Accept the work our hands have wrought;
Accept, O God, this earthly shrine;
Be Thou our Rock, our Life, our Thought,
And we, as living temples, Thine.

The celebrated hymnist happily has left a personal account of how he
wrote "America." Lowell Mason, the composer, had given him a collection
of German books containing songs for children with the request that Smith
should examine them and translate anything of merit.

"One dismal day in February, 1832," he wrote long afterward, "about half
an hour before sunset, I was turning over the leaves of one of the music
books when my eye rested on the tune which is now known as 'America.' I
liked the spirited movement of it, not knowing it at that time to be 'God
save the King.' I glanced at the German words and saw that they were
patriotic, and instantly felt the impulse to write a patriotic hymn of my
own, adapted to the tune. Picking up a scrap of waste paper which lay
near me, I wrote at once, probably within half an hour, the hymn
'America' as it is now known everywhere. The whole hymn stands today as
it stood on the bit of waste paper, five or six inches long and two and a
half wide."

Dr. Smith was a member of the celebrated Harvard class of 1829, to which
Oliver Wendell Holmes also belonged. The latter wrote a poem for one of
the class reunions, in which he referred to the distinguished hymn-writer
in the following lines:

And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith--
Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith;
But he shouted a song for the brave and the free--
Just read on his medal, 'My country,' 'of thee.'

On November 19, 1895, the venerable pastor and poet was called suddenly
to his eternal home. He died as he was taking a train from Boston to
preach in a neighboring town.

A Pearl among Christmas Carols

It came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold;
"Peace on the earth, good will to men,
From heaven's all-gracious King:"
The world in solemn stillness lay
To hear the angels sing.

Still through the cloven skies they come
With peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heavenly music floats
O'er all the weary world;
Above its sad and lowly plains
They bend on hovering wing,
And ever o'er its Babel sounds
The blessed angels sing.