XV.

Again their own shore rises on the view, No more polluted with a hostile hue; No sullen ship lay bristling o'er the foam, A floating dungeon:--all was Hope and Home! A thousand Proas darted o'er the bay, With sounding shells, and heralded their way; The chiefs came down, around the people poured, And welcomed Torquil as a son restored; The women thronged, embracing and embraced By Neuha, asking where they had been chased, 410 And how escaped? The tale was told; and then One acclamation rent the sky again; And from that hour a new tradition gave Their sanctuary the name of "Neuha's Cave." A hundred fires, far flickering from the height,[fw] Blazed o'er the general revel of the night, The feast in honour of the guest, returned To Peace and Pleasure, perilously earned; A night succeeded by such happy days As only the yet infant world displays.[fx] 420

J. 10^th^ 1823.

FOOTNOTES:

[ex] {587} ----_and made before the breeze her way_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[ey] ----_their doubtful shimmer from the deep_.--[MS. D. erased]

[352] [William Bligh, the son of Cornish parents, was born September 9 1754 (? 1753). He served under Cook in his second voyage in the _Resolution_, 1772-75, as sailing-master; and, in 1782, fought under Lord Howe at Gibraltar. He married a daughter of William Betham, first collector of customs in the Isle of Man, and hence his connection with Fletcher Christian, who belonged to a Manx family, and the midshipman Peter Hayward, who was the son of a Deemster. He was appointed to the _Bounty_ in December, 1787, and in 1791 to the _Providence_, which was despatched to the Society Islands to obtain a fresh cargo of bread-fruit trees in place of those which were thrown overboard by the mutineers. He commanded the _Glatton_ at Copenhagen, May 21, 1801, and on that and other occasions served with distinction. He was made Governor of New South Wales in 1805, but was forcibly deposed in an insurrection headed by Major Johnston, January, 1808. He was kept in prison till 1810, but on his return to England his administration of his office was approved, and Johnston was cashiered. He was advanced to the rank of Vice-Admiral of the Blue in 1814, and died, December 7, 1817.

In his _Narrative_ Bligh describes the mutiny as "a close-planned act of villainy," and attributes the conspiracy not to his own harshness, or to disloyalty provoked by "real or imaginary grievances," but to the contrast of life on board ship, "in ever climbing up the climbing wave," with the unearned luxuries of Tahiti, "the allurements of dissipation ... the female connections," which the sailors had left behind. Besides his own apology, there are the sworn statements of the two midshipmen, Hayward and Hallet, and others, which Bligh published in answer to a pamphlet which Edward Christian, afterwards Chief Justice of Ely, wrote in defence of his brother Fletcher. The evidence against Bligh is contained in the MS. journal of the boatswain's mate, James Morrison, which was saved, as by a miracle, from the wreck of the _Pandora_, and is quoted by Sir John Barrow, Lady Belcher, and other authorities. There is, too, the testimony of John Adams (Alexander Smith), as recorded by Captain Beachey, and, as additional proof of indifference and tyrannical behaviour, there are Bligh's own letters to Peter Hayward's mother and uncle (March 26, April 2, 1790), and W. C. Wentworth's account of his administration as Governor of New South Wales (see _A Statistical Description_, etc., 1819, p. 166). It cannot be gainsaid that Bligh was a man of integrity and worth, and that he was upheld and esteemed by the Admiralty. Morrison's Journal, though in parts corroborated by Bligh's MS. Journal, is not altogether convincing, and the testimony of John Adams in his old age counts for little. But according to his own supporters he "damned" his men though not the officers, and his own _Narrative_, as well as Morrison's Journal, proves that he was suspicious, and that he underrated and misunderstood the character and worth of his subordinates. He was responsible for the prolonged sojourn at Tahiti, and he should have remembered that time and distance are powerful solvents, and that between Portsmouth Hard and the untracked waters of the Pacific, "all Arcadia" had intervened. He was a man of imperfect sympathies, wanting in tact and fineness, but in the hour of need he behaved like a hero, and saved himself and others by submission to duty and strenuous self-control. Moreover, he "helped England" not once or twice, "in the brave days of old." (See _A_ _Narrative, etc._, 1790; _The Naval History of Great Britain_, by E. P. Brenton, 1823, i. 96, _sq._; _Royal Naval Biography_, by John Marshall, 1823-35, ii. pp. 747, _sq._; _Mutineers of the Bounty_, by Lady Belcher, 1870, p. 8; _Dictionary of National Biography_, art. "Bligh.")]

[353] {589}["A few hours before, my situation had been peculiarly flattering. I had a ship in the most perfect order, and well stored with every necessary, both for service and health; ... the voyage was two thirds completed, and the remaining part in a very promising way."--_A Narrative of the Mutiny, etc._, by Lieut. W. Bligh, 1790, p. 9.]

