Stanzas, Addressed to Northumbria
Old Janus advances all cloathed in white,
And his long-smother’d tempests sends forth;
On the mountains cold bosom, as black as the night,
Sinks the dark rolling clouds of the north.
In their winding sheets rob’d are the hills and the dales,
And the verdure no longer is seen;
Save where the slow streams wind their way thro’ the vales,
With their margins besprinkled with green.
On the stump of a thorn, with his bosom of red,
See the robin his thankful notes raise
For his crumbs—by his precepts, oh! may I be led
To give the All-bounteous due praise.
Hark! the blast sweeps the heath; see the mountain fir bend;
Thick tempests obscure the pale sky;
The fast-gathering drift on the hedge see descend,
And streams of faint lightning flash by.
Yes, Northumbria, thy climate is cold and severe;
There winter usurps the blithe spring;
And through the wide range of the circling year,
Chilling damps to thy bosom will cling.
Yet thy health-giving breeze, be it ever so cold,
Knits the nerves of thy children for war;
Whose proud speaking eye in the soldier behold,
And for whose dauntless heart view the tar.
He bounds o’er thy brooks, and he climbs thy wild rocks,
Health and vigour inhales from the breeze;
Despising in manhood the tempest’s rude shocks,
Fearless quits his dear home for the seas.
Lo! the canvas it swell’d: from the banks of the Tyne,
The vessel scuds swiftly along;
From his eye independant, see stern valour shine,
As he hums a Northumbrian song.
Now the battle-day comes, and far, far from his shore,
The squadrons of France meet his eyes;
Unaw’d his proud heart, ’mid the cannons’ loud roar,
He with Collingwood conquers and dies.
From thy hills, too, at sound of the heart-rousing drum,
Thy war breathing soldier retires;
In lion-like strength seeks the carnage field’s hum,
Fights—blesses thy name—and expires!
Such, such are the heroes in thy vallies rear’d,
Such, Northumbria, thy children still be:
Proud commerce, from Tyne’s banks in glory uprear’d,
To her breast clasps the lords of the sea.
Come forward ye dark rolling clouds of the north,
Who shrinks from your blasts but the coward and slave?
Ye nerve the bold sons that Northumbria sends forth,
To fight for her king on Trafalgar’s proud wave.
January 2d, 1807.
Bothwell.