A few words on the navy, and we have done--and only a few words; for we
have nothing to say, but to give unqualified praise. In the habiliments
of our jolly tras--God bless 'em!--utility is every thing, ornament
nothing. They are clad just as they should be; and yet, on gala days,
they know how to make themselves as coquettish as any girl on Portsmouth
Downs. There is no greater dandy in the world, in his peculiar way, than
your regular man-of-war's man. The short jacket, and the loose trousers,
and the neat pumps, and the trim little hat, and the checked shirt, and
the black riband round his neck--he is quite irresistible among the
fairer portion of the creation. Or in a stormy night, with his pilot
coat on, at the lonely helm, and his northwester pulled close over his
ears, and his steady, unflinching eye, and his warm, lion-like heart
within--the true sailor is one of the noblest specimens of man. He that
is fierce as a bull, and yet tender-hearted like a young child--the
greatest blasphemer on earth, and yet the most religious, or even the
most superstitious, of men--he is not to be tied down by the rules of
aesthetics, like a land-crab. His home is on the sea, as somebody has
said or sung; he has nobody there to see him but himself, (if we may be
excused the bull.) What does he care for dress? Only look at him
standing by his gun, when broadside after broadside is pouring into the
timbers of some sanguinary Yankee or blustering Frenchman. What is his
uniform then? Let them declare who have seen that most awful of human
sights, a great battle at sea; but let them not whisper it in ears
feminine or polite.
To the officers, we will only add a word--let them eschew all hats and
short coats, and keep to their caps and frocks. This is their proper
dress. Let them keep themselves warm, comfortable, and ever ready for
service. Never let them face their coats with red again. The old blue
and white against all the world, say we! And let the soldiers take a
leaf out of the sailors' books, and remember that utility, though
accompanied by plainness, is far more consonant to the laws of aesthetics
than unmeaning ornament or erroneous form.
GOETHE TO HIS ROMAN LOVE.
ATTEMPTED IN THE ORIGINAL METRE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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