THE LIFE OF WILLIAM FALCONER.

BY THE REV. JOHN MITFord.

WHEN Anderson published the life of Falconer, the earliest which I have seen, in his collection of the British Poets, he possessed,* as he confesses, no memorials of the birthplace or parentage of the poet and when Stanier Clarke was preparing his accurate and beautiful edition, he was equally at a loss for authentic materials, till he fortunately met with Governor Hunter, a shipmate of the poet's, at the house of Mr. M'Arthur. From the communications of this gentleman, and from subsequent conversations with his brother, Lieutenant Hunter, of Greenwich Hospital, many particulars were collected: Clarke's Life of Falconer has justly been the foundation on which Mr. Chalmers's, and all subsequent biographies have been founded, and, with some trifling additions, it must be the one to which the present will look, as to its most correct authority.

* Anderson's edition of the British Poets was published in 1795. Mr. Stanier Clarke's edition of the Shipwreck, in 1806.

William Falconer, who has given lasting dignity to a name previously obscure, was born about 1736* or 1737, and was the son of a poor man at Edinburgh, who exercised the equally unprofitable trades of barber and wig-maker in the Netherbow, and subsequently of grocer: he got no more by weighing plums than by shaving polls: he was also a fellow of infinite wit, and consequently remained "an honest poor man as long as he lived.

The vocal powers of the family, which are generally shared largely by the female members, were in this instance concentrated in the person of our poet: for his brothers and sisters were all deaf or dumb and Captain Hunter verified the statement which Falconer had made to him of this unusual infliction, when he met two of the family in the poor-house at Edinburgh, where they continued until death. Falconer received some education which may truly be called Elementary, at the school of a Mr. Webster, for the establishment was broken up in 1746, when he was only beginning his grammar, and there is no reason to suppose that he went to any other. The following account of him is from the pen of Mr. Forrest: "I well remember being greatly surprised when he gave me a copy of the above ode (On the Prince of Wales) as his own, for he had been always reckoned rather a dunce at

* Mr. J. Forrest, the correspondent of Dr. Anderson, printed in Campbell's History of Scottish Poetry, 4to. 1798, p. 237.

school; and, young as I then was, I knew that a sailor's life was not favourable for the cultivation of letters. I never to my recollection saw him since that time, indeed I fancy he never was here. He was a lumpish, heavy looking lad, very careless and dirty in his dress, and was known by the appellation of Bubly-hash-Falconer; if you are not a Scotchman, this name will not convey to you such a distinct idea of his looks as it does to one of us. He was then placed, reluctantly on his part, on board a merchant vessel at Leith, and there he served his apprenticeship.†

Forlorn of heart and by severe decree,

Condemn'd RELUCTANT to the faithless sea.

One of his biographers ‡ asserts that the affairs of his father, which were never prosperous, fell into great derangement on the death of his wife, a woman whose prudent management had long averted the impending crisis. Subsequently he was servant to Archibald Campbell, the author of Lexiphanes and other works, who was purser of a ship. Dr. Currie, in his edition of Burns, § says "that his master

* See Al. Campbell's Introd. of Poetry to Scotland, p. 237. † See Lives of the Scottish Poets, 1822, 3 vols. Boys, vol. iii. p. 64. Although a Life of Falconer by Irving is alluded to by his biographers, I can find none in my copy of Irving's Lives of the Scottish Poets, 2 vols. 8vo. Ed. 1804.

For an account of Campbell, see Dyce's Akenside, p. lxxix. Hawkins's Life of Johnson, p. 347.

§ See Currie's ed. of Burns, vol. ii. p. 283, 2nd ed.

delighted to instruct the mind of the young seaman, and boasted of his tuition, when Falconer subsequently had acquired reputation." It is supposed that through Campbell's interest, Falconer was made second mate of a vessel employed in the Levant trade, (the Britannia,) which was shipwrecked in her passage from Alexandria to Venice, near Cape Colonna, on the coast of Greece.

The exact date when this calamity happened, is not known; only three of the crew survived — and the distressing event made such an impression on Falconer's mind, as to become the subject of a poem; which certainly is not, as Stanier Clarke asserts, one of the finest in our language, and is far from being so; but which in all probability will continue to be a favourite with a certain class of readers, and therefore preserve its station among the brotherhood of English Poets.

In 1751, Falconer, as an humble sailor, for he had not risen above that station, revisited his native city, and commenced his poetical career with an elegy on the death of Frederick, Prince of Wales; Gray also began his, with an Hymeneal on the marriage of the same illustrious person. He followed up his first step on the poetic ladder, with others; and sent to the Gentleman's Magazine, (which has been the kind protector of all youthful bards, and in whose venerable courts they have imped their plumes, and tried their earliest flights),

*

a few poems, that have been recognized as his — as The Chaplain's Petition to the Lieutenants in the Ward Room - The Description of a Ninetygun Ship and some lines containing a very unusual and unnecessary complaint - On the Uncommon Scarcity of Poets. These are given to Falconer on the authority of Dr. Clarke, who also is of opinion, that he was the author of the popular song- Cease, rude Boreas, and another copy of verses, descriptive of the sentiments and abode of a midshipman, has been ascribed to him by the same biographer.

Falconer is supposed to have continued in the merchant service till he published his poem of the Shipwreck in 1762, which was dedicated to the

* See Gent. Mag. 1758, p. 371. This poem Lieutenant Hunter ascribed to Falconer; the other two are given on the belief of S. Clarke: it is not of much consequence from whom such lines as the following proceeded:

The rough rude wind which stern Æōlus sends.

†This is a mere conjecture of S. Clarke's, who thinks the song to be either Falconer's, or Captain Thomson's, the well known editor of several works, as well as author of some popular naval songs. See also 'The Songs of England and Scotland, 2 vols. 1835,' vol. i. p. 231, and Naval Chronicle, vol. ii. p. 233, where the song is decidedly attributed to Falconer, and said "to have been long given with singular injustice to G. Al. Steevens."

The first edition was printed by Miller in May, 1762. Shipwreck, in Three Cantos, by a Sailor, 4to. The subsequent editions, says Mr. Alex. Campbell, are by many deemed inferior to the first, as what it has gained in embellishment it has lost in