A poem of the great Crich landslip of 1882 was written by Thomas Crofts in "A Castle in the Air and other poems" published in 1892
The Great Landslip at Crich
ONE morning a short time ago,
Crich cliff had decided to move
On a trip to the valley below,
And give a few houses a shove.
Mrs. Allsopp’s was one, and she sent
For a lawyer, proceedings to stay;
But the cliff was on moving intent,
So slipped from its bed of soft clay,
When down went the house, it is said,
With a touch of the cliff on its side.
“ How sad ! oh, how sad, if in bed
Mrs. Allsop had been,” people cried.
Her life’s course would then have been run,
And this would have been her last day
’Neath the cliffs, but the good Dr. Dunn
Came and bore her from danger away.
Some ladies they will or they won’t;
’Tis just as they take it, and this
Had been warned, but persisted “ I don’t
Believe with the cliff aught’s amiss.”
But O fates ! and O stars ! she was glad
To skedaddle when chasms yawned wide,
And ’tis plain if she hadn’t she had
Been buried alive in its side.
Now the moral I wish you to draw
From this tale is as plain as the sun—
When a mountain as big as “ Skiddaw ” Takes a
walk, it is time you should run;
That, in fact, if you stand in the way,
And refuse at friends’ warnings to flee, But
decide, like a donkey, to stay,
In your case it may end with U.P.
The Stand which so long has withstood
The storms and the tempests that blow,
The “ natives ” declare is as good
As booked for the chasm below.
Let visitors, then, take great care
How they venture the structure to climb,
Lest, when they are poised in mid-air,
They pass from the confines of time.
But should you this danger escape
With unbroken bones and sound skin, Beware of
the chasms that gape,
Nor stumble and tumble therein.
So if you to grief after this,
In spite of these warnings should come,
When too late you will find that- it is
The safest and best place at home.
With thanks to Rosemary Hall