and now to a mad sister of the earth, screaming and foaming in fierce and aimless antagonism to her brother--should have reared so few poets. This may arise either from the uncultivated and careless character of sailors as a class, or from the influence of habit in deadening the effect of the grandest objects. It is the same with other modes of life equally romantic. What more so than that of a shepherd among the Grampian Mountains, constantly living between the everlasting hills and the silent sun and stars, surrounded by streams, cataracts, deep dun moorlands, and the wild-eyed and wild-winged creatures which dwell in them alone, their life hid in Nature, and their cries of rude praise going up continually to Nature's God? And yet the Highlands of Scotland have not hitherto produced one great rural poet, except Macpherson, who did belong to the peasantry. And so of the seafaring class; only, so far as we remember, have expressed, the one in verse, and the other in prose, the 'poetry' of their calling,--namely, Cooper and Falconer, both of whose descriptions of sea storms and scenery have been equalled, if not surpassed, however, by such landsmen as Byron and Scott. A poetic mind, which comes in contact with strange and wonderful events or scenery only at intervals, often carries away a much more vivid idea of their striking features than those who reside constantly in their midst. It must be a very rough rope, to borrow an image from the theme, which does not feel softer after long handling. It is the short and sudden impression, made in the twinkling of an eye, which is at once the most lively and the most lasting. When, however, enthusiasm continues, as in some favoured cases, unabated by familiarity, and is united to thorough technical knowledge, then the professional man may be nearly as successful as the amateur, or if there be any deficiency in freshness of feeling, it is made up for by accuracy of knowledge. It was so in the case of James Hogg, the poet of the shepherd life of Southern Scotland, and in William Falconer, the poet of British shipwreck. We shall afterwards show how his knowledge of his profession partly helped and partly hindered him in his poem.