CANADA

  Canada, the blest—­the free! 
  With prophetic glance, I see
  Visions of thy future glory,
  Giving to the world’s great story
  A page, with mighty meaning fraught,
  That asks a wider range of thought. 
  Borne onward on the wings of Time,
  I trace thy future course sublime;
  And feel my anxious lot grow bright,
  While musing on the glorious sight;—­
  My heart rejoicing bounds with glee
  To hail thy noble destiny!

  Even now thy sons inherit
  All thy British mother’s spirit. 
  Ah! no child of bondage thou;
  With her blessing on thy brow,
  And her deathless, old renown
  Circling thee with freedom’s crown,
  And her love within thy heart,
  Well may’st thou perform thy part,
  And to coming years proclaim
  Thou art worthy of her name. 
  Home of the homeless!—­friend to all
  Who suffer on this earthly ball! 
  On thy bosom sickly care
  Quite forgets her squalid lair;
  Gaunt famine, ghastly poverty
  Before thy gracious aspect fly,
  And hopes long crush’d, grow bright again,
  And, smiling, point to hill and plain.

  By thy winter’s stainless snow,
  Starry heavens of purer glow,
  Glorious summers, fervid, bright,
  Basking in one blaze of light;
  By thy fair, salubrious clime;
  By thy scenery sublime;
  By thy mountains, streams, and woods;
  By thy everlasting floods;
  If greatness dwells beneath the skies,
  Thou to greatness shalt arise!

  Nations old, and empires vast,
  From the earth had darkly pass’d
  Ere rose the fair auspicious morn
  When thou, the last, not least, wast born. 
  Through the desert solitude
  Of trackless waters, forests rude,
  Thy guardian angel sent a cry
  All jubilant of victory! 
  “Joy,” she cried, “to th’ untill’d earth,
  Let her joy in a mighty birth,—­
  Night from the land has pass’d away,
  The desert basks in noon of day. 
  Joy, to the sullen wilderness,
  I come, her gloomy shades to bless,
  To bid the bear and wild-cat yield
  Their savage haunts to town and field. 
  Joy, to stout hearts and willing hands,
  That win a right to these broad lands,
  And reap the fruit of honest toil,
  Lords of the rich, abundant soil.

  “Joy, to the sons of want, who groan
  In lands that cannot feed their own;
  And seek, in stern, determined mood,
  Homes in the land of lake and wood,
  And leave their hearts’ young hopes behind,
  Friends in this distant world to find;
  Led by that God, who from His throne
  Regards the poor man’s stifled moan. 
  Like one awaken’d from the dead,
  The peasant lifts his drooping head,
  Nerves his strong heart and sunburnt hand,
  To win a potion of the land,
  That glooms before him far and wide
  In frowning woods and surging tide
  No more oppress’d, no more a slave,
  Here freedom dwells beyond the wave.