1786 - 1854 Hymnal Number: d122 Author of "Down from the willow bough" in A Prayer Meeting and Revival Hymn Book . 27th ed. Southey, Caroline Ann, née Bowles, daughter of Charles Bowles, of Buckland, near Lymington, was born in 1786; married, in 1839, to Robert Southey, the poet; and died in 1854. Her publications include Solitary Hours, 1826; The Birthday, a Poem, 1836; and some prose works. Her Poetical Works were published in 1867; and her correspondence with Southey in 1882. A few pieces from her works are in common use as hymns:—
1. I weep, but not rebellious tears. For the Aged. Published in her Solitary Hours, 1826; and, again, in her Poetical Works, 1867, p. 285, in 5 stanzas of 6 lines. It is given, in full, in the Baptist Psalms & Hymns, 1858. To the line, "The faithful few made perfect there " (st. v., 1. 5), the fol¬lowing note is appended in the Poetical Works:-—"The word ‘few' is used here in no presumptuously exclusive sense of the Author's, but simply as being the scrip¬tural phrase, 'Many are called, but few are chosen.' The word having been altered, lately, in two religious publications, where the poem was inserted unknown to the Author, it is thought proper to annex this note."
2. Launch thy bark, mariner. For Sailors. Given in her Solitary Hours, 1826, p. 22, in 5 stanzas of 8 lines, and entitled, "The Mariner's Hymn;" also in her Poetical Works, 1867.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)
Caroline A. B. Southey