The Phenomenon Poem by John Nicholson

What gigs, what carts, what marvelling hearts
Are pressing the mountain brown
To see a bog the valley clog
And in deluge tumble down

Old trees which sprung when Homer sung
And wither'd heath and wither'd bent
Which bloom'd, as it may be presumed
When Roman hosts were hither sent

But the summer's heat the heaps of peat
Had dry'd in many a gaping chink
and when so dry the the clouds on high
Send down a flood to give it drink

And as each flaw with greedy jaw
Quaft with unsatiated thirst
The lightnings flashed, the thunders crasht
And its tremendous bowels burst

Charybdis' shore should never Roar
Nor Scylla murmur half so hoarse
Its works gave way & could not stay
But joined the deluge in its course

The scaly fry in myriads die
And eels full half a century old
No more can creep amid the deep
But helpless on the flood are roll'd

Leeds folks amaz'd in terror gaz'd
The river's contents beat their skill
But news went down to that great town
A bog had burst upon a hill

The learned men were eager then
That chymists to the hill should fly
for if the bog kept running still
Their trade must cease - they could not dye

So many went - the heath and bent
Were by their footsteps worn away
When they were there what did appear
For Crowhill bog had run away!!