Classic Poem

Daughter of the woods and hills, Dartmouth, my stern,
Rock-boned and wind-blown sibyl of the snows!
First in thy praise whom we can never praise
Enough, I lay my laurel in my turn
Before thee in thy uplands. No one goes
Forth from thy granite through the summer days.
And many a land of apple and of rose,
Keeping in his heart more faithfully than I
The love of thy grim hills and northern sky.

Mother of Webster! Mother of men! Being great,
Be greater; let the honor of thy past,
For which we sit in festival, elate,
Be but the portent of thy larger fate,
The adumbration of a deed more vast.
With eyes upon the future, thou and we
Shall better celebrate the past we praise,
And in the pledge of unaccomplished days
Find a new joy thrill through our pride in thee.