Ah, solid, weighty, beautiful!

How could I first have said that thou wert dull?

How could have wondered that men willingly

Gave up their homes, and toiled and died for thee?

Theirs was the martyrdom in which was planted

A glorious State, by precious memories haunted:

Ours is the comfort, ease, the power, the fame

Of an exalted name:

Theirs was the struggle of a proud ambition—

Ours is the full fruition.