| |
| ARE these the ancient holy hills | |
| Where angels walked of old? | |
| Is this the land our story fills | |
| With glory not yet cold? | |
| For I have passed by many a shrine | 5 |
| O’er many a land and sea; | |
| But still, oh! promised Palestine, | |
| My dreams have been of thee. | |
| |
| I see thy mountain cedar green, | |
| Thy valleys fresh and fair, | 10 |
| With summers bright as they have been | |
| When Israel’s home was there. | |
| Tho’ o’er thee sword and time have passed, | |
| And cross and crescent shone, | |
| And heavily the chain has pressed | 15 |
| Oh! they are still our own. | |
| |
| Thine are the wandering race that go | |
| Unblest through every land, | |
| Whose blood hath stained the polar snow, | |
| And quench’d the desert sand. | 20 |
| And thine the home of hearts that turn | |
| From all earth’s shrines to thee | |
| With their lone faith for ages born | |
| In sleepless memory. | |
| |
| For throngs have fallen, nations gone | 25 |
| Before the march of time, | |
| And where the ocean rolled alone | |
| Are forests in their prime. | |
| Since gentile ploughshares marr’d the brow | |
| Of Zion’s holy hill | 30 |
| Where are the Roman eagles now? | |
| Yet Judah wanders still. | |
| |
| And hath she wandered thus in vain | |
| A pilgrim of the past? | |
| No! long deferred her hope hath been | 35 |
| But it shall come at last. | |
| For in her wastes a voice I hear, | |
| As from a prophet’s urn, | |
| It bids the nations build not there | |
| For Jacob shall return. | 40 |
| |
| Oh! lost and loved Jerusalem | |
| Thy pilgrim may not stay | |
| To see the glad earth’s harvest home | |
| In thy redeeming day. | |
| But now resigned in faith and trust | 45 |
| I seek a nameless tomb; | |
| At least beneath thy hallowed dust | |
| Oh! give the wanderer room. | |
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