]

Our fathers' God! from out whose hand
The centuries fall like grains of sand,
We meet to-day, united, free,
And loyal to our land and Thee,
To thank Thee for the era done,
And trust Thee for the opening one.

Here, where of old, by Thy design,
The fathers spake that word of Thine
Whose echo is the glad refrain
Of rended bolt and falling chain,
To grace our festal time, from all
The zones of earth our guests we call.

Be with us while the New World greets
The Old World thronging all its streets,
Unveiling all the triumphs won
By art or toil beneath the sun;
And unto common good ordain
This rivalship of hand and brain.

Thou, who hast here in concord furled
The war flags of a gathered world,
Beneath our Western skies fulfil
The Orient's mission of good-will,
And, freighted with love's Golden Fleece,
Send back its Argonauts of peace.

For art and labor met in truce,
For beauty made the bride of use,
We thank Thee; but, withal, we crave
The austere virtues strong to save,
The honor proof to place or gold,
The manhood never bought nor sold!

Oh make Thou us, through centuries long,
In peace secure, in justice strong;
Around our gift of freedom draw
The safeguards of thy righteous law:
And, cast in some diviner mould,
Let the new cycle shame the old!

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.

* * * * *

HYMN OF THE WEST.[A]

WORLD'S FAIR, ST. LOUIS.

[Footnote A: Copyright 1904 by Robert Allan Reid.]

[1904.]

O Thou, whose glorious orbs on high
Engird the earth with splendor round,
From out Thy secret place draw nigh
The courts and temples of this ground;
Eternal Light,
Fill with Thy might
These domes that in Thy purpose grew,
And lift a nation's heart anew!

Illumine Thou each pathway here,
To show the marvels God hath wrought
Since first Thy people's chief and seer
Looked up with that prophetic thought,
Bade Time unroll
The fateful scroll,
And empire unto Freedom gave
From cloudland height to tropic wave.

Poured through the gateways of the North
Thy mighty rivers join their tide,
And on the wings of morn sent forth
Their mists the far-off peaks divide.
By Thee unsealed,
The mountains yield
Ores that the wealth of Ophir shame,
And gems enwrought of seven-hued flam