A Poem, dedicated to the Memory of the late learned and eminent Mr William Law, Professor of Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh
| In silence to suppress my griefs I've tried, And kept within its banks the swelling tide! But all in vain: unbidden numbers flow; Spite of myself my sorrows vocal grow. This be my plea.—Nor thou, dear Shade, refuse The well-meant tribute of the willing muse, Who trembles at the greatness of its theme, And fain would say what suits so high a name. Which, from the crowded journal of thy fame,— Which of thy many titles shall I name? For, like a gallant prince, that wins a crown, By undisputed right before his own, Variety thou hast: our only care Is what to single out, and what forbear. Though scrupulously just, yet not severe; Though cautious, open; courteous, yet sincere; Though reverend, yet not magisterial; Though intimate with few, yet loved by all; Though deeply read, yet absolutely free From all the stiffnesses of pedantry; Though circumspectly good, yet never sour; Pleasant with innocence, and never more. Religion, worn by thee, attractive show'd, And with its own unborrow'd beauty glow'd: Unlike the bigot, from whose watery eyes Ne'er sunshine broke, nor smile was seen to rise; Whose sickly goodness lives upon grimace, And pleads a merit from a blubber'd face. Thou kept thy raiment for the needy poor, And taught the fatherless to know thy door; From griping hunger set the needy free; That they were needy, was enough to thee. Thy fame to please, whilst others restless be, Fame laid her shyness by, and courted thee; And though thou bade the flattering thing give o'er, Yet, in return, she only woo'd thee more. How sweet thy accents! and how mild thy look! What smiling mirth was heard in all thou spoke; Manhood and grizzled age were fond of thee, And youth itself sought thy society. The aged thou taught, descended to the young, Clear'd up the irresolute, confirm'd the strong; To the perplex'd thy friendly counsel lent, And gently lifted up the diffident; Sigh'd with the sorrowful, and bore a part In all the anguish of a bleeding heart; Reclaim'd the headstrong; and, with sacred skill, Committed hallow'd rapes upon the will; Soothed our affections; and, with their delight, To gain our actions, bribed our appetite. Now, who shall, with a greatness like thy own, Thy pulpit dignify, and grace thy gown? Who, with pathetic energy like thine, The head enlighten, and the heart refine? Learn'd were thy lectures, noble the design, The language Roman, and the action fine; The heads well ranged, the inferences clear, And strong and solid thy deductions were: Thou mark'd the boundaries out 'twixt right and wrong, And show'd the land-marks as thou went along. Plain were thy reasonings, or, if perplex'd, Thy life was the best comment on thy text; For, if in darker points we were deceived, 'Twas only but observing how thou lived. Bewilder'd in the greatness of thy fame, What shall the Muse, what next in order name? Which of thy social qualities commend— Whether of husband, father, or of friend? A husband soft, beneficent, and kind, As ever virgin wish'd, or wife could find; A father indefatigably true To both a father's trust and tutor's too; A friend affectionate and staunch to those Thou wisely singled out; for few thou chose: Few, did I say, that word we must recall; A friend, a willing friend, thou wast to all. Those properties were thine, nor could we know Which rose the uppermost, so all wast thou. So have I seen the many-colour'd mead, Brush'd by the vernal breeze, its fragrance shed: Though various sweets the various field exhaled, Yet could we not determine which prevail'd, Nor this part rose, that honey-suckle call But a rich bloomy aggregate of all. And thou, the once glad partner of his bed, But now by sorrow's weeds distinguished, Whose busy memory thy grief supplies, And calls up all thy husband to thine eyes; Thou must not be forgot. How alter'd now! How thick thy tears! How fast thy sorrows flow! The well known voice that cheer'd thee heretofore, These soothing accents thou must hear no more. Untold be all the tender sighs thou drew, When on thy cheek he fetch'd a long adieu. Untold be all thy faithful agonies, At the last anguish of his closing eyes; For thou, and only such as thou, can tell The killing anguish of a last farewell. This earth, yon sun, and these blue-tinctured skies, Through which it rolls, must have their obsequies: Pluck'd from their orbits, shall