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| GRANDEUR is written on thy throne, | |
| Beauty encompasseth thy mien; | |
| The glory of the North alone, | |
| Is thine, O Ottawa, my Queen. | |
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| Here as the years of promise roll | 5 |
| Shall gather all a nation’s pride; | |
| The great of intellect and soul | |
| Shall build a city, vast and wide. | |
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| Here shall the sculptor’s vision stand | |
| For ever caught in burnished bronze; | 10 |
| Roof, tower, and column, nobly plann’d, | |
| Shall greet the future’s mystic dawns. | |
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| Here shall the plunging torrent’s wrath | |
| Strange kindness to the toiler show; | |
| Here o’er the steel, the watery path, | 15 |
| The East and West commingling flow. | |
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| Here shall the human wants that lead | |
| To hunger, thirst, and sore distress, | |
| Be met before their cruel need | |
| By trade shorn of its sordidness. | 20 |
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| Not here shall shelter foul disease | |
| In sunless lairs bereft of sky; | |
| Nor Death be hidden in the lees | |
| Of fountains which man’s needs supply. | |
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| A press shall flourish, kind but grave, | 25 |
| Well recking of the trusts they bear; | |
| Unbought of wealth, unawed by knave, | |
| The truth shall modestly declare. | |
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| Like honeyed flowers that call the bees, | |
| The hoarded lore of every age | 30 |
| Shall gather gladsome companies | |
| Of lovers of the printed page. | |
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| Here shall the code of Righteousness | |
| Be set to common speech once more, | |
| And noble deeds shall daily bless | 35 |
| Of which men only dreamed before. | |
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| And here the ancient hills appeal | |
| To all that most endures in man, | |
| Rebuking hate and strident zeal, | |
| For ah, how brief our breathing span! | 40 |
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| Beloved of cities thou shalt be— | |
| Wise, fair, strong, joyous and serene— | |
| Once more accept my fealty— | |
| My love, O Ottawa, my Queen! | |
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