The Falmouth Bell

Never was there lovelier town     Than our Falmouth by the sea.     Tender curves of sky look down     On her grace of knoll and lea.     Sweet her nestled Mayflower blows     Ere from prouder haunts the spring     Yet has brushed the lingering snows     With a violet-colored wing.     Bright the autumn gleams pervade     Cranberry marsh and bushy wold,     Till the children's mirth has made     Millionaires in leaves of gold;     And upon her pleasant ways,     Set with many a gardened home,     Flash through fret of drooping sprar     Visions far of ocean foam.     Happy bell of Paul Revere,     Sounding o'er such blest demesne     While a hundred times a year     Weaves the round from green to green.     Never were there friendlier folk     Than in Falmouth by the sea,     Neighbor-households that invoke     Pride of sailor-pedigree.     Here is princely interchange     Of the gifts of shore and field,     Starred with treasures rare and strange     That the liberal sea-chests yield.     Culture here burns breezy torch     Where gray captains, bronzed of neck     Tread their little length of porch     With a memory of the deck.     Ah, and here the tenderest hearts,     Here where sorrows sorest wring     And the widows shift their parts     Comforted and comforting.     Holy bell of Paul Revere     Calling such to prayer and praise.     While a hundred times the year     Herds her flock of faithful days!     Greetings to thee, ancient bell     Of our Falmouth by the sea!     Answered by the ocean swell,     Ring thy centuried Jubilee!     Like the white sails of the Sound,     Hast thou seen the years drift by,     From the dreamful, dim profound     To a goal beyond the eye.     Long thy maker lieth mute,     Hero of a faded strife;     Thou hast tolled from seed to fruit     Generations three of life.     Still thy mellow voice and clear     Floats o'er land and listening deep,     And we deem our fathers hear     From their shadowy hill of sleep.     Ring thy peals for centuries yet,     Living voice of Paul Revere!     Let the future not forget     That the past accounted dear!