the planets fall, And smoke and conflagration cover all: What, then, is man? The creature of a day, By moments spent, and minutes borne away. Time, like a raging torrent, hurries on; Scarce can we say it is, but that 'tis gone. Whether, fair shade! with social spirits, tell (Whose properties thou once described so well), Familiar now thou hearest them relate The rites and methods of their happy state: Or if, with forms more fleet, thou roams abroad, And views the great magnificence of God, Points out the courses of the orbs on high, And counts the silver wonders of the sky! Or if, with glowing seraphim, thou greets Heaven's King, and shoutest through the golden streets, That crowds of white-robed choristers display, Marching in triumph through the pearly way? Now art thou raised beyond this world of cares, This weary wilderness, this vale of tears; Forgetting all thy toils and labours past, No gloom of sorrow stains thy peaceful breast. Now, 'midst seraphic splendours shalt thou dwell, And be what only these pure forms can tell. How cloudless now, and cheerful is thy day! What joys, what raptures, in thy bosom play! How bright the sunshine, and how pure the air! There's no difficulty of breathing there. With willing steps a pilgrim at thy shrine, To dew it with my tears the task be mine; In lonely dirge, to murmur o'er thy urn And with new-gather'd flowers thy turf adorn: Nor shall thy image from my bosom part; No force shall rip thee from this bleeding heart. Oft shall I think o'er all I've left in thee, Nor shall oblivion blot thy memory; But grateful love its energy express (The father gone) now to the fatherless. |
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Poetical Works of William Falconer
The Life and Poetry of William Falconer
It may seem singular how the life of a sailor—a life so full of
vicissitude and enterprise, of hair's-breadth escapes, of contact
with wild men and wild usages, and of intercourse with a form of
nature so vast, so fluctuating, so mysterious, and so terribly
sublime as the ocean, which, in its calm and silence, forms an
emblem of all that is peaceful and profound, and, in its
tempestuous rage, of all that is unreconciled and anarchical in
the mind of man, now comparable to a
"Cradled child in dreamless slumber bound!"
and now to a mad sister of the earth, screaming and foaming in
fierce and aimless antagonism to her brother—should have reared
so few poets. This may arise either from the uncultivated and
careless character of sailors as a class, or from the influence
of habit in deadening the effect of the grandest objects. It is
the same with other modes of life equally romantic. What more so
than that of a shepherd among the Grampian Mountains, constantly
living between the everlasting hills and the silent sun and
stars, surrounded by streams, cataracts, deep dun moorlands, and
the wild-eyed and wild-winged creatures which dwell in them
alone, their life hid in Nature, and their cries of rude praise
going up continually to Nature's God? And yet the Highlands of
Scotland have not hitherto produced one great rural poet, except
Macpherson, who did belong to the peasantry. And so of the
seafaring class; only, so far as we remember, have expressed, the
one in verse, and the other in prose, the
poetry
of their
calling,—namely, Cooper and Falconer, both of whose descriptions
of sea storms and scenery have been equalled, if not surpassed,
however, by such landsmen as Byron and Scott. A poetic mind,
which comes in contact with strange and wonderful events or
scenery only at intervals, often carries away a much more vivid
idea of their striking features than those who reside constantly
in their midst. It must be a very rough rope, to borrow an image
from the theme, which does not feel softer after long handling.
It is the short and sudden impression, made in the twinkling of
an eye, which is at once the most lively and the most lasting.
When, however, enthusiasm continues, as in some favoured cases,
unabated by familiarity, and is united to thorough technical
knowledge, then the professional man may be nearly as successful
as the amateur, or if there be any deficiency in freshness of
feeling, it is made up for by accuracy of knowledge. It was so in
the case of James Hogg, the poet of the shepherd life of Southern
Scotland, and in William Falconer, the poet of British shipwreck.
We shall afterwards show how his knowledge of his profession
partly helped and partly hindered him in his poem.
