O’er the world’s widest harvest field
Seed now sown in many a clime,
Harvest manifold shall yield
In His own good time.
Curtained clouds without a rift
Hide the mount at morning’s prime,
These the sunlight’s smile shall lift
In His own good time.
Through the mist of doubts and fears
Let us bravely upward climb,
Till our Father’s face appears
In His own good time.
Where sits Satan throned in might,
Dens of darkness, haunts of crime,
There shall penetrate the light
In His own good time.
All our search for harmony,
Broken music, halting rhyme,
Shall become heavens symphony
In His own good time.
Work to-day for work is blest,
Work till rings the evening chime;
He shall give His Sabbath rest
In His own good time.
Come, Lord, in Thy Royal state
Decked in glory all sublime,
Blest and only Potentate
In Thine own good time.
By R.W. Ryde (an extract from the College Magazine 1909)
Reverend Robert William Ryde
Reverend R.W. Ryde
Reverend Robert William Ryde, a scholar of Jesus College Cambridge, was a Classics Master at Monkton Coombe School in Somerset, England.
He was a minister of religion and member of the Church Missionary Society (CMS).
His dispatch to Ceylon was to take up the post of Vice Principal at Trinity College, Kandy. In 1895, he assumed duties of his newly appointed post, but left College in 1899 for the post of Principal at St. John’s College, Jaffna.
In 1900, on his return, he was appointed to the helm of Trinity, succeeding his predecessor Mr Napier-Clavering.
His period as Principal spanned only two years, after which he quit his teaching career. But the impression he left on the students of both schools was a lasting one, as a result he was made the President of the St John’s College Old Boys’ Association in 1904, and of the Trinity OBA (Colombo) in 1908.
In the midst of his ministerial duties at St. Andrews Church in Anuradhapura he was taken ill. Reverend Ryde died in Colombo in 1909.
In honour of this fine educationalist whose loss was felt deeply in Trinity, the OBA of Colombo has since been presenting The Ryde Gold Medal to the best all round boy in his name.
