I see the long river-stripes of the earth,

I see the Amazon and the Paraguay,

I see the four great rivers of China, the Amour, the Yellow River,

the Yiang-tse, and the Pearl,

I see where the Seine flows, and where the Danube, the Loire, the

Rhone, and the Guadalquiver flow,

I see the windings of the Volga, the Dnieper, the Oder,

I see the Tuscan going down the Arno, and the Venetian along

the Po,

I see the Greek seaman sailing out of Egina bay.

6

I see the site of the old empire of Assyria, and that of Persia, and

that of India,

I see the falling of the Ganges over the high rim of Saukara.

I see the place of the idea of the Deity incarnated by avatars in human forms,

I see the spots of the successions of priests on the earth, oracles, sacrifices, brahmins, sabians, llamas, monks, muftis, exhorters,

I see where druids walked the groves of Mona, I see the mistletoe and vervain,

[old signifiers. I see the temples of the deaths of the bodies of Gods, I see the

I see Christ eating the bread of his last supper in the midst of youths and old persons,

I see where the strong divine young man the Hercules toil'd faithfully and long and then died,

I see the place of the innocent rich life and hapless fate of the beautiful nocturnal son, the full-limb'd Bacchus,

I see Kneph, blooming, drest in blue, with the crown of feathers

on his head,

I see Hermes, unsuspected, dying, well-belov'd, saying to the

people Do not weep for me,

This is not my true country, I have lived banish'd from my true

country, I now go back there,

I return to the celestial sphere where every one goes in his turn.

7

I see the battle-fields of the earth, grass grows upon them and

blossoms and corn,

I see the tracks of ancient and modern expeditions.

I see the nameless masonries, venerable messages of the unknown events, heroes, records of the earth.

I see the places of the sagas,

I see pine-trees and fir-trees torn by northern blasts,

I see granite bowlders and cliffs, I see green meadows and lakes,

I see the burial-cairns of Scandinavian warriors,

I see them raised high with stones by the marge of restless oceans, that the dead men's spirits when they wearied of their quiet graves might rise up through the mounds and gaze on the tossing billows, and be refresh'd by storms, immensity, liberty, action.

I see the steppes of Asia,

[Baskirs,

I see the tumuli of Mongolia, I see the tents of Kalmucks and

I see the nomadic tribes with herds of oxen and cows,

I see the table-lands notch'd with ravines, I see the jungles and

deserts,

I see the camel, the wild steed, the bustard, the fat-tail'd sheep, the antelope, and the burrowing wolf.

I see the highlands of Abyssinia,

I see flocks of goats feeding, and see the fig-tree, tamarind, date, And see fields of teff-wheat and places of verdure and gold.

I see the Brazilian vaquero,

I see the Bolivian ascending mount Sorata,

I see the Wacho crossing the plains, I see the incomparable rider of horses with his lasso on his arm,

I see over the pampas the pursuit of wild cattle for their hides.

8

I see the regions of snow and ice,

I see the sharp-eyed Samoiede and the Finn,

I see the seal-seeker in his boat poising his lance,

I see the Siberian on his slight-built sledge drawn by dogs,

I see the porpoise-hunters, I see the whale-crews of the south Pacific and the north Atlantic,

I see the cliffs, glaciers, torrents, valleys, of Switzerland-I mark the long winters and the isolation.

9

I see the cities of the earth and make myself at random a part of

them,

I am a real Parisian,

I am a habitan of Vienna, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Constantinople,

I am of Adelaide, Sidney, Melbourne,

I am of London, Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh, Limerick,

I am of Madrid, Cadiz, Barcelona, Oporto, Lyons, Brussels, Berne, Frankfort, Stuttgart, Turin, Florence,

I belong in Moscow, Cracow, Warsaw, or northward in Christiania or Stockholm, or in Siberian Irkutsk, or in some

street in Iceland,

I descend upon all those cities, and rise from them again.

10

I see vapors exhaling from unexplored countries,

I see the savage types, the bow and arrow, the poison'd splint, the fetich, and the obi.

I see African and Asiatic towns,

I see Algiers, Tripoli, Derne, Mogadore, Timbuctoo, Monrovia,

I see the swarms of Pekin, Canton, Benares, Delhi, Calcutta,

Tokio,

I see the Kruman in his hut, and the Dahoman and Ashanteeman in their huts,

I see the Turk smoking opium in Aleppo,

[Herat,

I see the picturesque crowds at the fairs of Khiva and those of

I see Teheran, I see Muscat and Medina and the intervening sands, I see the caravans toiling onward,

I see Egypt and the Egyptians, I see the pyramids and obelisks, I look on chisell❜d histories, records of conquering kings, dynasties, cut in slabs of sand-stone, or on granite-blocks,

I see at Memphis mummy-pits containing mummies embalm'd, swathed in linen cloth, lying there many centuries,

I look on the fall'n Theban, the large-ball'd eyes, the sidedrooping neck, the hands folded across the breast.

I see all the menials of the earth, laboring,

I see all the prisoners in the prisons,

I see the defective human bodies of the earth,

The blind, the deaf and dumb, idiots, hunchbacks, lunatics,

The pirates, thieves, betrayers, murderers, slave-makers of the

earth,

The helpless infants, and the helpless old men and women.

I see male and female everywhere,

I see the serene brotherhood of philosophs,

I see the constructiveness of my race,

I see the results of the perseverance and industry of my race,

I see ranks, colors, barbarisms, civilizations, I go among them, I

mix indiscriminately,

And I salute all the inhabitants of the earth.

You whoever you are!

II

You daughter or son of England!

You of the mighty Slavic tribes and empires! you Russ in Russia! You dim-descended, black, divine-soul'd African, large, fineheaded, nobly-form'd, superbly destin'd, on equal terms with me!

You Norwegian! Swede! Dane! Icelander! you Prussian!