He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass.


Even so He came, and shall still come. Three days ago the field,
in its pageant of fresh beauty, with shimmering blades and tossing
banners, greeted sun and shower alike with joy for the furtherance
of its life and purpose; now, laid low, it hears the young grass
whisper the splendour of its coming green; and the poor swathes are
glad at the telling, but full of grief for their own apparent
failure. Then in great pity comes the rain, the rain of summer,
gentle, refreshing, penetrating, and the swathes are comforted, for
they know that standing to greet or prostrate to suffer, the
consolations of the former and the latter rain are still their own,
with tender touch and cool caress. Then, once more parched by the
sun, they are borne away to the new service their apparent failure
has fitted them for; and perhaps as they wait in the dark for the
unknown that is still to come they hear sometimes the call of the
distant rain, and at the sound the dry sap stirs afresh--they are
not forgotten and can wait.

"Say unto your sisters Ruhamah," cries the prophet.

"He shall come down like rain on the mown grass," sang the poet of
the sheepfolds.

"My ways are not your ways, saith the Lord."


I remember how I went home along the damp sweet-scented lanes
through the grey mist of the rain, thinking of the mown field and