Classic Poem

I stood in Paris at the tomb
Of him who crossed the bleak Alps' ridge,
And charged o'er Lodi's bloody bridge,
Till Europe heard his cannons' boom:

Who made the haughty Hapsburg yield,
Who watched the flames from Kremlin's tower,
Who Elba fled, but fell from power
On Waterloo's tremendous field.

He was a dreamer in his youth,
His eyes were dull, his face was pale;
But, knowing no such word as fail,
He wrought his visions into truth.

Second alone to him of Rome
He sits within the halls of fame;
His glory France's, though he came,
A Cæsar, from the Cæsars' home.