[354] ["The women at Otaheite are handsome, mild, and cheerful in their manners and conversation, possessed of great sensibility, and have sufficient delicacy to make them admired and beloved. The chiefs were so much attached to our people, that they rather encouraged their stay among them than otherwise, and even made them promises of large possessions. Under these and many other attendant circumstances equally desirable, it is now, perhaps, not so much to be wondered at ... that a set of sailors, most of them void of connections, should be led away, especially when they imagined it in their power to fix themselves, in the midst of plenty, ... on the finest island in the world, where they need not labour, and where the allurements of dissipation are beyond anything that can be conceived,"--_Ibid._, p. 10.]

[ez] _And all enjoy the exuberance of the wild_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fa] {590} _Their formidable fleet the quick canoe_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[355] {591}["Just before sunrising Mr. Christian, with the master-at-arms, gunner's mate, and Thomas Burkitt, seaman, came into my cabin while I was asleep, and, seizing me, tied my hands with a cord behind my back, and threatened me with instant death if I spoke or made the least noise. I, however, called out so loud as to alarm every one; but they had already secured the officers who were not of their party, by placing sentinels at their doors. There were three men at my cabin door, besides the four within; Christian had only a cutlass in his hand, the others had muskets and bayonets. I was hauled out of bed, and forced on deck in my shirt, suffering great pain from the tightness with which they had tied my hands.... The boatswain was now ordered to hoist the launch out. The boat being hoisted out, Mr. Hayward and Mr. Hallet, midshipmen, were ordered into it; upon which I demanded the cause of such an order, and endeavoured to persuade some one to a sense of duty; but it was to no effect: 'Hold your tongue, sir, or you are dead this instant,' was constantly repeated to me."--_A Narrative of the Mutiny, etc._, by Lieut. W. Bligh, 1790, pp. 1, 2.]

[356] ["The boatswain, and seamen who were to go in the boat, were allowed to collect twine, canvass, lines, sails, cordage, an eight-and-twenty-gallon cask of water, and the carpenter to take his tool-chest. Mr. Samuel got one hundred and fifty pounds of bread with a small quantity of rum and wine ... also a quadrant and compass."--_Ibid._, p. 3.]

[357] {592}["The mutineers now hurried those they meant to get rid of into the boat, ... Christian directed a dram to be served to each of his own crew."--_A Narrative, etc._, 1790, p. 3.]

[fb]

_And lull it in his followers--"Ho! the dram"_ _Rebellions sacrament, and paschal lamb_. (_A broken metaphor of flesh for wine_ _But Catholics know the exchange is none of mine_.--[MS. D. erased.]

_And raise it in his followers--Ho! the bowl_ _That sure Nepenthe for the wavering_ [_soul_].--[MS. D. erased.]

[358] [It was Johnson, not Burke, who upheld the claims of brandy.--"He was persuaded," says Boswell, "to drink one glass of it [claret]. He shook his head, and said, 'Poor stuff!--No, Sir, claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero (smiling) must drink brandy.'"--Boswell's _Life of Johnson_, 1848, p. 627.]

[359] ["While the ship ... was in sight she steered to the W.N.W., but I considered this only a feint; for when we were sent away, 'Huzza for Otaheite!' was frequently heard among the mutineers."--_A Narrative, etc._, 1790, pp. 4-8. This statement is questioned by Sir John Barrow (_The Eventful History, etc._, 1831, p. 91), on the grounds that the mutiny was the result of a sudden determination on the part of Christian, and that liberty, and not the delights of Tahiti, was the object which the mutineers had in view.]

[360] {593}[A variant of Pope's lines--

"For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight, His can't be wrong, whose life is in the right."

_Essay on Man_, iii. 305, 306.]

[361] ["Isaac Martin, one of the guard over me, I saw, had an inclination to assist me; and as he fed me with shaddock (my lips being quite parched with my endeavours to bring about a change), we explained our wishes to each other by our looks; but this being observed, Martin was instantly removed from me."--_A Narrative, etc._, 1790, p. 4.]

[362] {594}["Christian ... then ... said, 'Come, Captain Bligh, your officers and men are now in the boat; and you must go with them; if you attempt to make the least resistance you will instantly be put to death;' and without any farther ceremony, holding me by the cord that tied my hands, with a tribe of armed ruffians about me, I was forced over the side, where they untied my hands. Being in the boat, we were veered astern by a rope. A few pieces of pork were thrown to me and some clothes.... After having undergone a great deal of ridicule, and being kept for some time to make sport for these unfeeling wretches, we were at length cast adrift in the open ocean.... When they were forcing me out of the ship, I asked him [Christian] if this treatment was a proper return for the many instances he had received of my friendship? He appeared disturbed at the question, and answered, with much emotion, 'That,--Captain Bligh,--that is the thing;--I am in hell--I am in hell.'"--_A Narrative, etc._, 1790, pp. 4-8.

