It was the evening sacrifice; the gathered crowd were there;
They thronged about the temple; it was the hour of prayer;
And costly offerings were cast into the Treasury,
By noble and by ruler, by scribe and Pharisee.
But see, a woman cometh, with feeble steps and slow,
And eyes long dimmed with weeping through many an hour of wo!
She, timid and half shrinking, gave all that she possessed,
And yet she knew not, from that hour, she was forever blest.
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The world has hoary grown, through all these weary years;
It has been steeped for ages in blood and woman's tears;
But the voice of God is sounding, "Let the oppress'd go free!
As ye do it to the least of these, ye do it unto Me."
A gallant band has gather'd upon the battle-plain;
They have fallen in the conflict; they writhe on beds of pain.
Shall we not help our brothers?—they are fighting for the right;
For the freedom of the black man, the freedom of the white.
Waiting no second summons, they come, the good and true,
Their hands are full of gifts; they ask, "What would'st thou have me do?"
And our merchant-princes vieing, their precious treasures bring,
Counting their silver and their gold a very little thing.
And, following their footsteps, comes an aged female slave;
What bears she in her sable hands? her garments for the grave.
"It is my sole possession; take it, I beg, from me;
It may help some wounded soldier, and they have set us free!"
Within the noisome street she has toiled through days of pain,
While the cold her limbs were stiffening, her head was wet with rain,
That, when they dressed her for the grave, she might be clothed in white;
But lo! beyond the pearly gates awaits her garment bright!
And she says, in simple language, "The good God will not care
What wraps my furrow'd body, when I shall meet Him there!"
O! daughter of a trodden race, where'er thy tale is told,
Thy name shall be forever blest, like hers in days of old!