“The skeletons of more than one sentry were found at their posts.”
Very pretty. As Mrs. Browning says, “Beautiful indeed, and worthy of
acceptation.” What a pity that we have to fall back upon the mistrustful
“Se non è vero è ben trovato.” Not that we question the likelihood of
such stern and unflinching obedience of orders in any age of the world,
but we want trustworthy evidence. In the case of the boy “who stood on
the burning deck,” commemorated by Mrs. Hemans, we have such evidence.
It is a feature of British naval history that Casabianca, the young son
of the admiral of the Orient, at the battle of the Nile, stood at his
post, and perished when the flames of the burning ship reached the
magazine.
Moore says in his “Irish Melodies”:
“The sunflower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look which she turned when he rose.”
Very pretty as a poetic fancy, but as a matter of fact the sunflower
does not turn either to the rising or the setting sun. It receives its
name solely because it resembles a picture sun. It is not a heliotrope
or turnsun.
Female birds in general do not sing, but as poets are not naturalists,
they fall into a common error, as the following quotations show:
“And in the violet-embroidered vale
Where the love-lorn Nightingale
Nightly to thee _her_ sad song mourneth well.”
—MILTON, “Comus.”
“And Philomel _her_ song with tears doth steep.”
—SPENCER, “Shepherd’s Calendar.”
“But the nightingale, another of my airy creatures, breathes such sweet
loud music out of _her_ instrumental throat, that it might make mankind
think miracles had not ceased.”—WALTON, “Angler.”
“Abandoned to despair _she_ sings
_Her_ sorrows through the night; and on the bough
Sole sitting, still at every dying fall,
Takes up again _her_ lamentable strain.”
—THOMSON, “Seasons.”