Some Poetic Fish-Fancies. 141 



a sea-serpent, to attempt to imagine ; and for myself I am 

 content to believe with the Talmudists that it was an unde- 

 finable sea-monster, of which the female lay coiled round 

 the earth, till God, fearing her progeny might destroy the 

 new globe, killed it, and that then He salted her flesh and 

 put it away for the banquet which the pious shall enjoy at 

 the Great End. In that day the angel Gabriel will kill the 

 male also, and will make a tent out of his skin for the elect 

 that are bidden to the banquet. But it is a hazy old tradi- 

 tion, I confess. 



The " imperial whale" that does not dare, "unless by 

 stealth," to attack the " firm united commonwealth of the 

 herrings," is a very precious fiction, and full of humour. 



" But herrings, lively fish, like best to play 

 In rowan ocean, or the open bay ; 

 In crowds amazing through the waves they shine, 

 Millions on millions from ilk equal line : 

 Nor dares the imperial whale, unless by stealth, 

 Attack their firm united commonwealth. 

 But artfu' nets and fishers' wilie skill 

 Can bring the scaly nations to their will." Allan Ramsay. 



Only a poet could imagine a whale stealing up in a red 

 Indian, snaky sort of manner upon its prey, or suppose that 

 Behemoth, let him be never so crafty, could take a herring 

 by surprise, or fancy that any danger to the whales could 

 possibly result from a bold front attack upon a shoal of 

 herrings. That the whale eats herrings is " a fact of know- 

 ledge " with the poets, and seeing that they are convinced it 

 really was "a whale" (as our translation of the Acts states), 

 that " swallowed " Jonah, there can be obviously no physical 

 difficulty in the way of Behemoth swallowing herrings. Pitt 

 goes farther, and says it swallows sharks ! Milton and many 

 others after him speak of the whale as being scaly, but 

 Campbell is, I think, the only poet who endows Leviathan 



