Nearer my Father's house,
Where the many mansions be,
Nearer the great white throne,
Nearer the crystal sea.
Nearer the bound of life,
Where we lay our burdens down,
Nearer leaving the cross
Nearer gaining the crown.
THE TUNE.
The old revival tune of “Dunbar,” with its chorus, “There'll be no more sorrow there,” has been sung to the hymn, but the tone-lyric of Philip Phillips, “Nearer Home,” has made the words its own, and the public are more familiar with it than with any other. It was this air that a young man in a drinking house in Macao, near Hong-Kong, began humming thoughtlessly while his companion was shuffling the cards for a new game. Both were Americans, the man with the cards more than twenty years the elder. Noticing the tune, he threw down the pack. Every word of the hymn had come back to him with the echo of the music.