William Falconer was born in Edinburgh in the year 1736. He was
the son of a poor barber in the Netherbow, who had two other
children, both deaf and dumb, who ended their days in a
poor-house. He early, through frequent visits to Leith, came in
contact with that tremendous element which he was to sing so
powerfully, and in which he was to sink at last—which was to
give him at once his glory and his grave. While a mere boy, he
went, by his own account, reluctantly on board a Leith merchant
ship, and was afterwards in the Royal Navy. Of his early
education or habits very little is known. He had all his
scholarship from one Webster. We figure him (after the similitude
of a dear lost sailor boy, a relative of our own) as a stripling,
with curling hair, ruddy cheek, form prematurely developed into
round robustness, frank, free, and manly bearing, returning ever
and anon from his ocean wanderings, and bearing to his friends
some rare bird or shell of the tropics as a memorial of his
labours and his love. Before he was eighteen years of age,
Providence supplied him with the materials whence he was to pile
up the monument of his future fame. He became second mate in the
ship
Britannia
, a vessel trading in the Levant. This
vessel was shipwrecked off Cape Colonna, exactly in the manner
described in the poem, which is just a coloured photograph of the
adventures, difficulties, dangers, and disastrous result of the
voyage. In 1751 we find him living in Edinburgh, and publishing
his first poem. This was an elegy on the death of Frederick,
Prince of Wales. It was followed by other pieces, which appeared
in the
Gentleman's Magazine
, and which will be found in
this volume. Some have claimed for him the authorship of the
favourite sea song, "Cease, Rude Boreas," but this seems
uncertain.
Falconer is supposed to have continued in the merchant service
(one of his biographers maintains that he was for some time in
the
Ramilies
, a man-of-war, which suffered shipwreck in
the Channel) till 1762, when he published his
Shipwreck
.
This poem was dedicated to the Duke of York, who had newly become
Rear-Admiral of the Blue on board the
Princess Amelia
,
attached to the fleet under Sir Edward Hawke. The Duke was not a
Solomon, but he had sense enough to perceive, that the sailor who
could produce such a poem was no ordinary man, and generous
enough to offer him promotion, if he should leave the merchant
service for the Royal Navy. Falconer, accordingly, was promoted
to be a midshipman on board the
Royal George
(Sir Edward
Hawke's ship); the same, we believe, which afterwards went down
in such a disastrous manner, and furnished a subject for one of
Cowper's boldest little poems.
The Shipwreck
was highly
commended by the
Monthly Review
,—then the leading
literary organ,—and became widely popular.
While in the
Royal George
, Falconer contrived to find time
for his poetical studies. Retiring sometimes from his messmates,
into a small space between the cable-trees and the ship's side,
he wrote his Ode on
the Duke of York's Second Departure from
England, as Rear-Admiral
. This poem was severely criticised
in the
Critical Review
. It has certainly much pomp, and
thundering sound of language and versification, but wants the
genuine Pindaric inspiration.
At the peace of 1763 the
Royal George
was paid off, and
Falconer became purser of the
Glory
, frigate of 32 guns.
About this time he married a young lady named Hicks, daughter of
a surgeon in Sheerness-yard—a lady more distinguished by her
mental than her physical qualities. The poet dubbed her in his
verses, "Miranda." It is hinted that he had some difficulty in
procuring her consent to marry him, and was forced to lay regular
siege to her in rhyme. At length she capitulated, and the
marriage was eminently happy. She survived her husband many
years; lived at Bath, and enjoyed a comfortable livelihood on the
proceeds of her husband's
Marine Dictionary
.
When the
Glory
was laid up at Chatham, Commissioner
Hanway, brother of the once celebrated Jonas Hanway (whom Dr
Johnson so justly chastised for his diatribe against Tea), showed
much interest in the pursuits and person of our poet. He even
ordered the captain's cabin to be fitted up with every comfort,
that Falconer might pursue his studies without expense, and with
all convenience. Here he brought his
Marine Dictionary
to
a conclusion—a work which had occupied him for years, and which
supplied a desideratum in the literature of the profession. The
design had been suggested by one Scott, and approved of by Sir
Edward Hawke; and the book, when it appeared in 1769, was greatly
commended by Dr Hamel, the Frenchman, who had gained note
himself, by producing some works on naval architecture. From the
Glory
Falconer received an appointment in the
Swift-sure
. In 1764 he issued a new edition of
The
Shipwreck
, carefully corrected, and with considerable
additions. The next year he issued a political poem, in which,
like a true tar of the
Royal George
, he took the King's
side, and emitted much dull and drivelling bile against Lord
Chatham, Wilkes, and Churchill. The satire proved that, though at
home on the ocean, he was utterly "at sea" in land-politics.
