tongues, and transfused through invisible channels into the thoroughfares and byways of human thought and feeling. It is best, no doubt, that we should not fully recognise our true prophets while they live, lest we make them our masters; but it is good that a people should recognise them when dead, at least, and praise the God who has sent them to enlighten and elevate the soul of the world; and how good and needful it is, and urgently incumbent on us, to see to it, that God spread not his light through them in vain to us, that he sow not the seed of his word through their hands into our hearts in vain, but that by all his light we be enlightened, and by all his sowings we be made fruitful in righteousness. ** TENNYSON'S POEMS. MR. TENNYSON'S poetical fortunes have been singularly various. Some six or seven years ago he first became known, partly by his own extraordinary demerits, and chiefly by a stringent review in the London Quarterly. It was supposed that he was, poetically speaking, dead; he certainly was, theatrically speaking, though not theologically, damned. Strange to say, his poems found their way across the Atlantic, and gained favor in the eyes of a peculiar class of sentimentalists. Young ladies were known to copy them entire, and learn them by heart. Stanzas of most melodious unmeaningness passed from mouth to mouth, and were praised to the very echo. The man who possessed a copy was the envy of more than twenty persons, counting women and children; until at length Mr. Tennyson came into possession of a very considerable amount of reputation. His ardent admirers sent to England for copies; but singularly enough, not one was to be had. The poet had bought them all up and committed them to the flames; but moved by the transatlantic resurrection of his poetical character, he set about convincing people that he was alive too at home. He broke upon the world in the twofold splendor of a pair of volumes, published in Mr. Moxon's finest style. His former writings were clipped of many puerilities, and brought nearer the confines of common sense; to them were added many poems, never before printed, some of which are marked by a delicate frost-work kind of beauty. The London Quar terly Journalists came out immediately with a long and highly laudatory critique, and ranked Mr. Tennyson among the foremost poets of the age, without an allusion to the homicidal attack they had made on him only a few short years before; and without the least apology for surrendering the doctrine of the infallibility of reviewers. The American reprint is page for page from the English, and in excellence of typography and luxury of paper, is not much inferior to the London edition. We understand also that the publishers have honorably agreed to let the author share in the profits, if any, of the American edition. This is as it should be. We hope the example may be imitated. It does not require much depth to fathom Mr. Tennyson's genius. He certainly has genius. He looks on things with a poetical eye; but they are small things, and his eye is none of the largest. There is nothing wide and comprehensive in his intellectual range - nothing of "the ample pinion That the Theban eagle bare, in his poetical flights. He has a remarkable alacrity at sinking. Quiet scenes, and soft characters, he delights to portray; and he portrays them with what the painters call a very soft touch. There is a very peculiar music in the flow of his lines and stanzas. It is generally pleasing, sometimes captivates the ear, but often overpowers us by its melting effeminacy. He is a dainty poet. We cannot help fancying him to be altogether finical in his personal habits. He is a sweet gentleman, and delights to gaze upon his image in a glass; his hair is probably long, and carefully curled; he writes in white kid gloves, on scented paper; perhaps he sleeps in yellow curl-papers. We are certain he lisps. - ὡς ἠλίθιον ἐφθέγξατο Καὶ τοισι χέιλεσιν διεξ υηκόσιν. He is deficient in manly thought and strong expression; but he has fancy and feeling. Instead of uttering what he has to say in a direct, unambiguous, and plain fashion, as the older and better poets did, he surrounds it with a haze of pretty words, bedecks it with sparkling conceits, and sweetens it with sugary sentimentalities. He is fond of "airy, fairy women," and has drawn a series of sketches, about as distinct and substantial as the forms on dying embers. He is a curious compound of the poet, the dandy, and the Della Cruscan. Affectation is his prevailing intellectual vice; and it is the badge of a numerous tribe. Sometimes he puts on the simple; and then he outruns the simplicity of Mother Goose, or but we must deal gingerly with the names of the living, for "caparisons are odorous." He has certainly grown stronger during his disappearance from the world of letters. The trance he was thrown into by the Quarterly did him good. But something infinitely better than he has yet written is unquestionably within the range of his powWe shall illustrate our view of his character most clearly by giving a few extracts. For the Mother Goose style, we take the second poem in volume first. ers. Airy, fairy Lilian, When I ask her if she love me, When my passion seeks Smiling, never speaks: So innocent-arch, so cunning simple, Prythee weep, May Lilian! The "Song to the Owl" is another precious piece; we do not wonder at that respectable bird for "complaining to the moon," if his "ancient solitary reign" is often molested by such melodies. Dora has been much praised; but the concluding lines are not remarkably poetical. So those four abode Within one house together; and as years The "Talking Oak" is one of the best pieces in the book. The tree is a little sappy, to be sure, and discourses somewhat tenderly for an oak; but it was probably a very green one. We would give it, but it is too long for quotation. We have room only for the poem entitled "Locksley Hall." Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet 't is early morn: Many a night from yonder ivied casement, ere I went to rest, In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. long." Love took up the glass of Time, and turn'd it in his glowing hands; Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in golden sands. Love took up the harp of Life, and smote on all the chords with might; Many an evening by the waters did we watch the stately ships, to decline On a range of lower feelings and a narrower heart than mine! Yet it shall be: thou shalt lower to his level day by day, What is this? his eyes are heavy: think not they are glazed with wine. It may be my lord is weary, that his brain is overwrought: Better thou and I were lying, hidden from the heart's disgrace, Cursed be the social wants that sin against the strength of youth! Cursed be the sickly forms that err from honest Nature's rule! Well- 't is well that I should bluster! - Hadst thou less unworthy proved Would to God · - for I had loved thee more than ever wife was loved. Am I mad, that I should cherish that which bears but bitter fruit? Never, tho' my mortal summers to such length of years should come Where is comfort? in division of the records of the mind? I remember one that perish'd: sweetly did she speak and move: Can I think of her as dead, and love her for the love she bore? 31 |