"Bonny Grizzy" was a Scottish maid, though her gallant if lawless deed was performed on Northumbrian soil; but there is one Northumbrian maiden whose fame will live as long as the sea-waves beat on the wild north-east coast, and as long as men's hearts thrill to a tale of courage and high resolve. Grace Darling's name still awakens in every bosom a response to all that is compassionate, courageous, and unselfish; and the thoughts of all north-country folk bold that admiration for the gentle girl which has been voiced as no other could voice it, in the magical words of Swinburne--
"Take, O star of all our seas, from not an alien hand, Homage paid of song bowed down before thy glory's face, Thou the living light of all our lovely stormy strand, Thou the brave north-country's very glory of glories, Grace."
The story of her gallantry has been many times re-told, but never grows wearisome. The memory of that stormy voyage of the _Forfarshire_, which ended in disaster on the Harcar rocks in the Farne group, remains in men's minds as the dark and tragic setting which throws into bright relief the gallant action of the father and daughter who dared almost certain death to rescue their fellow-creatures in peril. It was in September, 1838, that the ill-fated vessel left Hull for Dundee; but a leak in the boilers caused the fires to be nearly extinguished in the storm the vessel encountered. It reached St. Abb's Head by the aid of the sails, but then drifted southward, driven by the storm, and struck in the early morning, in a dense fog, on the Harcar rocks. Nine of the people on board managed to escape in a small boat, which was driven in a miraculous manner through the only safe outlet between the rocks. They were picked up by a passing boat and taken to Shields. Meanwhile a heavy sea had crashed down upon the _Forfarshire_, and broken it in half, one portion, with the greater number of crew and passengers, being swept away immediately. The remaining portion, the fore part of the vessel, was firmly fixed upon the rock. Here the shivering survivors clung all that stormy day, the waves dashing over them continually. The captain and his wife were washed overboard, clasped in each others' arms; and two little children, a boy of eight and a girl of eleven years of age, died from exposure and the relentless buffeting of the waves, their distracted mother clasping them by the hand long after life was extinct. To a terrible day succeeded a yet more terrible night.