Chapter CXL

‘I see before me the Gladiator lie:
He leans upon his hand--his manly brow
Consents to death, but conquers agony,
And his droop’d head sinks gradually low--
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one,
Like the first of a thunder-shower; and now
The arena swims around him; he is gone,
Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hail’d the wretch who won.