Bligh's testimony on this point does not correspond with Morrison's journal, or with the evidence of the master, John Fryer, given at the court-martial, September 12, 1792. According to Morrison, when the boatswain tried to pacify Christian, he replied, "It is too late, I have been in hell for this fortnight past, and am determined to bear it no longer." The master's version is that he appealed to Christian, and that Christian exclaimed, "Hold your tongue, sir, I have been in hell for weeks past; Captain Bligh has brought all this on himself." Bligh seems to have flattered himself that in the act of mutiny Christian was seized with remorse, but it is clear that the wish was father to the thought. Moreover, on being questioned, Fryer, who was a supporter of the captain, explained that Christian referred to quarrels, to abuse in general, and more particularly to a recent accusation of stealing cocoa-nuts. (See _The Eventful History_, etc., 1831, pp. 84, 208, 209.)]

[363] {595}[Byron must mean "antarctic." "Arctic" is used figuratively for "cold," but not as a synonym for "polar."]

[fc] _Now swelled now sighed along_----.--[MS. D. erased.]

[364] ["At dawn of day some of my people seemed half dead; our appearances were horrible; and I could look no way, but I caught the eye of some one in distress."--_A Narrative, etc._, p. 37. Later on, p. 80, when the launch reached Timor, he speaks of the crew as "so many spectres, whose ghastly countenances, if the cause had been unknown, would have excited terror rather than pity."]

[365] [Bligh dwells on the misery caused to the luckless crew by drenching rains and by hunger, but says that no one suffered from thirst.]

[fd] {596} _Nor yet unpitied. Vengeance had her own_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fe] ----_the undisputed root_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[366] The now celebrated bread fruit, to transplant which Captain Bligh's expedition was undertaken.

[The bread-fruit (_Autocarpus incisa_) was discovered by Dampier, in 1688. "Cook says that its taste is insipid, with a slight sweetness, somewhat resembling that of the crumb of wheaten bread mixed with a Jerusalem artichoke."--_The Eventful History, etc._, 1831, p. 43.]

[367] [See _Letters from Mr. Fletcher Christian_ (_pseud_.), 1796, pp. 48, 49.]

[ff] _Thus Argo plunged into the Euxine's foam_.--[MS. D, erased.]

[368] {598} The first three sections are taken from an actual song of the Tonga Islanders, of which a prose translation is given in "Mariner's Account of the Tonga Islands." Toobonai is _not_ however one of them; but was one of those where Christian and the mutineers took refuge. I have altered and added, but have retained as much as possible of the original.

["Whilst we were talking of _Vavaoo tooa Lico_, the women said to us, 'Let us repair to the back of the island to contemplate the setting sun: there let us listen to the warbling of the birds, and the cooing of the wood-pigeon. We will gather flowers from the burying-place at _Matawto_, and partake of refreshments prepared for us at _Lico O'n[)e]_: we will then bathe in the sea, and rinse ourselves in the _Vaoo A'ca_; we will anoint our skins in the sun with sweet-scented oil, and will plait in wreaths the flowers gathered at _Matawto_.' And now as we stand motionless on the eminence over _Anoo Manoo_, the whistling of the wind among the branches of the lofty _toa_ shall fill us with a pleasing melancholy; or our minds shall be seized with astonishment as we behold the roaring surf below, endeavouring but in vain to tear away the firm rocks. Oh! how much happier shall we be thus employed, than when engaged in the troublesome and insipid cares of life!

"Now as night comes on, we must return to the _Mooa_. But hark!--hear you not the sound of the mats?--they are practising a _bo-oola_ ['a kind of dance performed by torch-light'], to be performed to-night on the _malai_, at _Tanea_. Let us also go there. How will that scene of rejoicing call to our minds the many festivals held there, before _Vavdoo_ was torn to pieces by war! Alas! how destructive is war! Behold! how it has rendered the land productive of weeds, and opened untimely graves for departed heroes! Our chiefs can now no longer enjoy the sweet pleasure of wandering alone by moonlight in search of their mistresses. But let us banish sorrow from our hearts: since we are at war, we must think and act like the natives of _Fiji_, who first taught us this destructive art. Let us therefore enjoy the present time, for to-morrow perhaps, or the next day, we may die. We will dress ourselves with _chi coola_, and put bands of white _tappa_ round our waists. We will plait thick wreaths of _jiale_ for our heads, and prepare strings of _hooni_ for our necks, that their whiteness may show off the colour of our skins. Mark how the uncultivated spectators are profuse of their applause! But now the dance is over: let us remain here to-night and feast and be cheerful, and to-morrow we will depart for the Mooa. How troublesome are the young men, begging for our wreaths of flowers! while they say in their flattery, 'See how charming these young girls look coming from _Licoo_!--how beautiful are their skins, diffusing around a fragrance like the flowering precipice of _Mataloco_:--Let us also visit _Licoo_. We will depart to-morrow.'"--_An Account of the Natives of the Tonga Islands, etc._, 1817, i. 307, 308. See, too, for another version, ed. 1827, vol. ii. Appendix, p. xl.]

