And so forth. The fact is, that most readers of Falconer’s poem require his “Dictionary of the Marine” at hand, or some old “salt” to explain the constantly recurring nautical terms.
“DEEP ON HER SIDE THE REELING VESSEL LIES.”
It is not wonderful that so many of our poets have written more or less concerning the sea, few passing over the grand subject entirely, when we consider England’s paramount position on and interests in it. A number of them have produced works in which we seem to sniff the briny ocean as we read them, while only a minority have written artificially and without a true feeling for their subject. Much that the Dibdins[91] indited for the concert-room, the theatre, and to an extent for the sailor himself, is of a trivial nature, dealing largely—too largely—with grog and sweethearts, and more than occasionally verging on the coarse and indelicate. But among their productions are songs with the true ring, ballads that will never die while our language lasts or Britain “rules the waves.” Among these may fairly be counted Charles Dibdin’s “Poor Jack,” “The Greenwich Pensioner” (“’Twas in the good ship Rover”), “The Sailor’s Journal” (“’Twas post-meridian, half-past four”), and, above all, that noble picture of a true sailor, “Tom Bowling”—
“Tom never from his word departed,
His virtues were so rare;
His friends were many and true-hearted,
His Poll was kind and fair:
And then he’d sing so blithe and jolly,
Ah! many’s the time and oft;