"Oh, 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 perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming And the rockets' red glare The bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there; Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave? "On that shore dimly seen 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 in the stream; 'Tis the star-spangled banner; oh, long may it wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave! "And where are the foes 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! "Oh, thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation! Blest with victory and peace, may the heaven-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!" A moment of silence followed the dying away of the last strains, then Captain Raymond resumed his narrative: "The first rough notes of the song were written by Key upon the back of a letter he happened to have in his pocket, and after his arrival in Baltimore he wrote it out in full. The next morning he read it to his uncle, Judge Nicholson, one of the gallant defenders of the fort, asking his opinion of it. The judge was delighted with it, took it to the printing office of Captain Benjamin Edes, and directed copies to be struck off in handbill form. That was done, the handbills were distributed, and it was sung first in the street, in front of Edes' office, by James Lawrenson, a lad but twelve years of age. That was on the second day after the bombardment of Fort McHenry. The song was 'set up,' printed, and distributed by another lad seventeen or eighteen years old, named Samuel Sands. It created intense enthusiasm, was sung nightly at the theater, and everywhere in public and private."