The writings of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume 4.
John Greenleaf Whittier, Ed.

I saw, as I prayed, my home once more,
The house, the barn, the elms by the door,

The grass-lined road, that riverward wound,
The tall slate stones of the burying-ground,

The belfry and steeple on meeting-house hill,
The brook with its dam, and gray grist mill,

And I knew in that vision beyond the sea,
The very place where my well must be.

God heard my prayer in that evil day;
He led my feet in their homeward way,

From false mirage and dried — up well,
And the hot sand storms of a land of hell,

Till I saw at last through the coast-hill's gap,
A city held in its stony lap,

The mosques and the domes of scorched Muscat,
And my heart leaped up with joy thereat;

For there was a ship at anchor lying,
A Christian flag at its mast-head flying,

And sweetest of sounds to my homesick ear
Was my native tongue in the sailor's cheer.