[369] {599}[Bolotoo is a visionary island to the north westward, the home of the Gods. The souls of chieftains, priests, and, possibly, the gentry, ascend to Bolotoo after death; but the souls of the lower classes "come to dust" with their bodies.--_An Account, etc._, 1817, ii. 104, 105.]

[370] [The toa, or drooping casuarina (_C. equisetifolia_). "Formerly the toa was regarded as sacred, and planted in groves round the 'Morais' of Tahiti."--_Polynesia_, by G. F. Angas, 1866, p. 44.]

[371] {600}[The capital town of an island.]

[372] ["The preparation of _gnatoo_, or _tappa_-cloth, from the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree, occupies much of the time of the Tongan women. The bark, after being soaked in water, is beaten out by means of wooden mallets, which are grooved longitudinally.... Early in the morning," says Mariner, "when the air is calm and still, the beating of the _gnatoo_ at all the plantations about has a very pleasing effect; some sounds being near at hand, and others almost lost by the distance, some a little more acute, others more grave, and all with remarkable regularity, produce a musical variety that is ... heightened by the singing of the birds, and the cheerful influence of the scene."--_Polynesia_, 1846, pp. 249, 250.]

[373] [Marly, or Malai, is an open grass plat set apart for public ceremonies.]

[fg]

_Ere Fiji's children blew the shell of war_ _And armed Canoes brought Fury from afar_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fh] _Too long forgotten in the pleasure ground_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[374] [Cava, "kava," or "ava," is an intoxicating drink, prepared from the roots and stems of a kind of pepper (_Piper methysticum_). Mariner (_An Account, etc._, 1817, ii. 183-206) gives a highly interesting and suggestive account of the process of brewing the kava, and of the solemn "kava-drinking," which was attended with ceremonial rites. Briefly, a large wooden bowl, about three feet in diameter, and one foot in depth in the centre (see, for a typical specimen, King Thakombau's kava-bowl, in the British Museum), is placed in front of the king or chief, who sits in the midst, surrounded by his guests and courtiers. A portion of kava root is handed to each person present, who chews it to a pulp, and then deposits his quid in the kava bowl. Water being gradually added, the roots are well squeezed and twisted by various "curvilinear turns" of the hands and arms through the "fow," _i.e._ shavings of fibrous bark. When the "kava is in the cup," quaighs made of the "unexpanded leaf of the banana" are handed round to the guests, and the symposium begins. Mariner (_ibid._, p. 205, note) records a striking feature of the preliminary rites, a consecration or symbolic "grace before" drinking. "When a god has no priest, as Tali-y-Toobo [the Supreme Deity of the Tongans], no person ... presides at the head of his cava circle, the place being left ... vacant, but which it is supposed the god invisibly occupies.... And they go through the usual form of words, as if the first cup was actually filled and presented to the god: thus, before any cup is filled, the man by the side of the bowl says ... 'The cava is in the cup:' the mataboole answers ... 'Give it to our god:' but this is mere form, for there is no cup filled for the god." (See, too, _The Making of Religion_, by A. Lang, 1900, p. 279.)]

[375] {601}[The gnatoo, which is a piece of tappa cloth, is worn in different ways. "Twenty yards of fine cloth are required by a Tahitian woman to make one dress, which is worn from the waist downwards."--_Polynesia_, 1866, p. 45.]

[376] [_Licoo_ is the name given to the back of or unfrequented part of any island.]

[fi]

_How beauteous are their skins, how softly all_ _The forms of Beauty wrap them like a pall_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fj] {602} _Glares with his mountain eye_--.--[MS. D. erased.]

[377] [The _Morning Chronicle_, November 6, 1822, prints the following proclamation of Jose Maria Carreno, Commandant-General of Panama: "Inhabitants of the Isthmus! The Genius of History, which has everywhere crowned our arms, announces peace to Colombia.... From the banks of Orinoco to the towering summits of Chimborazo not a single enemy exists, and those who proudly marched towards the abode of the ancient children of the Sun have either perished or remain prisoners expecting our clemency."]

[378] [Compare "a wise man's sentiment," as quoted by Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun: "He believed if a man were permitted to make all the Ballads, he need not care who should make the Laws."--_An Account of a Conversation, etc._, 1704, p. 10.]

