Scripture Verse

Introduction

Anecdote

In the ju­bi­lee year of [Queen Vic­tor­ia] em­bass­ies from the chief courts of the world came to do her hon­our. Among these was an em­bas­sy from the mon­arch of Ma­da­gas­car.

One of those in the em­bas­sy was a Ho­va, a man of years, dark skinned and in­tel­li­gent, and de­sir­ing for his peo­ple’s sake to make a good im­pres­sion, he, in of­fer­ing his con­gra­tu­la­tions re­called ma­ny in­ci­dents of his long jour­ney around the Cape in a sail­ing ves­sel; and when he had told all he could re­col­lect, he asked if it would be agree­a­ble that he should sing—that he had one song in his heart that had whiled away ma­ny a wea­ry hour in his pil­grim­age through life.

The ex­pec­ta­tion was that the ven­er­a­ble Ho­va would sing some­thing hea­then­ish and na­tion­al—some­thing so­cial or con­vi­vi­al—but to the as­ton­ish­ment of all, he be­gan in a thin sweet te­nor:

Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee!

He sang it through all its stan­zas, each verse grow­ing more sub­dued and ten­der. At the close there was pro­found, awk­ward si­lence, which was dif­fi­cult to break, for some were af­fect­ed to tears in see­ing the com­ing back of seed sown on the wa­ters in mis­sion­ary faith and zeal—all were tak­en by sur­prise, lit­tle ex­pect­ing to hear from the lips of the Ho­va on this grand oc­ca­sion the sweet­est of the songs of Zi­on.

His name, says the re­port­er of the day, was as start­ling in length as his per­for­mance was sur­pris­ing:—Right Hon. Lord Rain­i­fer­on­gal­a­ro­vo.

Morrison, pp. 95–96