O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming--
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the clouds of the fight
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming!
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
O! say, does the star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?
On that shore dimly see through the mists of the deep
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;
'Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave;
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto--"_In God is our trust_:"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
* * * * *
[Footnote:1. The song is taken as it appears in Stedman and Hutchinson's
_Library of American Literature_, vol. iv. p. 419. The text, slightly
different from the common one, corresponds to the facsimile of
a copy made by Mr. Key in 1840.]
THOMAS CAMPBELL
SCOTLAND, 1777-1844