falconer's shipwreck. 131 



But Falconer had yet other difficulties to combat ; 

 his was a poem of real life, and that again as it 

 appeared at the time of writing : as such it is natu- 

 rally restricted in the use of imagery. The critics 

 hold that a good poet may improve on, but not con- 

 trovert, the popular belief of his date. 



To subject the "Shipwreck" to this canon — In 

 Virgil the pilot falls overboard, and is lost, the 

 accident being brought about by supernatural causes : 

 Falconer's period confined him to simpler expedients. 

 Father Bossu, speaking of the poet of the Odyssey, 

 remarks, that nothing can be more natural than 

 making it turn on the dangers of the sea. But in 

 all its subordinate parts. Homer enjoyed ampler 

 range to diversify the simplicity of his fable. Who 

 will not observe how much Falconer is straightened 

 by the sad realities of his tale ? 



- The proposal of the subject, while the poet and 

 his harp are alone by the sea shore is made finely in 

 accordance with these : and the invocation that follows 

 is conceived in terms the most sublime and awful. 

 His appeal is made by the roaring of the blast, and 

 " because of the noise of the water pipes." 



" By the long surge that foams through yonder cave 

 Whose vaults remurmur." 



The main action of the piece commences with 

 Arion being startled from a dream. Childe Harold 

 has been dreaming: of his daughter : — 



" Waking with a start 

 The waters rage around me, and on high 

 The floods lift up their voices." 



The seaman's vision is appropriately broken by the 

 call of duty and the boatswain's whistle : — 



"All hands unmoor! ! ! " 

 " The Skimmer of the Seas," in Cooper's novel 

 under that title, and the Grab as described in " The 

 Adventures of a younger son," both wear about them 

 more or less of a romantic feature. Falconer steadily 

 rejects all such ornament ; his ship is an English 

 merchantman of that date and nothing more. 