[fk] {603} _Than all the records History's annals rear_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[379] [Jean Francois Champollion (1790-1832), at a meeting of the _Academie des inscriptions_, at Paris, September 17, 1822, announced the discovery of the alphabet of hieroglyphics.]

[380] [So, too, Shelley, in his Preface to the _Revolt of Islam_, speaks of "that more essential attribute of Poetry, the power of awakening in others sensations like those which animate my own bosom."]

[fl] {604}

_And she herself the daughter of the Seas_ _As full of gems and energy as these_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[381] {605}[George Stewart was born at Ronaldshay (circ. 1764), but was living at Stromness in 1780 (where his father's house, "The White House," is still shown), when, on the homeward voyage of the Resolution, Cook and Bligh were hospitably entertained by his parents. He was of honourable descent. His mother's ancestors were sprung from a half-brother of Mary Stuart's, and his father's family dated back to 1400. When he was at Timor, Bligh gave a "description of the pirates" for purposes of identification by the authorities at Calcutta and elsewhere. "George Stewart, midshipman, aged 23 years, is five feet seven inches high, good complexion, dark hair, slender made ... small face, and black eyes; tatowed on the left breast with a star," etc. Lieutenant Bligh took Stewart with him, partly in return for the "civilities" at Stromness, but also because "he was a seaman, and had always borne a good character." Alexander Smith told Captain Beachey (_Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific_, 1831, Part I. p. 53) that it was Stewart who advised Christian "to take possession of the ship," but Peter Hayward, who survived to old age, strenuously maintained that this was a calumny, that Stewart was forcibly detained in his cabin, and that he would not, in any case, have taken part in the mutiny. He had, perhaps, already wooed and won a daughter of the isles, and when the _Bounty_ revisited Tahiti, September 20, 1789, he was put ashore, and took up his quarters in her father's house. There he remained till March, 1791, when he "voluntarily surrendered himself" to the captain of the _Pandora_, and was immediately put in irons. The story of his

## parting from his bride is told in _A Missionary Voyage to the Southern

Pacific Ocean in the Ship Duff_ (by W. Wilson), 1799, p. 360: "The history of Peggy Stewart marks a tenderness of heart that never will be heard without emotion.... They had lived with the old chief in the most tender state of endearment; a beautiful little girl had been the fruit of their union, and was at the breast when the Pandora arrived.... Frantic with grief, the unhappy Peggy ... flew with her infant in a canoe to the arms of her husband. She was separated from him by violence, and conveyed on shore in a state of despair and grief too big for utterance ... she sank into the deepest dejection, pined under a rapid decay ... and fell a victim to her feelings, dying literally of a broken heart." Stewart was drowned or killed by an accident during the wreck of the _Pandora_, August 29, 1791. _Sunt lacrymae rerum!_ It is a mournful tale.]

[382] {606} The "ship of the desert" is the Oriental figure for the camel or dromedary; and they deserve the metaphor well,--the former for his endurance, the latter for his swiftness. [Compare _The Deformed Transformed_, Part I. sc. i, line 117.]

[383] [Compare _The Age of Bronze_, lines 271-279.]

[384]

"Lucullus, when frugality could charm. Had roasted turnips in the Sabine farm."

POPE [_Moral Essays_, i. 218, 219.]

[385] The consul Nero, who made the unequalled march which deceived Hannibal, and defeated Asdrubal; thereby accomplishing an achievement almost unrivalled in military annals. The first intelligence of his return, to Hannibal, was the sight of Asdrubal's head thrown into his camp. When Hannibal saw this, he exclaimed with a sigh, that "Rome would now be the mistress of the world." And yet to this victory of Nero's it might be owing that his imperial namesake reigned at all. But the infamy of one has eclipsed the glory of the other. When the name of "Nero" is heard, who thinks of the consul?--But such are human things! [For Hannibal's cry of despair, "Agnoscere se fortunam Carthaginis!" see Livy, lib. xxvii. cap. li. _s.f._]

[fm] _Tyrant or hero--patriot or a chief_.--[MS. erased.]

[386] [Compare _Childe Harold_, Canto II. stanza v. line i, see _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 102, and 99, note 1.]

[387] {609}[Toobo Neuha is the name of a Tongan chieftain. See Mariner's _Account, etc._, 1817, 141, _sq._]

[388] When very young, about eight years of age, after an attack of the scarlet fever at Aberdeen, I was removed by medical advice into the Highlands. Here I passed occasionally some summers, and from this period I date my love of mountainous countries. I can never forget the effect, a few years afterwards, in England, of the only thing I had long seen, even in miniature, of a mountain, in the Malvern Hills. After I returned to Cheltenham, I used to watch them every afternoon, at sunset, with a sensation which I cannot describe. This was boyish enough: but I was then only thirteen years of age, and it was in the holidays. [Byron spent his summer holidays, 1796-98, at the farm-house of Ballatrich, on Deeside. (See _Poetical Works_, 1898, i. 192, note 2. For his visit to Cheltenham, in the summer of 1801, see _Life_, pp. 8, 19.)

