"The only fault Melville's enemies could find with his personal character was his impetuous and explosive temper. In regards to this he was his own best apologist when he said, "If my anger be from below trample upon it; but if from above let it rise!" If he was 'zealously affected,' it was always 'in a good thing'. No one could ever charge him with personal or narrow ambitions. It was always, as he once wrote, his own desire 'to be concealed in the crowd even when the field of honor appeared to ripen' before him"