• Author: Meader. J.R.
• Editor: B-7413
• Newspaper: The Umpire volume 5
• Page Number:
• Date: 11 8 1916
• Tags:
• poetry

*THE HYMN THAT BORE HIM HOME

“Take that preaching chap away now; I don’t want to hear him tell Of the blessings of a heaven, of the torments of a hell; He will brag of being perfect, or will lord o’er me at least, And I’d rather die this moment than be bothered by a priest.”’ He was dying in the prison, all alone, without a word From an anxious heart to tell him of the mercies of the Lord; But he lay and tossed in fever, wishing that the ling’ring breath Would announce to him the presence of the eager angel, Death. Suddenly, up from the court-yard, rose the soft words of a hymn; He had heard it in his childhood, ere his heart was black with sin; And it touched him now as coming as a message from the hand : Of his mother as she sung it in his own far native land. He was dying now, a stranger and an outcast, in his cell, But this hymn that seemed to reach him from those angels lips could tell, Better than the best of preachers, what he longed for, what he had When he knelt at night and mother’s side a lad:

“Jesus, lover of my soul, Let me to Thy bosom fly, While the nearer waters roll, While the tempest still is high; Hide me, O my Saviour hide, Till the storm of life is past; Safe into the haven guide, Oh, receive my soul at last.”

As he raised himself, with wonder peering out into the night, From the darkness all around him suddenly there rose a light, And he saw, beyond his bedside, all the scene he loved so well, In those distant days of childhood—how they came he could not' tell.

And his mother stood before him, as he saw her long ago, With her care-worn, wrinkled forehead, with her hair as white as snow, So he streched his arm to greet her—wnen he woke and was alone! But up from the prison court-yard rose the soft, angelic tone:

“Other refuge have I none, Hangs my helpless soul on Thee; Leave, O leave me not alone, Still support and comfort me. All my trust on Thee is stayed, All my help from Thee I bring; Cover my defenseless head With the shadow of Thy wing.”

When the prison-keeper found him, he was kneeling on the floor, With his hands before him folded, but the pains of life were o’er; From the glory of forgiveness he had lost the look of sin, All because an unknown singer chanced to sing a vesper hymn.

—J. R. Meader.

*We publish the above poem at the request of a “King’s Daughter,” whose interest in the welfare of E. S. P. inmates finds expression in the “hope that the poem may touch a responsive chord in the heart of some mothei’s son among ‘the boys.’ "—Editor.