Genesis 6:2,4 on the prairie

Image Courtesy of the Digital Image Archive, Pitts Theology Library
Candler School of Theology, Emory University

"That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose."  --Genesis 6:2

Allusions to Genesis 6:2 and 4 occur in consecutive installments of "Scenes Beyond the Western Border." Both references take the biblical "sons of God" to mean "angels":

July 1852:

Ay de Mi! Our life is a sad struggle;—our material nature with its base cravings,—its cares for animal comforts, and all the ills of the flesh, preys upon and tethers the soul, which yearns for the Beautiful, the Noble, the Exalted;—essays to soar in that sphere, whose types are the bright stars of Heaven! Or, clings to that electric chain of Love which binds humanity—and in the olden Time drew down angels!--Southern Literary Messenger 18 (July 1852): 413; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army.

August 1852:

Come, O, sleep! thou luxury to the happiest; thou matchless blessing to those that may not be comforted. Come deathlike; profound as Adam's first. Oh! fated Progenitor! Then from near thy soft heart, sprang its resistless enemy, evermore armed against the peace of thy unhappy sons! Nay, the very Angels surrendered Heaven, and trembling, yielded to her arms.--Southern Literary Messenger 18 (August 1852): 506; and (slightly revised) Scenes and Adventures in the Army

Herman Melville's seventh novel Pierre; Or, The Ambiguities was first published in late July 1852--in between the July and August installments of "Scenes Beyond the Western Border," quoted above.

Did not the angelical Lotharios come down to earth, that they might taste of mortal woman's Love and Beauty? even while her own silly brothers were pining after the self-same Paradise they left? Yes, those envying angels did come down; did emigrate; and who emigrates except to be better off?  --Pierre; Or, The Ambiguities

 More allusions to Genesis 6:2, 4 in Melville's writings:

All of us have monarchs and sages for kinsmen; nay, angels and archangels for cousins; since in antediluvian days, the sons of God did verily wed with our mothers, the irresistible daughters of Eve. --Mardi: And a Voyage Thither

"... according to Genesis, the angels indeed consorted with the daughters of men, the devils also, add the uncanonical Rabbins, indulged in mundane amours.  --Moby-Dick, or, The Whale

But still the Venus is of the earth, and the Apollo is divine. Should a match be made between them, the union would be like that of the sons of God with the daughters of men.  --Statues in Rome, reconstructed lecture

"This evanescence is the charm!
And most it wins the spirits that be
Celestial, Sir. It comes to me
It was this fleeting charm in show
That lured the sons of God below,
Tired out with perpetuity
Of heaven's own seventh heaven aglow;
Not Eve's fair daughters, Sir; nay, nay
Less fugitive in charm are they:
It was the rose."  --Herman Melville, The Rose Farmer

presto!

Well I had almost forgotten about "Oregon, Ho!" the 1845 newspaper sketch by "St George" that kickstarts the April 1852 installment of "Scenes Beyond the Western Border."  In that April 1852 number, the new matter of the 1845 dragoon expedition to the Rocky Mountains begins with an extensive rewrite of "Oregon, Ho!"

"Oregon, Ho!" is an early progress report in the form of a letter to the editor, originally published in the editorial correspondence of the Washington National Intelligencer, July 15, 1845 and signed, "ST. GEORGE."

"Oregon, Ho!" was reprinted in Littell's Living Age (August 23, 1845): 356-358.

Two early re-printings of "Oregon, Ho!" appeared (with significant deletions of original material) in New York newspapers:

New York Commercial Advertiser, July 18, 1845  (accessible at GenealogyBank)
New York Spectator, July 23, 1845  (GenealogyBank)

In "Oregon, Ho!" St George showily introduces the story of a prairie wedding with this anti-romantic warning:

But there was a wedding last night!  That damsel takes things coolly as they come.  She is a fine girl for a new country.  Beware, ye Suckers [corrected to "seekers" in Littell’s Living Age], after the romantic!  Cry not Eureka! and straightway with bold imagination found a love story with intricate plot of a maid of the mountain, who was wooed and won by a bold horseman of the prairie desert, and, scorning silken dalliance and trifling forms, yielded her hand, possibly, over the arching neck of prancing steed; for ruthlessly I shall wave my wand of truth, and, presto!  the fabric will vanish.
(Oregon, Ho!)

None of this introduction was used in the 1852 revision.  Hmm, wonder if Melville ever had any use for that magic word presto?

Presto! the castle rose; but alas, the roof was hardly on, when the Yankee's patron, having speculated beyond his means, broke all to pieces, and was absolutely unable to pay one "plug" of tobacco in the pound. His failure involved the carpenter, who sailed away from his creditors in the very next ship that touched at the harbour. (Omoo)

 The gash being made, a metamorphosis took place, transcending any related by Ovid. For, presto! the shirt was a coat!—a strange-looking coat, to be sure; of a Quakerish amplitude about the skirts; with an infirm, tumble-down collar; and a clumsy fulness about the wristbands; and white, yea, white as a shroud.  (White-Jacket)

And then, presto! Ahab seemed a pyramid, and I like a blazing fool, kept kicking at it.  (Moby-Dick, chapter 31)

That instant the stricken whale started on a fierce run, the line swiftly straightened; and presto! poor Pip came all foaming up to the chocks of the boat, remorselessly dragged there by the line, which had taken several turns around his chest and neck.  (Moby-Dick, chapter 93)

thus; in creeps my soft-handed gentlemen; and hey, presto! how comes on the soft cash?"  (Confidence-Man)

Stock-still I stand,

   And him I see

Prying, peeping

   From Beech-Tree;

Crickling, crackling

   Gleefully!

But, affrighted

   By wee sound,

Presto! Vanish—

   Whither Bound? 

(From "The Chipmunk," as printed in Melville's Tales Poems and Other Writings, ed. John Bryant, 556)