"Home-Thoughts from the Sea" was written at the same time and under the same circumstances as "[How they brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix]." The poet, aboard a vessel coasting along the shore of Africa, could see to the northwest the Portuguese Cape Vincent, near which, in 1797, England won a naval victory over Spain; southeast of Cape Vincent, on the Spanish coast, Cadiz Bay, where, in 1796, England defeated the second Spanish Armada; and southeast of Cadiz Bay, Cape Trafalgar, where, in 1805, Nelson won a famous victory over the allied fleets of France and Spain. To the northeast, the poet could see Gibraltar, the great fortress which England acquired from Spain by the Peace of Utrecht, 1713.
[SAUL]
1. Abner. The cousin of Saul and the commander of his army. I Samuel xiv, 50.
9. Saul and the Spirit. For the conflict between Saul and the evil spirit, and the refreshment that came to him when David played, see I Samuel xvi, 14-23.
12. Gracious gold hair. For the personal appearance of David, see I Samuel xvi, 12, 18; xvii, 42.
12. Those lilies ... blue. Mrs. Coleridge wrote to Mr. Kenyon to know whether Mr. Browning had any authority for "blue lilies." Mr. Browning answered, "Lilies are of all colors in Palestine—one sort is particularized as white with a dark blue spot and streak—the water lily, lotus, which I think I meant, is blue altogether." (Letters of R. B. and E. B. B., i, 523, 556.)
31. The king-serpent. Probably the boa-constrictor. In poetry the characteristic most often attributed to a snake is malignancy. But in this picture of the serpent lying dormant and waiting for the sloughing of its old skin in the springtime, when it will come forth with new beauty and power, the idea presented is that of tremendous force temporarily in abeyance.
42. Then the tune. The boy, alone in the field, tries all sorts of experiments in musical attraction on the animals about him. Professor Albert S. Cook suggests that Browning is here indebted to the Greek pastoral romance of Daphnis and Chloe. See Smith's translation in the Bohn edition. The passages read in part as follows: "He ran through all variations of pastoral melody; he played the tune which the oxen obey, and which attracts the goats—that in which the sheep delight.
"He took his pipe from his scrip, and breathed into it very gently. The goats stood still, merely lifting up their heads. Next he played the pasture tune, upon which they all put down their heads and began to graze. Now he produced some notes soft and sweet in tone; at once his herd lay down. After this he piped in a sharp key, and they ran off to the woods as if a wolf were in sight." These quotations serve at least to show how old is the fancy that animals are affected by music.
60. The service enjoined on the men of the House of Levi is described in I Chronicles xxiii, 24-32.