Falconer had now left his cabin study with its many pleasant
accommodations, and become a scribbler of all work in a London
garret. Here his existence ran on for a while in an obscure and
probably miserable current. It is said that Murray, the
bookseller, the father of
the
John Murray, of Albemarle
Street, wished to take the poet into partnership,—upon terms of
great advantage,—but that Falconer, for reasons which are not
known, declined the offer. "My Murray," as Byron calls him, was
destined instead to have his name connected with a grander and
ghastlier shipwreck than it lay in the brain of the projected
partner of his firm to conceive, or in his genius to
execute—that, namely, described in the ever-detestable, yet
ever-memorable, second canto of
Don Juan.
In 1769, a third edition of his poem was called for, and he was
employed in making improvements and additions when he was again
summoned to sea. In his hurry of departure, he is said to have
committed these to the care of the notorious David Mallett, the
son of a Crieff innkeeper, the friend of Thomson, the biographer
of Bacon, and, as Johnson called him, the "beggarly Scotchman,
who drew the trigger of Bolingbroke's blunderbuss of infidelity,"
who seems to have paid no manner of attention to his trust, as
mistakes in the nautical terms and a frequent inferiority in
execution manifest.
Falconer had undoubtedly thought the sea a hard and sickening
profession; but latterly found that writing for the booksellers
was a slavery still more abject and unendurable. He resolved once
more to embark upon the "melancholy main." Often as he had hugged
its horrors, laid his hand on its mane, and narrowly escaped its
devouring jaws, he was drawn in again as by the fatal suction of
a whirlpool into its power. Perhaps he had imbibed a passion for
the sea. At all events, he accepted the office of purser to the
Aurora frigate, which was going out to India, and on the 30th of
September 1769, he left England for ever. The Aurora was never
heard of more! Some vague rumours, indeed, prevailed of a
contradictory character—that she had been burned—that she had
foundered in the Mozambique Channel—that she had been cast away
on a reef of rocks near Macao—that five persons had been saved
from her wreck, but nothing certain transpired, except that she
was lost; and this fine singer of the sea along with her.
Unfortunate Aurora! dawn soon overcast! Unfortunate poet, so
speedily removed!
"It was that fatal and perfidious bark,
Built i' the eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark,
That laid so low that sacred head of thine."
The drowning of one poet of far loftier genius in the Bay of
Spezia, latterly proved that the offering up of Falconer's life
had not fully appeased the wrath of old Neptune, and that bards
may still entertain, in the lines of Wordsworth,
"Of the old sea some reverential fear."
Burns heard of and deplored the loss of the Poet of the
Shipwreck. In one of his letters to Mrs Dunlop, he mentions the
fact, and adds the beautiful words, "He was one of those daring,
adventurous spirits which Scotland beyond any other country is
remarkable for producing. Little does the fond mother think, as
she hangs delighted over the sweet little leech at her bosom,
where the poor fellow may hereafter wander, and what may be his
fate. I remember a stanza in an old Scottish ballad, which speaks
feelingly to the heart—
'Little did my mother think,
That day she cradled me,
What land I was to travel on,
Or what death I should die.'"
Falconer is represented as a bluff, blunt, but cheerful
sailor—fond of amusing his shipmates with acrostics on the names
of their mistresses—with little learning except in seamanship,
and what he had picked up in his travels. His smaller pieces
scarcely deserve criticsm. His whole reputation now reposes on
the one pillar of his one poem,
The Shipwreck
.
