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adumbration of the lost friend's power and charm. Neither quite definite nor yet mystic, the presence made sacred by death flits, with a strange light around it, through the poem; it never comes or goes without making us feel that this great sorrow is no fantasy, but has its root in a great loss. The religious thought of In Memoriam bears the stamp of the time at which it was produced, in so far as doubts, frankly treated, are met with a sober optimism of a purely subjective and emotional kind. But the poem has also an abiding and universal significance as the journal of a mind slowly passing through a bitter ordeal, and as an expression of reliance on the 'Strong Son of God, immortal Love.'

The Idylls of the King, in their complete form, include work of various periods. Tennyson's interest in the legends of the Arthurian cycle was shown at an early date, and was fruitful at intervals during half a century. The Lady of Shalott (1832) was his lyric prelude to the theme; two kindred lyrics-Sir Galahad and Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere-found place in the volumes of 1842, which contained also the epic Morte d'Arthur, now incorporated in The Passing of Arthur. A half-playful prologue introduces the Morte d'Arthur as the only surviving canto of an epic which had been consigned to the flames: perhaps the poet felt, in 1842, that the taste for 'romance' had so far waned as to render this 'fragment' somewhat of an experiment. It is one of his finest pieces of blank verse, and the reception given to it was an invitation to continue the strain. But it was not till 1859 that he published the first set of Idylls - Enid, Vivien, Elaine, and Guinevere. In 1870 appeared The Coming of Arthur, The Holy Grail, Pelleas and Ettarre, and The Passing of Arthur; followed in 1872 by Gareth and Lynette and The Last Tournament, and in 1885 by Balin and Balan. The twelve books (two being given to Enid) are now arranged in the order of events; but in the order of composition, as we have seen, the last portion of the story came first, the beginning next, and the middle last. Such a process of growth is in itself a warning that the series, though it had been planned from the outset as a whole, should not be tried by the ordinary tests of an epic: the unity is here less strict; the main current of narrative is less continuous. 'Idyll' is, indeed, exactly the right word; each is a separate picture, rich in passages of brilliant power, but distinguished especially by finish of detail. Arthur's ideal purpose is rather a golden thread, common to the several pieces but not equally vital to all, than an organic bond

among them; and the pervading allegory of 'sense at war with soul' is at most a link of another kind. But instead of epic concentration these Idylls have a charm of their own. From tracing the destiny of the king, they lead us aside, now and again, into those by-ways of romance where a light tinged with modern thought and fancy is thrown on mediaeval forest and castle, on tournament and bower, on the chivalry, the tenderness, the violence, the enchantments, and the faith. Arthur's fortunes are illustrated by his age. No other single work shows so comprehensively the range of Tennyson's power; the variety of the theme demands a corresponding wealth of resource; there is scarcely any mood of the mind, any phase of action, any aspect of nature which does not find expression somewhere or other in the Idylls.

But a poet who is everywhere an exquisite artist, and who is also remarkably versatile, cannot be adequately judged except by the sum total of his work; there are notes which he may strike only once or twice in the whole of it. Thus in Maud-never a popular poem, in spite of the marvellous lyrics-he touches his highest point in the utterance of passion; its dramatic power is undisputed. The general verdict upon his plays has been that they are more distinguished by excellence of literary execution than by qualities properly dramatic; though few critics, perhaps, would deny the dramatic effectiveness of particular scenes or passages, in Harold, for example, or Becket, or The Cup. But whatever may be the final judgment upon the plays, Maud remains to prove that, among Tennyson's gifts, the dramatic gift was at least not originally absent; though its manifestation in that poem is necessarily limited to a particular phase. Turning next to a different region of his work, we see in The Northern Farmer (old style') a quality which hardly any imaginative writer of this century has better exemplified - the power of faithfully conceiving a very narrow mental horizon, without allowing a single disturbing ray to steal in from the artist's own mind. Again: in the interpretation of feeling, this poet can seize impressions so transient, so difficult of analysis, that they might seem to defy the grasp of language; one recognizes them almost with a start, as if some voice, once familiar, were unexpectedly heard ;

'Moreover something is or seems,

That touches me with mystic gleams,
Like glimpses of forgotten dreams.'

Or:

'The glory of the sum of things

Will flash along the chords and go.'

Akin to this faculty is Tennyson's subtle expression of desiderium, the indefinable yearning towards 'the days that are no more,' as in Break, break, break, or in Tears, idle tears.

His descriptions of nature exhibit two qualities, distinct in essence, though sometimes combined. One appears in his landscape-painting: it is the gift of selecting salient features and composing them into an artistic picture-such as that of the 'vale in Ida,' where

'The swimming vapour floats athwart the glen,
Puts forth an arm, and creeps from pine to pine,
And loiters, slowly drawn';

or of that coral island where Enoch Arden heard

'The league-long roller thundering on the reef,

The moving whisper of huge trees that branch'd
And blossom'd in the zenith . . .'

