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| O FORTRESS city, bathed by streams, | |
| Majestic as thy memories great, | |
| Where mountain-floods and forests mate | |
| The grandeur of the glorious dreams, | |
| Born of the hero-hearts who died | 5 |
| In founding here an empire’s pride. | |
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| Who hath not known delight, whose feet | |
| Hath paced thy streets, thy terrace way; | |
| From rampart sod or bastion grey | |
| Hath marked thy sea-like river greet | 10 |
| The bright and peopled banks which shine | |
| In front of the far mountain’s line; | |
| Thy glittering roofs below, the play | |
| Of currents where the ships entwine | |
| Their spars, or laden pass away. | 15 |
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| As we who joyously once rode | |
| Past guarded gates to trumpet sound, | |
| Along the devious ways that wound | |
| O’er drawbridges, through moats, and showed | |
| The vast St. Lawrence flowing, belt | 20 |
| The Orleans Isle, and seaward melt; | |
| Then by old walls with cannon crowned, | |
| Down stair-like streets, to where we felt | |
| The soft winds blown o’er meadow ground. | |
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| Where flows the Charles past wharf and dock, | 25 |
| And Learning from Laval looks down, | |
| And quiet convents grace the town; | |
| There, swift to meet the battle-shock, | |
| Montcalm rushed on; and eddying back | |
| Red slaughter marked the bridge’s track; | 30 |
| See now the shores with lumber brown, | |
| And girt with happy lands which lack | |
| No loveliness of summer’s crown. | |
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| Quiet hamlet alleys, border-filled | |
| With purple lilacs, poplars tall, | 35 |
| Where flits the yellow-bird, and fall | |
| The deep eave-shadows. There, when tilled | |
| The peasant’s field or garden bed, | |
| He rests content if o’er his head, | |
| From silver spires, the church bells call | 40 |
| To gorgeous shrines, and prayers that gild | |
| The simple hopes and lives of all. | |
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