This poem was greatly overrated when it first appeared. It was by
some critics preferred to Virgil's
Æneid
, and
compared to the
Odyssey
. It is now, we think, as unjustly
depreciated. That there is a good deal of swollen commonplace in
the diction and sentiments, must be admitted. Falconer arose in a
bad age in respect of poetry. The terseness of Pope was gone, and
in his imitators only his tinkle remained. His exquisite sense
and trembling finish had vanished, and only his conventional
diction—the ghost of his greatness—was to be found in the poets
of the time. It was extremely natural that a half-taught mind
like Falconer's should be captivated by what was the mode of the
day. Indeed, Burns himself was only saved from the same error by
continuing to write in Scotch; many of his English verses and his
letters are marred by more or less of the disgusting and vicious
affectation of style which then prevailed; and in parts of
Campbell's
Pleasures of Hope
, we find the last modified
specimen of the evil. Hence, in Falconer the obsolete
mythological allusions—the names with classical
terminations—the perpetual apostrophes—the set and stilted
speeches he puts into the mouths of heroes—the bombast,
verbiage, and sounding sameness of much of his verse. Nor do we
greatly admire the story which he introduces with the poem, nor
the discrimination of his characters, nor, what may be called
strictly, the pathos of the piece. Indeed, considering the size
of the poem, there is so much that is vapid and common, that the
counter-balancing excellences must be great ere they could have
floated it so long. To use an expression suitable to the theme,
the vessel which has sailed so far, notwithstanding its numerous
leaks, must be of a strong and sturdy build.
And this is the main merit of
The Shipwreck
. It has in
most of its descriptive passages a certain rugged strength and
truth, which prove at once the perspicacity and the poetic vision
of the author, who, while he sees all the minute details of his
subject, sees also the glory of imagination shining around them.
A ship appears before his view, with its every spar and yard,
clear and distinct as if seen in meridian sunshine, and yet with
a radiance of poetry around it all, as if he were looking at it
by moonlight, or in the magical light of a dream. Take the
following lines, for instance:—
Up-torn reluctant from its oozy cave,
The ponderous anchor rises o'er the wave.
High on the slipp'ry masts the yards ascend,
And far abroad the canvas wings extend.
Along the glassy plain the vessel glides,
While azure radiance trembles on her sides."
We grant, indeed, that sometimes his technical lore rises up, as
it were, and drowns the poetry. What imaginative quality, for
example, have we in the following verses?
"The mainsail, by the squall so lately rent,
In streaming pendants flying, is unbent;
With brails refixed, another soon prepared,
Ascending spreads along beneath the yard;
To each yard-arm the head-rope they extend,
And soon their ear-rings and their robans bend.
That task perform'd, they first the braces slack,
Then to the chess-tree drag the unwilling tack;
And, while the lee clue-garnet's lower'd away,
Taught aft the sheet they tally, and belay."
This is mere log-book; and such passages are common in the poem.
But frequently he bathes the web of the shrouds and ship-rigging
in rich ideal gold. Take the following:—
"With equal sheets restrain'd, the bellying sail
Spreads a broad concave to the sweeping gale;
While o'er the foam the ship impetuous flies,
The helm the attentive timoneer applies:
As in pursuit along the aërial way,
With ardent eye the falcon marks his prey,
Each motion watches of the doubtful chase,
Obliquely wheeling through the fluid space;
So, govern'd by the steersman's glowing hands,
The regent helm her motion still commands."
Falconer may in some points be likened to Crabbe. Like him, he
excels in minute and patient painting. Like him he is capable at
times of extracting the imaginative element from the barest and
simplest details. And, like him, he sometimes sets before us,
mere dry inventories or invoices, instead of such poetical
catalogues as Homer gives of ships, and Milton of devils. It is
remarkable that Falconer never shines at all except when he is
describing ships or sea scenery.
"His path is on the mountain waves,
His home is on the deep."
