"... in his grand, inaccessible cabin, the high and mighty commodore sat silent and stately, as the statue of Jupiter in Dodona." -- Herman Melville, White-Jacket; Or The World in a Man-of-War (1850)
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Be not alarmed! I make a rhyme but once a year; the idea came in that shape, and you must take it as it comes. -- Scenes Beyond the Western Border, June 1851How dreary must be a great Commodore
Alone in the cabin of a seventy-four.
My tragedy is all true,—and if not quite serious, has, as is proper, its moral;—but rather, as I have alluded to the primitive tragedy, let that "future reader" here imagine the entry of Chorus, and their song to Freedom! That dumb beasts prefer death to slavery! Liberty lost, they can die without the excitement of the world's applause, or hopes of a grateful posterity! (It is not possible, I think, that the cub could have known that I would immortalize him.)
Scenes Beyond the Western Border," March 1853
and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army (1857)
"And that immortalized Rondo, no doubt," said Babbalanja. "Ha! ha!" (Mardi)
BABBALANJA--Probably some one who lived in Lombardo's time, and went by that name. He is incidentally mentioned, and cursorily immortalized in one of the posthumous notes to the Koztanza. (Mardi)
they finally succeeded in immortalizing themselves by quenching their mortalities all round; the bards still singing. (Mardi)
It was a curious and remarkable book; and from the many fond associations connected with it, I should like to immortalize it, if I could. (Redburn)
In plain prose, Selvagee was one of those officers whom the sight of a trim-fitting naval coat had captivated in the days of his youth. He fancied, that if a sea-officer dressed well, and conversed genteelly, he would abundantly uphold the honour of his flag, and immortalize the tailor that made him. (White-Jacket)
How natural then the inference, that instead, as in old times, immortalizing a genius, a portrait now only dayalized a dunce. (Pierre)
It was the famous pilot, Juan Fernandez, immortalized by the island named after him....
(Encantadas)
... only, is it certain that I can get to Baltimore the day following in time to immortalise myself there also? (Letter to George L. Duyckinck, 20 December 1858)
'Bravissimo!'
'Encore!'
'Write it out, Major!'
'Put it in verse!'
'Good, it will immortalise thee!'
(Sketch of Jack Gentian in Great Short Works)
"My dunderfunk, sir—as elegant a dish of dunderfunk as you ever see, sir—they stole it, sir!"
"Go forward, you rascal!" cried the Lieutenant, in a towering rage, "or else stop your whining. Tell me, what's the matter?"
"Why, sir, them 'ere two fellows, Dobs and Hodnose, stole my dunderfunk."
(White-Jacket)
“Can’t sell his head?—What sort of a bamboozingly story is this you are telling me?” getting into a towering rage. “Do you pretend to say, landlord, that this harpooneer is actually engaged this blessed Saturday night, or rather Sunday morning, in peddling his head around this town?”
(Moby-Dick, Chapter 3)
... that an innocent brother, (or sister,) being ruthlessly slain, and the baffled lady-mother left (unceremoniously) full of towering and demonstrative rage,— the imprisoned hero himself sank overwhelmed,—or in a well-acted counterfeit of death....
("Scenes Beyond the Western Border," March 1853)
"From storm to storm! So be it, then. Born in throes, 't is fit that man should live in pains and die in pangs! So be it, then! Here's stout stuff for woe to work on. So be it, then." (Moby-Dick, November 1851)
C. "But who lives, who may not be wounded through another!—Then so be it! let us treat the whole world as it has done us, and—forget it! I dare say, nay, I am sure, that beyond some family ties, there is not upon the wide earth a heart in sympathy with our good or ill; whose even beat would be as much disturbed, were this wild sod to cover us forever, as at the most ephemeral of the trifling cares which make up their petty lives."
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border, August 1852)
"Amigo Mio! Didn't you desert me on the eve of a snow storm, like many another friend of so honest mouthing! And is a touch of poetry a bad companion in difficulty and trial? Never a bit; it was the boon of a God — Wisdom was ever feminine."
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border, April 1852; and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army)
"Your bivouac was marvellously like this present one! But go on; and — if you do not stop at a dream or two — you will doubtless soon come to the cream of the story."
"Amigo mio. — My dreams are — not what they were! "
(September 1852; and Scenes and Adventures)
Amigo, do not scourge me on;
Put up, put up your monkish thong!
"Amigo, how you persecute!"
"Amigo! favored lads there are,
Born under such a lucky star,
They weigh not things too curious, see,
Albeit conforming to their time
And usages thereof, and clime:
Well, mine's that happy family."
(The sensual poetical "Lyonese" in Clarel 4, Canto 26)
"Time, Amigo, does but mask us —" (L'Envoi from Weeds and Wildings)
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| "The Sons of God Saw the Daughters of Man that they were Fair" Daniel Chester French (1923) |
Come, sleep! thou luxury to the happiest; thou matchless blessing to those that may not be comforted. Come deathlike; profound as Adam's first. 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.which sounds something like this
(August 1852; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)
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)in the allusion to Genesis 6:1-4, with special mention of the inherently irresistible charms of the fair sex.
"... when though, according to Genesis, the angels indeed consorted with the daughters of men, the devils also, add the uncanonical Rabbins, indulged in mundane amours."UPDATE:
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? (Book II, iv)Melville's Pierre was published at the end of July 1852; the excerpt from Scenes Beyond the Western Border is from the August 1852 installment. And look here! the previous installment in July 1852 also recalled the descent of angels, down to earth, for Love's sake:
"... that electric chain of Love which binds humanity—and in the olden Time drew down angels!" (Scenes Beyond the Western Border, July 1852)
The best diplomatists of us all, they would conquer the land as easily as, — Adam lost Paradise.
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border, April 1852; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)
Come, sleep! thou luxury to the happiest; thou matchless blessing to those that may not be comforted. Come deathlike; profound as Adam's first. 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.
(August 1852; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)
A most imperial and archangelical apparition of that unfallen, western world, which to the eyes of the old trappers and hunters revived the glories of those primeval times when Adam walked majestic as a god, bluff-bowed and fearless as this mighty steed. (Moby-Dick)
I feel deadly faint, bowed, and humped, as though I were Adam, staggering beneath the piled centuries since Paradise. (Moby-Dick)
"He would turn Turk before he would disown an allegiance hereditary to all gentlemen, from the hour their Grand Master, Adam, first knelt to Eve." (Pierre)
"... there came into the mind of Pierre, thoughts and fancies never imbibed within the gates of towns; but only given forth by the atmosphere of primeval forests, which, with the eternal ocean, are the only unchanged general objects remaining to this day, from those that originally met the gaze of Adam." (Pierre)
