[About seven hundred hymns and poems were submitted to the committee, and they were to select the hymn best adapted to the home missionary work, and to give the writer of it $100. To the writer of the best poem for the same purpose they were to give $50. They failed to select a poem, but unanimously agreed upon the hymn below as the best, on the whole, for the object proposed. But the writer of it required, as a condition of accepting the reward, that her name should not be given to the public, but that the hymn, if published, should be announced as by “a lady of Virginia.” The hymn which has been accepted, deserves, as it will no doubt secure, a permanent place in our American hymnology. We have great pleasure in laying it before our readers.]