The cross is to be erected in hail of Monkwearmouth, on Roker Point, where it will be seen by the vast holiday population of Wear and Tyne.  It was felt that, whatever were the natural claims of Jarrow and Durham, the church at one place and the tomb at the other were lasting monuments of the great Northumbrian we wish to honour, and that it was unwise either at Jarrow or Monkwearmouth to entrust such fine sculpture as is intended to the grime or the fume of the open air.  To place the cross under cover within a building at either place was impossible.  The committee, therefore, determined to erect it, by leave of the town council of Sunderland, in clear and clean air, on a headland which must have been familiar to Bede, and which is actually “in territorio monasterii,” given by Egfrid the King to Benedict Biscop, for the founding of the sister monasteries of Monkwearmouth and Jarrow.

The cross, 25ft. high, will be Anglian in form, as being germane to the district and contemporary with Bede’s time.  The shaft of the cross on the west side will be ornamented with scroll patterns from the Lindisfarne Gospel and from the stones at Jarrow, and will contain, with a twisted loop of the duck-billed serpent seen on the Monkwearmouth doorway, pictorial subjects from the life of Bede.  On the east side will be roman lettering, giving two extracts from Bede’s work—one from the Ecclesiastical History, one from his Life of St. Cuthbert—both extracts speaking of the accuracy and care with which he worked.  On the south side, within a vine scroll, will be carved in alto and bas relief the heads and busts of the friends and associates of Bede.  On the north side a scroll introducing birds and animals, spring from a harp, emblematic of his poetic gifts, will show Bede’s love of nature.

Beneath these four sculptured sides will run in a band the little verse written by Bede on his death-bed, beginning, “Fore there nedfarae,” in Latin, in rune, in minuscule, and in English.  And on the block out of which the cross rises will be carved a short inscription to the glory of God and in memory of His servant Bede. 

(Times, 21 April 1903, p. 5; Carlisle Journal, 28 April 1903, p. 5)

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Very little was said; one heard the click, click of the shears, and sometimes the sigh of a pocket whetstone as the shearer sharpened his weapons; but occasionally it seemed as if all the dogs of the dale had gone mad; such barking! such fun!  For some sheep, after being let free from the shearing-bench and feeling his unwonted lightness of body, had gone off on a scamper, and must needs be brought back to the pen to wait for sauving or salving and straking or marking. (pp. 258-259)

The gravity of the whole business struck one.  It was solemn work of a very solemn order.  At least, so the men astride of the clipping benches seemed to feel.  I daresay they were right to be solemn, for I know that a “Herdwick” can kick and struggle with much spirit, till he is mastered.  The shears are sharp and very near the surface, and no man cares to wound his neighbour’s sheep.  But in addition these men were friends from a “lang time sen,” and one clipping bench was filled to-day by a new man; “T’ auld un hed gone down.  It was aw in course o’ natur,” said my friend, “so you cannot complain, but it natterly teks heart o’ yan for aw that, to see ald nebbors and good nebbors neah mair at clippin’ time; and it meks one think to onesel’ that it’s mebbe last time fer some on us an’ aw.” (p. 259)

But if there was a kind of dignified solemnity in the air as far as the clippers went, there was plenty of sparkle and life amongst the youngsters.  It seemed to be their privilege to catch the sheep as they were called for and hug them to the shearers’ benches.  They would hear the cry, “Bring us anudder—a good un this time, my lad!” and the boy dashed into the flock, and, while the dogs barked with excitement, seized and dragged them willy nilly to their fate. (p. 260)

At eleven o’clock a girl came from the farm saying, “Oor master bids you coom to lunch,” and in a moment the benches were deserted, and the men were busy washing their hands in the tin basins by the garden wall, and others went round “backside o’ the house, and cleaned up in the back kitchen.”  We sat down, no one spoke nor stirred finger, till the master of the feast, with a kindly smile, said: “Now my lads, reach till,” and we “reached till,” and took good oaten cake or haver-bread, and cheese with milk or ale or coffee to wash it down, as men minded. (p. 260)

It was astonishing to note how little was eaten, and in twenty minutes we were all out of the house and hard at the clipping again.  So the work went forward till dinner was served, and so the work went forward till tea came round; and the men took this at their clipping stools, for there was a deal yet to be done if the flock was to be finished off before night-time. (p. 260)

There was something for all to do; the little girls, home rom school, were soon busy carrying the fleeces which were folded and tie dup inside-out in a very clever way by a single turn of the wrist, to the barn; while the keenest amongst them took their share at catching and bringing the woolled ones to be shorn. (pp. 260-261)….

The light began to go for all that long after-glow of Cumberland clipping-nights, and still the shears clicked away, till the girl came with a summons to supper, and the work of the day was over. (p. 262)

“A reet doon good supper it was, an’ aw,” said one of the shearers afterwards, and he spoke but the honest truth.  It was the women-bodies’ turn to show what they could do to crown the clipping with success, and they certainly managed to make all the hungry shearers feel that a farm supper-table would be a very poor thing if it were not for the womenkind.  There was a bit o’ fiddling after supper, and a deal o’ good shepherds crack, and the following famous Herdwick shepherd’s song [‘The Sheep-Shearing Song] was sung by John Birkett to an old-fashioned country-side tune.  It was a song all seemed to know, and had been sung time out of mind at all the clippings under Helvellyn.  How they made the rafters ring with the chirus! (p, 263) 

(Life and Nature at the English Lakes, pp. 250-264)

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We leave the church, where weekly prayer was
        said,
Ringed round with graves and fenced with elm and
    yew;
Praise in a fairer shrine shall men renew,
Vows at a nobler altar shall be made;
Unheeded now the mossy dial’s shade,
No preacher climbs three stories high to view
The village magnate in his musty pew,
And Georgian galleries to dust shall fade.
White gleams the tower beyond the village street,
And proud and loud ring out the lustier chimes;
But some heart-flowers, transplanted, ne’er can grow:
These old church grasses still shall feel the feet
Of those, who hear the bells of other times,
And seek the holiest spot on earth they know.

(Sonnets Round the Coast, p. 140)

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They lie as they would never wake again,
        Those weary fisher-boats, in slumber sound;
But, as one sees at times a dreaming hound
Stir, and believe his phantom quarry slain,
Sudden they start, and soon the ocean plain
Is studded o’er with sails.  Away they bound!
Some keen sea-hawk the silver drove has found;
The wingèd huntsmen follow in her train.
With such an equal pace the swarthy keels,
Slipped from their moorings, hurry to the prey,
It seems as if the sky, the ocean, all
Move with their motion if they move at all;
And like a dream the quiet pageant steals,
To melt into the far horizon’s grey.

(Sonnets Round the Coast, p. 173)

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