[389] {610}[For the eagle's beak, see _Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanza xviii. line 6, _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 226, note 1.]

[390] {611}[Compare _Macbeth_, act ii. sc. 4, line 13.]

[391] [Compare--"The never-merry clock," _Werner_, act iii. sc. 3, line 3.]

[fn] _Which knolls the knell of moments out of man_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[392] {612} The now well-known story of the loves of the nightingale and rose need not be more than alluded to, being sufficiently familiar to the Western as to the Eastern reader. [Compare _Werner_, act iv. sc. 1, lines 380-382; and _The Giaour_, lines 21, 33.]

[fo] _Which kindled by another's_--.--[MS. D.]

[393] [Compare _Childe Harold_, Canto III. stanzas lxxii., lxxv. Once again the language and the sentiment recall Wordsworth's _Tintern Abbey_. (See _Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 261, note 2.)]

[394] {613} If the reader will apply to his ear the sea-shell on his chimney-piece, he will be aware of what is alluded to. If the text should appear obscure, he will find in _Gebir_ the same idea better expressed in two lines. The poem I never read, but have heard the lines quoted, by a more recondite reader--who seems to be of a different opinion from the editor of the _Quarterly Review_, who qualified it in his answer to the Critical Reviewer of his _Juvenal_, as trash of the worst and most insane description. It is to Mr. Landor, the author of _Gebir_, so qualified, and of some Latin poems, which vie with Martial or Catullus in obscenity, that the immaculate Mr. Southey addresses his declamation against impurity!

[These are the lines in _Gebir_ to which Byron alludes--

"But I have sinuous shells of pearly hue.

* * * * *

Shake one and it awakens; then apply Its polisht lips to your attentive ear, And it remembers its august abodes, And murmurs as the ocean murmurs there."

Compare, too, _The Excursion_, bk. iv.--

"I have seen A curious child, who dwelt upon a tract Of inland ground, applying to his ear The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell, To which, in silence hushed, his very soul Listened intently," etc.

Landor, in his _Satire upon Satirists_, 1836, p. 29, commenting on Wordsworth's alleged remark that he "would not give five shillings for all the poetry that Southey had written" (see _Letters_, 1900, iv. Appendix IX. pp. 483, 484), calls attention to this unacknowledged borrowing, "It would have been honester," he says, "and more decorous if the writer of the following verses had mentioned from what bar he drew his wire." According to H. C. Robinson (_Diary_, 1869, iii. 114), Wordsworth acknowledged no obligation to Landor's _Gebir_ for the image of the sea-shell. "From his childhood the shell was familiar to him, etc. The 'Satire' seemed to give Wordsworth little annoyance."]

[395] {615}[In his Preface to Cantos I., II. of _Childe Harold_ (_Poetical Works_, 1899, ii. 5), Byron relies on the authority of "Ariosto Thomson and Beattie" for the inclusion of droll or satirical "variations" in a serious poem. Nevertheless, Dallas prevailed on him to omit certain "ludicrous stanzas." It is to be regretted that no one suggested the excision of sections xix.-xxi. from the second canto of The Island.]

[396] Hobbes, the father of Locke's and other philosophy, was an inveterate smoker,--even to pipes beyond computation.

["Soon after dinner he [Hobbes] retired to his study, and had his candle, with ten or twelve pipes of tobacco laid by him; then, shutting his door, he fell to smoking, and thinking, and writing for several hours."--_Memoirs of the Family of Cavendish_, by White Kennet, D.D., 1708, pp. 14, 15.]

[fp] _Yet they who love thee best prefer by far_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[397] ["I shall now smoke two cigars, and get me to bed.... The Havannah are the best;--but neither are so pleasant as a hooka or chiboque."--_Journal_, December 6, 1813, _Letters_, 1898, ii. 368.]

[398] {616} This rough but jovial ceremony, used in crossing the line, has been so often and so well described, that it need not be more than alluded to.

[399] {617} "That will do for the marines, but the sailors won't believe it," is an old saying: and one of the few fragments of former jealousies which still survive (in jest only) between these gallant services.

[400] {619} Archidamus, King of Sparta, and son of Agesilaus, when he saw a machine invented for the casting of stones and darts, exclaimed that it was the "grave of valour." The same story has been told of some knights on the first application of gunpowder; but the original anecdote is in Plutarch. [The Greek is "[Greek: A)po/lolen, a)ndro\s a)reta/]," Plutarch's _Scripta Moralia_, 1839, i. 230.]