No words in Scripture are so strange to him as these, "There
shall be no more sea." The course of his voyage in the
Shipwreck
, brings him past lands the most famous in the
ancient world for arts and arms, for philosophy, patriotism, and
poetry. And sore does he labour to lash himself into inspiration
as he apostrophizes them; but in vain—the result is little else
than furious feebleness and stilted bombast. But when he returns
to the element, the impatient, irregular, changeful, treacherous,
terrible ocean—and watches the night, winged with black storm
and red lightning, sinking down over the Mediterranean, and the
devoted bark which is helplessly struggling with its billows,
then his blood rises, his verse heaves, and hurries on, and you
see the full-born poet—
"High o'er the poop the audacious seas aspire,
Uproll'd in hills of fluctuating fire:
With labouring throes she rolls on either side,
And dips her gunnells in the yawning tide.
Her joints unhinged in palsied langour play,
As ice-flakes part beneath the noontide ray;
The gale howls doleful through the blocks and shrouds,
And big rain pours a deluge from the clouds.
From wintry magazines that sweep the sky,
Descending globes of hail incessant fly;
High on the masts with pale and lurid rays,
Amid the gloom portentous meteors blaze!
The ethereal dome in mournful pomp array'd,
Now buried lies beneath impervious shade,—
Now flashing round intolerable light,
Redoubles all the horrors of the night.
Such terror Sinai's trembling hill o'erspread,
When Heaven's loud trumpet sounded o'er its head.
It seem'd the wrathful angel of the wind,
Had all the horrors of the skies combined;
And here to one ill-fated ship opposed,
At once the dreadful magazine disclosed."
This is noble writing. "Deep calleth unto deep." It reminds us
of Pope's translation of that tremendous passage in the 8th Book
of the
Iliad
, where Jove comes forth, and darts his angry
lightnings in the eyes of the Grecians, and repels and appals
their mightiest; Nestor alone, but with his horse wounded by the
dart of Paris, sustaining the divine assault.
Lord Byron, in his letter to Bowles in defence of Pope, alludes
to Falconer's
Shipwreck
, and cites it in proof of the
poetical use which may be made of the works of art. But it has
justly been remarked by Hazlitt, in his very masterly reply,
published in the
London Magazine
, that the finest parts of
the
Shipwreck
are not those in which he appears to versify
parts of his own
Marine Dictionary
, or in which he makes
vain efforts to describe the vestiges of Grecian grandeur, but
those in which, as in the above passage, he mates with the
sublime and terrible
natural
phenomena he meets in his
voyage—the gathering of the storm—the treacherous lull of the
sea, breathing itself like a tiger for its fatal spring—the
ship, now walking the calm waters of the glassy sea, and now
wrestling like a demon of kindred power and fury with the angry
billows—the last fearful onset of the maddened surge—and the
secret stab given by the assassin rock from below, which
completes the ruin of the doomed vessel, and scatters its
fragments o'er the tide, growling in joy—these, as the poet
describes them, constitute the poetical glory of
The
Shipwreck
, and these have little connexion with art, and much
with nature.
Lord Byron was better at emulating than at criticising Falconer's
chef-d'oeuvre
. We have already once or twice alluded to
his
Shipwreck—surely the grandest and most characteristic
effort of his genius, in its demoniac force, and demoniac spirit.
As we have elsewhere said, "he describes the horrors of a
shipwreck, like a fiend who had, invisible, sat amid the shrouds,
choked with laughter—with immeasurable glee had heard the wild
farewell rising from sea to sky—had leaped into the long-boat as
it put off with its pale crew—had gloated o'er the cannibal
repast—had leered, unseen, into the 'dim eyes of those
shipwreck'd men'—and with a loud and savage burst of derision
had seen them at length sinking into the waves." The superiority
of his picture over Falconer's, lies in the simplicity and
strength of the style, in the ease of the narrative, in the
variety of the incidents and characters, and in certain short
masterly touches, now of pathos, now of infernal humour, and now
of description, competent only to Byron and to Shakspeare. Such
are,—
"Then shriek'd the timid and stood still the brave."
"The bubbling cry
Of some strong swimmer in his agony."
