While doing some online research about the history of the Hudson River Palisades I turned up a reference in a Google Book (*Palisades: 100,000 Acres in 100 Years * by Robert O. Binnewies) that claimed that Rudyard Kipling wrote the following little rhyme to describe the rock-mining that took place on the Jersey cliffs at the turn of the 19th century. The book does not appear to have footnotes or endnotes, so there’s no cite that I can double check. (Either that or the notes are on the pages that are not included in the online excerpt.)
We hear afar the sounds of war,
as rocks they rend and shiver;
They blast and mine and rudely scar
the pleasant banks of the river.
I want to know more about this rhyme. Is it really by Kipling and was he, in fact, writing about the blasting of the Jersey Palisades? Does it have a title? Was it part of some greater work? When exactly did he write it? My online searching has turned up nothing.
Here’s a little background on the topic. The Hudson River Palisades are the sheer cliffs that run along the New Jersey bank of the Hudson River opposite northern Manhattan, the Bronx and parts further north. Jerseybound drivers/pedestrians/bikers who use the George Washington Bridge see them as they cross the Hudson. During the American Revolution, the area saw significant military action, especially at Ft. Lee. In the 1880s and 1890s the traprock mining industry had taken over the area. Miners blasted away at the cliff faces with dynamite, much to the distress of preservationists who cherished the site for its scenic and historic value. Conservation-minded groups in NY and NJ mounted a preservation campaign that resulted (in the early 20th century) in the creation of the Palisades Interstate Park Commission, which bought up all the cliffland and folded it into the Palisades Interstate Park system that exists today.
I don’t know about Kipling – I never heard that he visited New York. But poet John Masefield apparently wrote a poem entitled “The Western Hudson Shore” about the New Jersey Palisades, which seems a safer bet:
This is the site I got that quote from, by the way. I couldn’t find anything from it on the 'net (and googling the lines gives nothing – I’d think, if Kipling wrote it, I’d stumble across a hit):
I’ve also done a text search of some very large poetry and literature databases that i have access to through my university, and those lines didn’t come up anywhere.
Kipling traveled widely & lived in the USA for years (in Vermont). Surely, he’d been to NYC. He was also interested in technology–a few of his stories are science fiction.
However, the verse quoted sounds like* faux* Kipling. Apparently other Dopers haven’t found a link.
Turns out **Bridget Burke ** was right. It *is * faux Kipling!
Unless I’m reading this letter to the New York Times (4/6/1905) wrong, the real author was B.H. Nadal, who, several Google hits would seem to indicate, was a minister who wrote poetry on the side.
I think the book author had a lot of nerve attributing the rhyme to Kipling. The letter mentions RK, but certainly does not credit him with the poem. Don’t you agree that that was sloppy research and/or wishful thinking?
It was in a house he called Naulakha, located near Brattleboro. It’s now owned by an excellent British organization The Landmark Trust, and you can stay there.
A piece of trivia gleaned from a biography: Kilping was one of the first to own a pair of skis in Vermont.