For I am weak and weary,
And helpless and defiled.
* * * * * *
Tell me the story simply
That I may take it in—
That wonderful Redemption,
God's remedy for sin.
THE TUNE.
Dr. W.H. Doane was present at the International Conference of the Y.M.C.A. at Montreal in 1867, and heard the poem read—with tears and in a broken voice—by the veteran Major-General Russell. It impressed him so much that he borrowed and copied it, and subsequently set it to music during a vacation in the White Mountains.
The poem of fifty stanzas was entitled “The Story Wanted;” the sequel or answer to it, by Miss Hankey, was named “The Story Told.” This second hymn, of the same metre but different accent, was supplied with a tune by William Gustavus Fischer.