[fq] {621} _To people in a small embarrassment_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[401] {622} [Fletcher Christian, born 1763, was the fourth son of Charles Christian, an attorney, of Moreland Close, in the parish of Brigham, Cumberland. His family, which was of Manx extraction, was connected with the Christians of Ewanrigg, and the Curwens of Workington Hall. His brother Edward became Chief Justice of Ely, and was well known as the editor of _Blackstones Commentaries_. For purposes of verification (see _An Answer to certain Assertions, etc._, 1794, p. 9), Bligh described him as "aged 24 years, five feet nine inches high, blackish or very dark brown complexioned, dark brown hair, strong made, star tatowed on the left breast," etc. According to "Morrison's Journal," high words had passed between Bligh and Christian on more than one occasion, and, on the day before the mutiny, a question having arisen with regard to the disappearance of some cocoa-nuts, Christian was cross-examined by the captain as to his share of the plunder. "I really do not know, sir," he replied; "but I hope you do not think me so mean as to be guilty of stealing yours." "Yes," said Bligh, "you ---- hound, I do think so, or you could have given a better account of them." It was after this offensive accusation that Christian determined, in the first instance, to quit the ship, and on the morning of April 28, 1788, finding the mate of the watch asleep, on the spur of the moment resolved to lay violent hands on the captain, and assume the command of the _Bounty_. The language attributed to Bligh reads like a translation into the vernacular, but if Christian kept his designs to himself, it is strange that they were immediately understood and acted upon by a body of impromptu conspirators. Testimony, whether written or spoken, with regard to the succession of events "in moments like to these," is worth very little; but it is pretty evident that Christian was a gentleman, and that Bligh's violent and unmannerly ratings were the immediate cause of the mutiny.

Contradictory accounts are given of Christian's death. It is generally believed that in the fourth year of the settlement on Pitcairn Island the Tahitians formed a plot to massacre the Englishmen, and that Christian was shot when at work in his plantation (_The Mutineers, etc._, by Lady Belcher, 1870, p. 163; _The Mutiny, etc._, by Rosalind A. Young, 1894, p. 28). On the other hand, Amasa Delano, in his _Narrative of Voyages, etc._ (Boston, 1817, cap. v. p. 140), asserts that Captain Mayhew Folger, who was the first to visit the island in 1808, "was very explicit in his inquiry at the time, as well as in his account of it to me, that they lived under Christian's government several years after they landed; that during the whole time they enjoyed tolerable harmony; that Christian became sick, and died a natural death." It stands to reason that the ex-pirate, Alexander Smith, who had developed into John Adams, the pious founder of a patriarchal colony, would be anxious to draw a veil over the early years of the settlement, and would satisfy the curiosity of visitors who were officers of the Royal Navy, as best he could, and as the spirit moved him.]

[fr] {625} _The ruined remnant of the land's defeat_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[402] {626}[Compare _The Siege of Corinth_, lines 438, 439, Poetical Works, 1900, iii. 467.]

[403] {629} Of this cave (which is no fiction) the original will be found in the ninth chapter of "Mariner's Account of the Tonga Islands" [1817, i. 267-279]. I have taken the poetical liberty to transplant it to Toobonai, the last island where any distinct account is left of Christian and his comrades.

[The following is the account given by Mariner: "On this island [Hoonga] there is a peculiar cavern, which was first discovered by a young chief, whilst diving after a turtle. The nature of this cavern will be better understood if we imagine a hollow rock rising sixty feet or more above the surface of the water, into the cavity of which there is no known entrance but one, and that is on the side of the rock, as low down as six feet under the water, into which it flows; and, consequently, the base of the cavern may be said to be the sea itself." Mariner seeing some young chiefs diving into the water one after another, and not rise again, he inquired of the last, ... what they were about? "'Follow me,'" said he, "'and I will take you where you have never been before....'" Mariner prepared to follow his companion, and, guided by the light reflected from his heels, entered the opening in the rock, and rose into the cavern. The light was sufficient, after remaining about five minutes, to show objects with some little distinctness; ... Nevertheless, as it was desirable to have a stronger light, Mariner dived out again, and, priming his pistol, tied plenty of gnatoo tight round it, and wrapped the whole up in a plantain-leaf: he directed an attendant to bring a torch in the same way. Thus prepared, he re-entered the cavern, unwrapped the gnatoo, fired it by the flash of the powder, and lighted the torch. "The place was now illuminated tolerably well.... It appeared (by guess) to be about forty feet wide in the main part, but it branched off, on one side, in two narrower portions. The medium height seemed also about forty feet. The roof was hung with stalactites in a very curious way, resembling, upon a cursory view, the Gothic arches and ornaments of an old church." According to one of the matabooles present, the entire family of a certain chief had, in former times, been condemned to death for conspiring against a rival tyrant--the chief to be taken out to sea and drowned, the rest of the family to be massacred. One of the chiefs daughters was a beautiful girl, to whom the youth who discovered the cave was attached. "He had long been enamoured of this young maiden, but had never dared to make her acquainted with the soft emotions of his heart, knowing that she was betrothed to a chief of higher rank and greater power, but now, ... no time was to be lost; he flew to her abode ... declared himself her deliverer if she would trust to his honour.... Soon her consenting hand was clasped in his: the shades of evening favoured their escape ... till her lover had brought a small canoe to a lonely part of the beach. In this they speedily embarked.... They soon arrived at the rock, he leaped into the water, and she, instructed by him, followed close after; they rose into the cavern, and rested from their fatigue, partaking of some refreshments which he had brought there for himself...." Here she remained, visited from time to time by her more fortunate Leander, until he was enabled to carry her off to the Fiji islands, where they dwelt till the death of the tyrant, when they returned to Vavaoo, "and lived long in peace and happiness."]

