[§2] [William Falconer (1732-1769), second mate of a vessel in the Levant trade, was wrecked between Alexandria and Venice. Only three of the crew survived. His poem, _The Shipwreck_, was published in 1762. It was dedicated to the Duke of York, and through his intervention he was "rated as a midshipman in the Royal Navy." Either as author or naval officer, he came to be on intimate terms with John Murray the first, who thought highly of his abilities, and offered him (October 16, 1768) a partnership in his new bookselling business in Fleet Street. In September, 1769, he embarked for India as purser of the _Aurora_ frigate, which touched at the Cape, but never reached her destination. See _Memoir_, by J. S. Clarke; _The Shipwreck_, 1804, pp. viii.-xlvi.] [§3] _Yes, at the dead of night_, etc.--_Pleasures of Hope_, lines 149, 150. [§4] [The quotation is from Hodgson's "Lines on a Ruined Abbey in a Romantic Country," _vide ante_, Canto I., p. 20, note.] [209] {171} ["It was, however, during our stay in the place, to be lamented that a war, more than civil, was raging on the subject of Lord Elgin's pursuits in Greece, and had enlisted all the French settlers and the principal Greeks on one side or the other of the controversy. The factions of Athens were renewed."--_Travels in Albania, etc._, i. 243.] [210] This word, in the cant language, signifies thieving.--Fielding's _History of Jonathan Wild_, i. 3, note. [211] This Sr. Gropius was employed by a noble Lord for the sole purpose of sketching, in which he excels: but I am sorry to say, that he has, through the abused sanction of that most respectable name, been treading at humble distance in the steps of Sr. Lusieri.--A shipful of his trophies was detained, and I believe confiscated, at Constantinople in 1810. I am most happy to be now enabled to state, that "this was not in his bond;" that he was employed solely as a painter, and that his noble patron disavows all connection with him, except as an artist. If the error in the first and second edition of this poem has given the noble Lord a moment's pain, I am very sorry for it: Sr. Gropius has assumed for years the name of his agent; and though I cannot much condemn myself for sharing in the mistake of so many, I am happy in being one of the first to be undeceived. Indeed, I have as much pleasure in contradicting this as I felt regret in stating it.--[_Note to Third Edition._]