No face was so bright, no heart more true,

And none were so sweet as he;

-and as the congregation caught up the refrain,—

O where is my boy tonight?

O where is my boy tonight?

My heart o'erflows, for I love him he knows,

O where is my boy tonight?

-a young man who had been sitting in a back seat made his way up the aisle and sobbed, "Mother, I'm here!" The embrace of that mother and her long-lost boy turned the service into a general hallelujah. At the inquiry meeting that night there were many souls at the Mercy Seat who never knelt there before--and the young wanderer

was one.

Mr. Sankey, when in California with Mr. Moody, sang this hymn in one of the meetings and told the story of a mother in the far east who had commissioned him to search for her missing son. By a happy providence the son was in the houseand the story and the song sent him home. repentant.

At another time Mr. Sankey sang the same hymn from the steps of a snow-bound train, and a man between whose father and himself had been trouble and a separation, was touched, and returned to be reconciled after an absence of twenty years.

At one evening service in Stanberry, Mo., the singing of the hymn by the leader of the choir led

to the conversion of one boy who was present, and whose parents were that night praying for him in an eastern state, and inspired such earnest prayer in the hearts of two other runaway boys' parents that the same answer followed.

There would not be room in a dozen pages to record all the similar saving incidents connected with the singing of "Where Is My Wandering Boy?" The rhetoric of love is strong in every note and syllable of the solo, and the tender chorus of voices swells the song to heaven like an antiphonal prayer.

Strange to say, Dr. Lowry set lightly by his hymns and tunes, and deprecated much mention of them though he could not deny their success. An active Christian since seventeen years of age, through his early pulpit service, his six years' professorship, and the long pastorate in Plainfield, N. J., closed by his death, he considered preaching to be his supreme function as it certainly was his first love. Music was to him "a side-issue," an "efflorescence," and writing a hymn ranked far below making and delivering a sermon. "I felt a sort of meanness when I began to be known as a composer," he said. And yet he was the author of a hymn and tune which "has done more to bring back wandering boys than any other" ever written.*

*Where Is My Boy Tonight" was composed for a book of temperance hymns, The Fountain of Song, 1877.

"ETERNITY."

This is the title and refrain of both Mrs. Ellen M. H. Gates' impressive poem and its tune.

O the clanging bells of Time!

Night and day they never cease;
We are wearied with their chime,

For they do not bring us peace.
And we hush our hearts to hear,

And we strain our eyes to see
If thy shores are drawing near
Eternity! Eternity!

Skill was needed to vocalize this great word, but the ear of Mr. Bliss for musical prosody did not fail to make it effective. After the beautiful harmony through the seven lines, the choral reverently softens under the rallentando of the closing bars, and dwelling on the awe-inspiring syllables, solemnly dies away.

TRIUMPH BY AND BY.

This rally-song of the Christian arena is wonderfully stirring, especially in great meetings, for it sings best in full choral volume.

CHORUS.

By and by we shall meet Him,
By and by we shall greet Him,
And with Jesus reign in glory,
By and by!

We'll follow where He leadeth,
We'll pasture where He feedeth,
We'll yield to Him who pleadeth
From on high.

Then nought from Him shall sever,
Our hope shall brighten ever

And faith shall fail us never;
He is nigh.

CHORUS

By and by, etc.

Dr. Christopher Ruby Blackall, the author of the hymn, was born in Albany, N. Y., Sept. 18, 1830. He was a surgeon in the Civil War, and in medical practice fifteen years, but afterwards became connected with the American Baptist Publication Society as manager of one of its branches. He has written several Sunday-school songs set to music by W. H. Doane.

THE TUNE,

By Horatio R. Palmer is exactly what the hymn demands. The range scarcely exceeds an octave, but with the words "From on high," the stroke of the soprano on upper D carries the feeling to unseen summits, and verifies the title of the song. From that note, through melody and chorus the "Triumph by and by" rings clear.

"NOT HALF HAS EVER BEEN TOLD”

This is emotional, but every word and note is uplifting, and creates the mood for religious impressions. The writer, Rev. John Bush Atchison, was born at Wilson, N. Y., Feb. 18, 1840, and died July 15, 1882.

I have read of a beautiful city

Far away in the kingdom of God,
I have read how its walls are of jasper,
How its streets are all golden and broad;
In the midst of the street is Life's River
Clear as crystal and pure to behold,
But not half of that city's bright glory
To mortals has ever been told.

The chorus (twice sung)—

Not half has been told,

-concludes with repeat of the two last lines of this first stanza.

Mr. Atchison was a Methodist clergyman who composed several good hymns. "Behold the Stone is Rolled Away,” “O Crown of Rejoicing," and "Fully Persuaded," indicate samples of his work more or less well-known. "Not Half Has Ever Been Told" was written in 1875.

THE TUNE.

Dr. Otis F. Presbry, the composer, was a young farmer of York, Livingston Co., N. Y., born there the 20th of December, 1820. Choice of a pro