Ysenda Maxtone Graham

High and mighty | 13 December 2018

Her hymns express with such unpretentious clarity and perfect scansion the essence of Christianity

issue 15 December 2018

In this 200th anniversary of the birth of Mrs C.F. Alexander, author of ‘Once in Royal David’s City’, all of us for whom Christmas properly begins when we hear the treble solo of verse one on Christmas Eve should remember her and be thankful.

She was born Cecil Frances Humphreys, ‘Fanny’, to a successful land agent in Dublin in 1818, and she seems to have been genuinely mild, obedient, good as He. From an early age she had an instinctive liking for vicars, rectors, deans, bishops and archbishops, although she was shy and at her most relaxed with children and dogs. She eventually married a Church of Ireland rector of her own, William Alexander, who later became a bishop, and they lived a long, happy life of parenthood and charitable works.

She wrote her book of Hymns for Little Children in 1848, before her marriage, hoping that the simple poetry would be helpful in fixing the understanding of Christian beliefs in children’s minds.

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