romance and poetry

"... the romance & poetry of the thing thence grow continually, till it becomes a story wild enough I assure you & with a meaning too." 
(Letter to John Murray, 25 March 1848)

"Romance and poetry were synonymous—they were imaginative, not factual and not commonplace, and they were associated in Melville’s mind with a higher form of literature than factual (and partly fictionalized) travel and adventure narrative." 

(Hershel Parker, "Historical Note" to Published Poems; and
Herman Melville: The Making of the Poet)

OK, notice how the Captain's critical "Imaginary Friend" insists on this same contrast, but from the opposite point of view, much preferring a factual travel narrative of "surface wanderings":

I. F.  "Nay, Friend, I belong to earth—from thy flight descend not lower:  as your old fashioned friend, I feel interested in your surface wanderings; but let your double-refined poetry and romance go 'to the D—.'" 
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border, December 1851)

Revisions in the 1857 book include the following: 

Friend. — Nay, stick to the surface now; only "to the d — l" with your double-refined poetry and romance.  (Scenes and Adventures in the Army)