Labente jam solis rota. C. Coffin. [Afternoon, Sunday.] Appeared in his Hymni Sacri, 1736, p. 93, as "Prono volutus impetu," and again in the Paris Breviary the same year, as "Labente jam solis rota." It is also in J. Chandler's Hymns of the Primitive Church, 1837, No. 8, and in Card. Newman's Hymni Ecclesiae, 1838 and 1865. Translated as:—
1. Now the day's declining wheel. By I. Williams, in the British Magazine, Jan. 1834; and again in his Hymns translated from the Parisian Breviary, 1839, p. 9, in 14 irregular lines. Rearranged as a hymn in 3 stanzas of 4 lines, in 4 of L.M., it was given in the English Hymnal, 1852, No. 10, and repeated in 1856 and 1861.
2. As now the sun's declining rays. By J. Chandler, in his Hymns of the Primitive Church, 1837, p. 7. It was soon incorporated in several hymnbooks as an afternoon hymn, and gradually grew in favour until few modern hymnbooks of the first rank are found without it. Usually the text is given without alteration as in the People's Hymnal, 1867. The text of Hymns Ancient & Modern, 1861 and 1875, is Chandler altered by the Compilers, the changes being in stanza i. and the doxology. This text is repeated in Thring's Collection, 1882, and others. In Kennedy, 1863, Chandler's translation is revised by the Editor.
--Excerpts from John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
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