Part I

, respectively, of the above-mentioned poem.

Katherine Hankey, born in Clapham, England, was the daughter of a banker. She was a refined, consecrated woman, a Sunday school teacher, and organizer of Bible classes among working girls. She travelled in South Africa to look after an invalid brother and became so interested in mission work that she devoted thereto the income from her writings.

_MUSIC._ HANKEY was composed for these words. For comments on the composer, Wm. G. Fischer, see Hymn 469. The melody, written in 1869, was harmonized by Hubert P. Main (No. 426) and became popular at revival meetings. It is one of the gospel song tunes that is included in the more dignified church hymnals.

494. Sing them over again to me _Philip P. Bliss_, 1838-76

Written especially for use in the first issue of _Words of Life_, a Sunday school paper published by Fleming H. Revell. Two years later, George Stebbins introduced the song in an evangelistic campaign which he and Dr. Pentecost were conducting in New Haven, Conn., the two men singing the song as a duet. The song was received with enthusiasm and immediately became popular. It was published in _Gospel Hymns, No. 3_ and has had a wide use in evangelistic services and in the Sunday schools throughout the country.

For comments on Philip P. Bliss, author and composer, see Hymn 442.

495. Tell me the old, old story _Katherine Hankey_, 1834-1911

For comments on the author, Katherine Hankey, and an account of the origin of this hymn, see Hymn 493.

_MUSIC._ Dr. W. H. Doane heard the poem read at a Y.M.C.A. Conference at Montreal in 1867 and was so impressed by it that he copied it and later set it to music while riding on a stage coach during a vacation in the White Mountains.

For comments on W. H. Doane, see Hymn 313.

496. There is a Name I love to hear _Frederick Whitfield_, 1829-1904

A hymn on the name of Jesus which was published in 1855 in hymn-sheets and leaflets in various languages. In 1861, it appeared in the author’s _Sacred Poems and Prose_, a volume containing twenty-six hymns.

Frederick Whitfield, born at Threapwood, Shropshire, was a minister in the Anglican Church. Educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he took his B.A. degree in 1859, he became, successively, curate of Otley, vicar of Kirby-Ravensworth, senior curate of Greenwich, and vicar of St. John’s, Bexley. He is the author of nearly thirty volumes of prose and poetry.

_MUSIC._ O HOW I LOVE JESUS is a traditional melody of unknown authorship.

497. Rescue the perishing _Fanny J. Crosby_, 1820-1915

A rallying song for Christian workers in all parts of the world. This is the only one of Fanny Crosby’s hymns to be included in the famous English publication, _Hymns Ancient and Modern_. It was a great favorite of Frances E. Willard and Frances Murphy, temperance crusaders, and D. L. Moody was very fond of it.

The hymn had its origin in a visit which the blind poet made to one of the worst slum districts in New York City. When she addressed the men at a rescue mission, Miss Crosby heard harrowing tales of lost and perishing people. She wrote:

“While I sat there that evening the line came to me, ‘Rescue the perishing, care for the dying.’ I could think of nothing else that night. When I arrived at my home, I went to work at once, and before I retired the entire hymn was ready for a melody.”

For comments on Fanny J. Crosby see Hymn 313.

_MUSIC._ RESCUE was composed by Dr. Doane for this hymn. The hymn and tune have resounded through many thousands of mission services.

For comments on Wm. H. Doane see Hymn 313.

498. O scatter seeds of loving deeds _Jessie Brown Pounds_, 1861-1921

For comments on Jessie Brown Pounds, see Hymn 453.

Her song poem has gone around the world on the wings of this tune composed by Fred A. Fillmore, of the musically famous Fillmore brothers. See comments at Hymn 453. Fred A. was born May 15, 1856, at Paris, Illinois.

499. Judge me, God of my salvation _Psalm 43_

A metrical version of Psalm 43 which may be compared with the version from the Scottish Psalter at No. 587. The fifth verse of the Psalm is made to serve as the refrain. The poet who made the version has not been identified. The hymn and tune were taken from the _Psalter_ of the United Presbyterian Church.

_MUSIC._ AMARA was composed by William O. Perkins, concerning whom no information has been found.

500. I can hear my Savior calling _E. W. Blandy_

An intimate hymn of personal consecration. The repetition of the phrases and the close harmony of the music have made the use of this song, even without the aid of an accompanying instrument, easy and enjoyable. No information has been found concerning the author, E. W. Blandy (misspelled Blandly in the _Hymnary_).

_MUSIC._ WHERE HE LEADS ME is admirably suited to the words. No information has come to light concerning the composer, J. S. Norris.