The distinction of his imaginary landscapes is not merely vividness or truth, but the union of these with a certain dreamy and aërial charm. His other great quality as a nature-poet is seen in the treatment of detail-in vignettes where the result of minute and keen insight is made to live before us in some magical phrase; such as 'The shining levels of the lake'; 'The twinkling laurel scatters silver lights'; the shoal of fish that 'came slipping o'er their shadows on the sand.' His accuracy in this province is said to be unerring: thus a critic who twitted him with having made a 'crow' lead a 'rookery' had to learn that in Lincolnshire, as in some other parts of Britain, 'crow' is the generic term. In this context we must not forget Owd Roä-as pathetic a tribute as any in English poetry to the heroism of a dog. In regard to the vegetation of England, and, generally, to the peculiar charm of English scenery, Tennyson is the foremost of English poets; no one else has painted them with such accurate felicity. Among the English poets of the sea, too, he has a high place; he can describe, as in Elaine, the wind in strife with the billow of the North Sea, 'green. glimmering toward the summit'; but especially his verse can give back all the tones of the sea upon the shore, and can interpret their sympathy with the varying moods of the human spirit.

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Seven of his poems are on subjects from Greek mythologyThe Lotus-Eaters, Ulysses, Enone, The Death of Enone, Tithonus, Tiresias, Demeter and Persephone. In each case he has chosen a theme which left scope for artistic originality - the ancient material being either meagre or second-rate. Each poem presents, in small or moderate compass, the picture of a moment, or of an episode; brief idyll' is the phrase by which he describes his Tiresias (in the lines on the death of Edward Fitzgerald). The common characteristic of these seven poems is the consummate art which has caught the spirit of the antique, without a trace of pedantry in form or in language. The blank verse (used for all except The Lotus-Eaters) has a restrained power, and a flexible yet majestic grace, which produces an effect analogous to that of Greek sculpture. Tennyson's instinct for classical literary art appears in his epitome of Virgil's style

'All the charm of all the Muses often flowering in a lonely word'; as, again, his sympathy with the temper of the old world's sorrow is seen in the verses written at' olive-silvery Sirmio,' and suggested by the lines of Catullus, Frater ave atque vale. In Lucretius Tennyson shows an intimate knowledge of that poet's work, and a curious skill in reproducing his tone; but the highest interest of this masterpiece is psychological and dramatic. It translates the sober earnestness of Lucretius into a morbid phase. The De Rerum Natura is silent on the difficulty of reconciling the gods with the cosmology of Epicurus. But now, when the whole inner life of Lucretius is unhinged by the workings of the poison, the doubt, so long repressed by reverence for the Greek master, starts up

'The Gods! the Gods!

If all be atoms, how then should the Gods
Being atomic, not be dissoluble,

Not follow the great law?'

Tennyson's English is always pure and idiomatic, avoiding foreign words, though without pedantic rigour; and he commands many different shades of diction, finely graduated according to the subject. One of his aims was to recall expressive words which had fallen out of common use; in the Idylls, more especially, he found scope for this. His melody, in its finer secrets, eludes analysis; but one element of it, the delicate management of vowel-sounds, can be seen in such lines as 'The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm';

or, 'Katie walks by the long wash of Australasian seas.' The latter verse illustrates also another trait of his melody the restrained use of alliteration, which he scarcely allows, as a rule, to strike the ear, unless he has some artistic motive for making it prominent, as in parts of Maud, and in some of the songs in The Princess. As a metrist, he is the creator of a new blank verse, different both from the Elizabethan and from the Miltonic. He has known how to modulate it to every theme, and to elicit a music appropriate to each; attuning it in turn to a tender and homely grace, as in The Gardener's Daughter; to the severe and ideal majesty of the antique, as in Tithonus; to meditative thought, as in The Ancient Sage, or Akbar's Dream; to pathetic or tragic tales of contemporary life, as in Aylmer's Field, or Enoch Arden; or to sustained romantic narrative, as in the Idylls. No English poet has used blank verse with such flexible variety, or drawn from it so large a compass of tones; nor has any maintained it so equably on a high level of excellence. In lyric metres Tennyson has invented much, and has also shown a rare power of adaptation. Many of his lyric measures are wholly his own; while others have been so treated by him as to make them virtually new. The In Memoriam stanza had been used before him, though he was unaware of this when he adopted it; but no predecessor had shown its full capabilities. In the first part of The Lotus-Eaters he employs the Spenserian stanza, but gives it a peculiar tone, suited to the theme; the melody is so contrived that languor seems to weigh upon every verse. To illustrate his lyric harmonies of form and matter would be to enumerate his lyrics; two or three instances must suffice. The close-locked three-line stanza of The Two Voices suits the series of compact sentiments or points:

'Then to the still small voice I said,

Let me not cast in endless shade

What is so wonderfully made.'

In The Palace of Art, the shortened fourth line of the quatrain gives a restful pause, inviting to the contemplation of pictures :

Or in a clear-walled city on the sea,
Near gilded organ-pipes, her hair
Wound with white roses, slept St. Cecily;
An angel look'd at her.

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