O saint of summer, what can we sing for you

O saint of summer, what can we sing for you? Jan Struther* (1901-53). This is a hymn for St Bartholomew’s Day (24 August). It was written for SofPE (1931). The problem for Struther, as for all writers on St Bartholomew, was that nothing is known about his life except that he was chosen as one of the twelve apostles. Percy Dearmer even suggested (Songs of Praise Discussed, 1933, p. 142) that a hymn had been written beginning ‘O blessed St Bartholomew/There’s nothing that we know of you’ (perhaps this was Dearmer himself, or Struther). EH got round the problem of St Bartholomew’s Day by printing a general saints’ hymn by Athelstan Riley*, ‘Saints of God! Lo, Jesu’s people/ Age to age your...