"For he, poor fellow, had a wife and children,
Two things to dying people quite bewildering,"—
and the inimitable description of the rainbow, closing
with,—
"Then changed like to a bow that's bent, and then—
Forsook the dim eyes of these shipwreck'd men."
The technicalities introduced are fewer; and are handled with
greater force, and made to tell more on the general effect. You
marvel, too, at the versatility of the writer, who seems this
moment to be looking at the scene with the eye of the melancholy
Jacques; the next, with the philosophical aspect of the
moralizing Hamlet; the next, with the rage of a misanthropical
Timon; and the next, with the bitter sneer of a malignant Iago:
and yet, who, amidst all these disguises, leaves on you the
impression that he is throughout acting the part, and displaying
the spirit, of a demon—a deep current of mockery at man's
miseries, and at God's providence, running under all his moods
and imitations. We read it once, when recovering from an illness,
and shall never forget the withering horror, and the shock of
disgust and loathing, which it gave to our weakened nerves.
Since Falconer's time, besides Byron, Scott, in the
Pirate
, and Cooper, there has not, as we hinted, been much
of the poetical extracted from the sea. The subject suggested in
Boswell's
Johnson
, by General Oglethorpe, as a noble theme
for a poem—namely,
The Mediterranean
, is still unsung, at
least by any competent bard. Mrs Hemans has one sweet strain on
the
Treasures of the Deep
. Allan Cunningham's
Wet Sheet
and Flowing Sea
, and Barry Cornwall's
The Sea, the
Sea
, are in everybody's mouth. We remember a young student at
Glasgow College, long since dead—George Gray by name—a thin
lame lad, with dark mild eyes, and a fine spiritual expression on
his pale face, handing in to Professor Milne of the Moral
Philosophy class, some lines which he read to his class, and by
which they, as well as the old, arid, although profound and
ingenious philosopher, were perfectly electrified. We shall quote
all we remember of them, and it will be thought much, when we
state that twenty-five years have elapsed since we read them.
They began—
"The storm is up; the anchor spring,
And man the sails, my merry men;
I must not lose the carolling
Of ocean in a hurricane;
My soul mates with the mountain storm,
The cooing gale disdains.
Bring Ocean in his wildest form,
All booming thunder-strains;
I'll bid him welcome, clap his mane;
I'll dip my temples in his yeast,
And hug his breakers to my breast;
And bid them hail! all hail, I cry,
My younger brethren hail!
The sea shall be my cemetery
Unto eternity.
How glorious 'tis to have the wave
For ever dashing o'er thee;—
Besides that dull and lonesome grave,
Where worms and earth devour thee.
My messmates, when ye drink my dirge,
Go, fill the cup from ocean's surge;
And when ye drain the beverage up,
Remember Neptune in the cup.
For he has been my brawling host,
Since first I roam'd from coast to coast;
And he my brawling host shall be—
I love his ocean courtesy—
His boisterous hospitality."
These lines, to us at least, seem to echo the rough roar of the
breakers, as they rush upon an iron-bound coast. Poor G. Gray! He
now sleeps, not in the bosom of that old Ocean he loved so
dearly, but, we think, in the kirkyard of Douglas, in the Upper
Ward of Lanarkshire,—a light early quenched,—but whose memory
this notice and these lines may, perhaps, for a season, preserve!
The
Sea
still lies over, after all written in prose or
rhyme regarding it, as the subject for a great poem; and it will
task all the energies of even the truest poet.
The Shipwreck
in three cantos.
The time employed in this poem is about six days.
Quæque ipse miserrima vidi,
Et quorum pars magna fui.
VIRG. ÆN. lib. ii.
