Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. [1915]

88

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION

Stanzta One-The Nautilus Alive.
He speaks of the shell as a ship of pearl because he says that poets
have always pretended that it was a fairy boat sailing over that part
of the ocean never visited by ordinary ships and mortal men, a kind of
ocean fairyland. Why did he call it a pearl ship? Why not just a
wooden boat? What figure of speech has he employed? Can you see
any reason for using the word "unshadowed"? In the imaginary picture
you are making for yourself of this far-away place, is the glassy mirror
of the sea dotted with steamers and fishing boats, or is it solitary?
What right have you to imagine the place so? "Main" is a poetical
word often used meaning sea.
The old fairy stories go on to say that this little boat would raise a
purple sail when it started out. What do you imagine would be the
texture of that sail? Why should the sail of a boat be likened to a
wing? Again what figure of speech is used? Why should such a ship
be called venturous? In what kind of writing have you read before the
word "bark" for ship? Evidently this enchanted place is in the tropics.
What makes you think so? Why did not the poet. imagine it to be in
the Arctic regions? Who were the sirens? (See mythology.) Why
should they live in an enchanted gulf? Can you see in your picture the
sea nymphs with their flowing hair, sunning themselves on the coral
reefs? Read up about coral reefs if you have forgotten, so that you will
be seeing what the author saw. If you could touch these maidens as
they rise dripping from the sea, would they be warm or cold?
Do not be satisfied until you can see the picture of the sea. How
would the wind feel on your face? What smell would be wafted to you?
Is it a place where you would like to stay or would you be anxious to
get back to a workaday world?
In this stanza has the poet forgotten once that he is imagining the
shell in his hand to be a fairy boat? Go through the stanza and note
what words he uses to preserve his figures of speech throughout.
Stanza Two-The Dead Nautilus.
He is still thinking of the fairy boat in the next two lines. Is it still
sailing the enchanted sea as he now thinks of it? Where is it? To
what does he again liken the sail? Why does he use the adjective
"living"? How does the word "wrecked" help the metaphor more than
"destroyed" or "abandoned" would have?
After the first two lines there is a change in the comparison and the
author imagines the shell to be a house with a number of rooms. Why
is this a good metaphor to draw? What words in this stanza and the
next prove that he now thought of the shell as a residence? Is there
a happy air about the little home as if the owner was busy and contented within? How does the author convey his impression to you? The
nautilus is a very low form of life like the oyster, its whole existence
being spent within the closed rooms of its shell. Why are "dim dreamitig" good words to use, then? What other words in the stanza refer to
the soft light within the house?
By using the word "crypt," the quiet darkened home of the nautilus
is compared to what? What does "unsealed" indicate concerning its
frail tenant?