up the steep path had Paul the prisoner trod, Past the proud shrine of the triumphant god, To where, the crown of all, sits Cæsar throned in state. Before the massive bar he stands, A bar of solid marble graven, And lays on it his fettered hands, And speaks of love, and hope, and heaven. And smiles; for he is not alone, Though none may see his present Friend, His best-beloved, his faithful One, Who will stand with him to the end. What though that end be present pain And death, his Lord will still deliver. Long ages passed, the mighty empire fell, Nor portico nor pillar stood to tell Where Cæsar once had held imperial sway. Then came an hour when the workman's spade Strange, 'mid the ruins of the Palatine One fragment stands: a marble bar, snow-white, Carved from the solid mass, with trellised line Still clear and sharp as when it first saw light. "And here," they say, was Cæsar's judgment-hall, This marble bar once fenced his ivory seat; Here before Nero once stood holy Paul." O precinct hallowed by the martyr's feet! Here many a stranger from a far-off land was peculiarly large, or there was song in his manner of giving which uses him to be fagz Vent la thie description of |