The Shipwreck: Introduction
| ���While jarring interests wake the world to arms, And fright the peaceful vale with dire alarms, While Albion bids the avenging thunder roll Along her vassal deep from pole to pole; Sick of the scene, where War with ruthless hand Spreads desolation o'er the bleeding land; Sick of the tumult, where the trumpet's breath Bids ruin smile, and drowns the groan of death; 'Tis mine, retired beneath this cavern hoar, That stands all lonely on the sea-beat shore, Far other themes of deep distress to sing Than ever trembled from the vocal string: A scene from dumb oblivion to restore, To fame unknown, and new to epic lore; Where hostile elements conflicting rise, And lawless surges swell against the skies, Till hope expires, and peril and dismay Wave their black ensigns on the watery way. ���Immortal train! who guide the maze of song, To whom all science, arts, and arms belong; Who bid the trumpet of eternal fame Exalt the warrior's and the poet's name, Or in lamenting elegies express The varied pang of exquisite distress; If e'er with trembling hope I fondly stray'd In life's fair morn beneath your hallow'd shade, To hear the sweetly-mournful lute complain, And melt the heart with ecstasy of pain, Or listen to the enchanting voice of love, While all Elysium warbled through the grove: Oh! by the hollow blast that moans around, That sweeps the wild harp with a plaintive sound; By the long surge that foams through yonder cave, Whose vaults remurmur to the roaring wave; With living colours give my verse to glow, The sad memorial of a tale of woe! The fate in lively sorrow to deplore Of wanderers shipwreck'd on a leeward shore. ���Alas! neglected by the sacred Nine, Their suppliant feels no genial ray divine: Ah! will they leave Pieria's happy shore To plough the tide where wintry tempests roar? Or shall a youth approach their hallow'd fane, Stranger to Phoebus, and the tuneful train? Far from the Muses' academic grove 'Twas his the vast and trackless deep to rove; Alternate change of climates has he known, And felt the fierce extremes of either zone: Where polar skies congeal the eternal snow, Or equinoctial suns for ever glow, Smote by the freezing, or the scorching blast, 'A ship-boy on the high and giddy mast,'1 From regions where Peruvian billows roar, To the bleak coasts of savage Labrador; From where Damascus, pride of Asian plains, Stoops her proud neck beneath tyrannic chains, To where the Isthmus2, laved by adverse tides, Atlantic and Pacific seas divides: But while he measured o'er the painful race In fortune's wild illimitable chase, Adversity, companion of his way, Still o'er the victim hung with iron sway, Bade new distresses every instant grow, Marking each change of place with change of woe: In regions where the Almighty's chastening hand With livid pestilence afflicts the land, Or where pale famine blasts the hopeful year, Parent of want and misery severe; Or where, all-dreadful in the embattled line, The hostile ships in naming combat join, Where the torn vessel wind and waves assail, Till o'er her crew distress and death prevail. Such joyless toils in early youth endured, The expanding dawn of mental day obscured, Each genial passion of the soul oppress'd, And quench'd the ardour kindling in his breast. Then censure not severe the native song, Though jarring sounds the measured verse prolong, Though terms uncouth offend the softer ear, Yet truth and human anguish deign to hear: No laurel wreath these lays attempt to claim, Nor sculptured brass to tell the poet's name. ��� And, lo! the power that wakes the eventful song Hastes hither from Lethean banks along: She sweeps the gloom, and rushing on the sight, Spreads o'er the kindling scene propitious light. In her right hand an ample roll appears, Fraught with long annals of preceding years, With every wise and noble art of man, Since first the circling hours their course began: Her left a silver wand on high display'd, Whose magic touch dispels oblivion's shade: Pensive her look; on radiant wings that glow Like Juno's birds, or Iris' flaming bow, She sails; and swifter than the course of light Directs her rapid intellectual flight: The fugitive ideas she restores, And calls the wandering thought from Lethe's shores; To things long past a second date she gives, And hoary time from her fresh youth receives; Congenial sister of immortal Fame, She shares her power, and Memory is her name. ��� O first-born daughter of primeval time! By whom transmitted down in every clime The deeds of ages long elapsed are known, And blazon'd glories spread from zone to zone; Whose magic breath dispels the mental night, And o'er the obscured idea pours the light: Say on what seas, for thou alone canst tell, What dire mishap a fated ship befell, Assail'd by tempests, girt with hostile shores? Arise! approach! unlock thy treasured stores! Full on my soul the dreadful scene display, And give its latent horrors to the day. |
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