The Caledonia is a picturesque figure. The figure-head of the Great Harry, Henry the Eighth's enormous vessel, represented the accompanying quaint image of the British Lion.
Lord Dufferin, in his charming book, "Letters from High Latitudes," pays great honour to the figure-head of his yacht Foam. "I remained on board to superintend the fixing of our sacred figure-head—executed in bronze by Marochetti, and brought along with me by rail still warm from the furnace." His Lordship apostrophises the effigy in some graceful verses, from which I quote the following stanzas:—
"Our progress was your triumph duly hailed
By Ocean's inmates; herald dolphins played
Before our stem, tall ships that sunward sailed
With stately curtseys due obeisance paid.
What marvel, then, if when our wearied hull
In some lone haven found a brief repose,
Rude hands, by love made delicate, would cull
A grateful garland for your goddess brows?"
We cannot give a more fitting conclusion to these slight notes than the figure-head of the old Nile, a remarkably realistic portrait bust of Lord Nelson, after he had lost his eye.
Figure-head of the "Nile."