[404] {631} This may seem too minute for the general outline (in Mariner's Account) from which it is taken. But few men have travelled without seeing something of the kind--on _land_, that is. Without adverting to Ellora, in Mungo Park's last journal, he mentions having met with a rock or mountain so exactly resembling a Gothic cathedral, that only minute inspection could convince him that it was a work of nature.

[Ellora, a village in the Nizam's dominions, is thirteen miles north-west of Aurangabad. "It is famous for its rock-caves and temples. The chief building, called the kailas, ... is a great monolithic temple, isolated from surrounding rock, and carved outside as well as in.... It is said to have been built about the eighth century by Raja Edu of Ellichpur."--Hunter's _Imperial Gazetteer of India_, 1885, iv. 348-351. The passage in Mungo Park's _Journal of a Mission to the Interior of Africa_, 1815, p. 75, runs thus: "June 24th [1805],--Left Sullo, and travelled through a country beautiful beyond imagination, with all the possible diversities of _rock_, sometimes towering up like ruined castles, spires, pyramids, etc. We passed one place so like a ruined Gothic abbey, that we halted a little, before we could satisfy ourselves that the niches, windows, etc., were all natural rock."]

[405] [Byron's quadrisyllable was, probably, a poetic licence. There is, however, an obsolete plural, _stalactitae_, to be found in the works of John Woodward, M.D., _Fossils of England_, 1729, i. 155.]

[fs] {632} _Where Love and Torquil might lie safe from men_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[406] {633} The reader will recollect the epigram of the Greek anthology, or its translation into most of the modern languages--

"Whoe'er thou art, thy master see-- He was, or is, or is to be."

[Byron is quoting from memory an "Illustration" in the notes to _Collections from the Greek Anthology_, by the Rev. Robert Bland, 1813, p. 402--

"Whoe'er thou art, thy Lord and master see. Thou wast my Slave, thou art, or thou shall be."

The couplet was written by George Granville, Lord Lansdowne (1667-1735), as an _Inscription for a Figure representing the God of Love_. (See _The Genuine Works, etc._, 1732, I. 129.)]

[407] {634} The tradition is attached to the story of Eloisa, that when her body was lowered into the grave of Abelard (who had been buried twenty years), he opened his arms to receive her.

[The story is told by Bayle, who quotes from a manuscript chronicle of Tours, preserved in the notes of Andreas Quercetanus, affixed to the _Historia Calamitatum Abaelardi_: "Eadem defuncta ad tumulam apertum depertata, maritus ejus qui multis diebus ante eam defunctus fuerat, elevatis brachiis eam recepit, et ita earn amplexatus brachia sua strinxit."--See Petri Abelardi _Opera_, Paris, 1616, ii. 1195.]

[ft] {636} _Too late it might be still at least to die_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fu] {637} _The crag as droop a bird without her young_.--[MS. D. erased.]

[408] In Thibault's account of Frederick the Second of Prussia, there is a singular relation of a young Frenchman, who with his mistress appeared to be of some rank. He enlisted and deserted at Schweidnitz; and after a desperate resistance was retaken, having killed an officer, who attempted to seize him after he was wounded, by the discharge of his musket loaded with a _button_ of his uniform. Some circumstances on his court-martial raised a great interest amongst his judges, who wished to discover his real situation in life, which he offered to disclose, but to the king only, to whom he requested permission to write. This was refused, and Frederic was filled with the greatest indignation, from baffled curiosity or some other motive, when he understood that his request had been denied. [_Mes Souvenirs de vingt ans de sejour a Berlin, ou Frederic Le Grand, etc._, Paris, 1804, iv. 145-150.]

[fv] _He tore a silver vest_----.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fw] {639} _Their hollow shrine_----.--[MS. D. erased.]

[fx]

_As only a yet infant_----.--[MS. D.] {_As only an infantine World_----. {_As only a yet unweaned World_----.--[Alternative readings. MS. D.]