Italy. In the poem which follows Mr. Lowell gives
expression to his want of faith in the French emperor.]

Wait a little: do _we_ not wait?
Louis Napoleon is not Fate,
Francis Joseph is not Time;
There's One hath swifter feet than Crime;
Cannon-parliaments settle naught; 5
Venice is Austria's,--whose is Thought?
Minie is good, but, spite of change,
Gutenberg's gun has the longest range.
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin![24]
Lachesis, twist! and, Atropos, sever! 10
In the shadow, year out, year in,
The silent headsman waits forever.

[Footnote 24: Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos were the three Fates of
the ancient mythology; Clotho spun the thread of human destiny,
Lachesis twisted it, and Atropos with shears severed it.]

Wait, we say; our years are long;
Men are weak, but Man is strong;
Since the stars first curved their rings, 15
We have looked on many things;
Great wars come and great wars go,
Wolf-tracks light on polar snow;
We shall see him come and gone,
This second-hand Napoleon. 20
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!
Lachesis, twist! and, Atropos, sever!
In the shadow, year out, year in,
The silent headsman waits forever.

We saw the elder Corsican, 25
And Clotho muttered as she span,
While crowned lackeys bore the train,
Of the pinchbeck Charlemagne:
"Sister, stint not length of thread!
Sister, stay the scissors dread! 30
On Saint Helen's granite bleak,
Hark, the vulture whets his beak!"
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!
Lachesis, twist! and, Atropos, sever!
In the shadow, year out, year in, 35
The silent headsman waits forever.

The Bonapartes, we know their bees
That wade in honey red to the knees:
Their patent reaper, its sheaves sleep sound
In dreamless garners underground: 40
We know false glory's spendthrift race
Pawning nations for feathers and lace;
It may be short, it may be long,
"'Tis reckoning-day!" sneers unpaid Wrong.
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin! 45
Lachesis, twist! and, Atropos, sever!
I