501. And must I be to judgment brought _Charles Wesley_, 1707-88

The hymn, originally in eight stanzas, was entitled “A Thought on Judgment” and was written for children! Why Wesley wrote such serious-minded hymns for children is explained in his preface to _Hymns for Children_, from which this hymn is taken:

There are two ways of writing or speaking to children. The one is to let ourselves down to them; the other, to lift them up to us. Dr. Watts wrote in the former way, and has succeeded admirably well, speaking to children as children and leaving them as he found them. The following hymns are written on the other plan. They contain strong and manly sense, yet expressed in such plain and easy language as even children may understand. But when they do understand them, they will be children no longer—only in years and in stature.

For comments on Charles Wesley, see Hymn 6.

_MUSIC._ MARLOW was composed by Rev. John Chetham, 1700-63, an English clergyman, curate of Skipton.

502. Savior, lead me lest I stray _Frank M. Davis_, 1839-96

The words and music were written on the deck of a steamer that plied between Baltimore and Savannah.

Frank M. Davis was born on a farm near Marcellus, New York, the youngest of a family of ten children. He began composing tunes at an early age and became a teacher of vocal and instrumental music. He travelled extensively through the eastern and southern states, directing chorus choirs and teaching vocal classes. He compiled several Sunday school collections, among them _New Pearls of Song_, 1877, and _Notes of Praise_, of which more than 100,000 copies were sold. Davis is the author of over 100 vocal and instrumental compositions. He died suddenly of heart failure at Chesterfield, Indiana, where he was attending a camp meeting.

503. My days are gliding swiftly by _David Nelson_, 1793-1844

A hymn written by a preacher while hiding from pursuing slave-holders whose anger and violence were aroused by Nelson’s aggressive anti-slavery views.

David Nelson, a surgeon in the U. S. Army during the war of 1812, left his profession to become a minister, meanwhile owning and operating a plantation in Missouri. After listening to an address on slavery, he declared himself in favor of freeing the slaves and advocated the plan of colonizing them in Africa. This so enraged some of the slave-holders that they drove Nelson from his home. To avoid mob violence, he escaped, reaching, after three days and nights of wandering, the Mississippi River opposite Quincy, Illinois. Hiding there in the bushes, with his pursuers near but unable to find him, the river gliding swiftly before him, he wrote this hymn on the back of old letters he had in his pocket. He was finally rescued by members of the Quincy Congregational Church who, having learned of his plight, took him on a fishing canoe and rowed him across the river, still pursued, to safety and friends, on the hospitable shore of a free state.

_MUSIC._ SHINING SHORE, one of the composer’s most popular tunes, has been given various arrangements for voice and instruments. Root has written concerning the origin of the tune:

One day, I remember, as I was working at a set of graded part-songs for singing classes, mother passed through the room and laid a slip from one of the religious newspapers before me, saying, “George, I think that would be good for music.” I looked at the poem which began, “My days are gliding swiftly by,” and a simple melody sang itself in my mind as I read. I jotted it down and went on with my work. That was the origin of the music of “The Shining Shore.” Later, when I took up the melody to harmonize it, it seemed so very simple and commonplace, that I hesitated about setting the other parts to it. I finally decided that it might be useful to somebody, and I completed it, though it was not printed until some months afterward. In after years I examined it in an endeavor to account for its great popularity—but in vain. To the musician there is not one reason in melody or harmony scientifically regarded, for such a fact. To him hundreds of others, now forgotten, were better.

For comments on George F. Root, 1820-95, see Hymn 418.

504. There’s a land that is fairer than day _S. F. Bennett_, 1836-98

“It’ll be all right _by and by_.” This trivial remark by Webster, when one morning, seemingly depressed, he was asked by his partner, Bennett, what was wrong with him, was the occasion for the writing of this hymn. The author and composer were friends and partners in the music publishing business in the village of Elkhorn, Wis. Webster, the musician of the firm, was inclined to be nervous and subject to periods of depression. His partner understood this and often effected a cure, as on this occasion, by putting him to work on a new song. Upon Bennett’s suggestion, the two agreed that morning to make a hymn out of the idea, “The sweet by and by.” Bennett penned the words and handed them to Webster, who promptly wrote the music. Words and music were thus produced in the incredibly short time of about thirty minutes. The song was published soon afterward in a Sunday school song book, _The Signet Ring_, which the two men were compiling. From there it found its way into numerous collections of songs until today “it is translated into various foreign languages and sung in every land under the sun.”

Sanford Filmore Bennett was a native of the West. He settled in Elkhorn, Wis., in 1861, to devote himself to music but later studied medicine and practiced in Richmond, Ill.

_MUSIC._ SWEET BY AND BY. Joseph Philbrick Webster, 1819-75, composer of this tune, was born in New Hampshire. He was an active member of the Handel and Haydn Society and various other musical organizations. He lived in Madison, Indiana, and Racine, Wisconsin, before finally moving to Elkhorn, in 1857.

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