It is difficult at the present time, when Tennyson's poetry has become a part of the air we breathe, to look back into the world of literature as it existed before he came.

There is a keen remembrance, lingering ineradicably with the writer, of a little girl coming to school once upon recitation day, with a "piece" of her own selection safely stored away in her childish memory. It was a new poem to the school, and when her turn came to recite her soul was full of the gleam and glory of Camelot. She felt as if she were unlocking a treasure-house, and it was with unspeakable pleasure to herself that she gave, verse after verse, the entire poem of "The Lady of Shalott." Doubtless the child's voice drifted away into sing-song, as her whole little self seemed to drift away into the land of faery, and doubtless also the busy teacher, who was more familiar with Jane Taylor and Cowper, was sadly puzzled. When the child at length sat down, scarcely knowing where she was in her sudden descent from the land of marvel, she heard the teacher say, to her amazement and discouragement, after an ominous pause, "I wonder if any young lady can tell me what this poem means?" There was no reply.

"Can you tell us?" was the next question, pointed at the poor little girl who had just dropped out of cloudland. "I thought it explained itself," was the plaintive reply. With a slight air of depreciation, in another moment the next recitation was called for, and the dull clouds of routine shut down over the sudden glory. "Shades of the prison-house" then and there began to close over the growing child. One joy had for the present faded from her life, that of a sure sympathy and understanding. Not even her teacher could see what she saw, nor could feel what lay deep down in her own glowing heart. Nevertheless Tennyson was henceforth a seer and a prophet to this child and to the growing world; but for some, who could never learn his language, he was born too late.

The picturesqueness of Scott and Byron, the simple piety of Cowper, had satisfied the poetic and religious nature of the world up to that time. Shelley and Keats had indeed lived, but men had scarcely then learned generally to read them. Tennyson may be looked upon as their interpreter, in a measure, to the common world. Even Wordsworth, the mountain-top of poetry, the leader, whom Tennyson called his master— even he failed to give the common mind, which looks for drama, any long poem which he who runs may read. This humanity in poetry is distinctly, first of all, Shakespearian; but if this quality should seem to any reader not also Tennysonian, let him re-read "Guinevere," in the "Idylls of the King," and reverse his decision.

The hearts of men were largely attuned by Tennyson, and taught to understand the affinities and symbolisms of nature. This new era in literature opened about the year 1830, when Tennyson gave a few poems to the world, which were chiefly canceled by his later judgment. A small book in green paper covers lies before me as I write, "privately printed" in 1862, containing his poems printed between 1830 and 1833, and giving the first readings of some which have been sanctioned in his later editions. The volume "privately printed" has been most privately treasured lest anything should appear from it to "vex the poet's mind." For thirty years it has lain in a secret drawer, with these words inscribed upon the cover: "Not to be lent; not to be stolen; not to be given away."

Some of these poems have been wrought over until we are reminded of his own line,

"Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere,"

and incorporated in his later editions; others seem to have been gathered up and published without permission by an American publisher, who in some way gained possession of the book. The present perfected edition, however, published by Macmillan, evidently contains all the poems Tennyson wished to have remembered. The chief interest in the small green book is in the early readings, which are a good study for those who pursue the art of poetry. We see in them the sure integrity of the master-hand.

"Isabel" was not, perhaps, one of the very earliest poems, although it stands among the early poems of character in the perfected edition. It does not appear in the green book, yet the title already stands in the table of contents. In his own revised editions it has always appeared unchanged from the first. There is a flawless loveliness in this poem which makes it especially worthy of admiration. "Isabel" possesses a peculiar interest, because it is understood to be the poet's tribute to his wife, and indeed even his imaginative eye could hardly elsewhere have found another to whom this description would so properly fit:—

"The intuitive decision of a bright
And thorough-edged intellect to part
Error from crime; a prudence to withhold
The laws of marriage character'd in gold
Upon the blanched tablets of her heart;
A love still burning upward, giving light
To read those laws; an accent very low
In blandishment, but a most silver flow
Of subtle-paced counsel in distress,
Right to the heart and brain, tho' undescried,
Winning its way with extreme gentleness
Thro' all the outworks of suspicious pride
A courage to endure and to obey;
A hate of gossip parlance and of sway,—
Crown'd Isabel, thro' all her placid life,
The queen of marriage, a most perfect wife."

The relation of Tennyson's life to that of other men has been but imperfectly understood. There was indeed a natural sublimity in his character which gave him, as he has himself said of the poet's mind, a power for scorn of things fit to be scorned; but his capacity for friendship has been proved again and again. The tree, as of old, is known by its fruits, and we need only recall the poems to James Spedding, to F. D. Maurice, to Mary Boyle, to Lord Dufferin, his correspondence with Edward Fitzgerald, and the great note of grief and consolation in "In Memoriam," to know a man capable of friendship, and one who has drawn to himself the noble lovers of his time.

There was an unconsciousness of outward things, of the furniture of life, which left him freer than most men to face the individual soul that approached him. There was also a fine consistency in his personality,—no tampering with the world; no trying to serve two masters. The greatness of his presence was felt, we believe, by all who approached him; he seemed to be invested by a strange remoteness from the affairs of the world. Yet it was easy for the spirits to draw near to him who really wanted what he could give. His hospitality was large and sincere. In his own words of the "Great Duke" we read his perfect likeness:—

"As the greatest only are,
In his simplicity sublime."

A friend who knew him wrote once: "Tennyson found out in the golden season of his life, his youth, just what kind of work he was fitted to do, and he never squandered an hour in search of his primary bearings…. There is always a gravity about him, a becoming nobleness, which reminds one of what St. Simon said of FÉnÉlon, 'When he is present it requires an effort to cease looking at him.'"

When this friend returned after his first interview with Tennyson, many years ago, we can well recall the eagerness with which we listened. His excitement as he described the hours they had passed together was hardly less than that of his hearer. Every minute detail of the interview was impatiently demanded. "How did he look?" was asked immediately in the first pause, and "What did he say?" followed before there was quite time to speak. In reply came a full description of the tall figure, clad in a long gray dressing-gown, presenting itself in the half-opened doorway of his chambers in the Temple, and looking cautiously out at the new comer.

"'Oh! it is you,' he said, drawing his visitor in through the narrow space with a most cordial welcome. He was sitting before the fire, with his books about him, which he put aside, and while he talked he began to toast sundry slices of bread for our repast. As for his looks, his head is a very grand one, and his voice has a deep swelling richness in it. He had just received from the printers some proof sheets of the 'Idylls of the King,' and then and there he chanted the story of Enid and Elaine: chanted is the true word to apply to his recitations. He had a theory that poetry should always be given out with the rhythm accentuated, and the music of the verse strongly emphasized, and he did it with a power that was marvelous."

The next recollection, and one that sweeps vividly across my memory, is that of going to Farringford for the first time, and seeing Tennyson among the surroundings so admirably suited to his tastes and necessities. The place was much more retired than at present; indeed, there was neither sight nor sound of any intrusion during those summer days. The island might have been Prospero's own, it seemed so still and far away.

Beyond the gardens and the lawn the great downs sloped to the sea, and in the distance on either hand could be seen the cliffs and shores as they wound away and were lost in the dim haze that lay between us and the horizon. We found ourselves suddenly walking as in a dream, surrounded with the scenery of his poems.

It is still easy to distinguish with perfect clearness to the "inward eye" two figures rambling along the downs that lovely day, and pausing at a rude summer-house, a kind of forgotten shelter, a relic of some other life. The great world was still as only the noon of summer knows how to be; the air blew freshly up from the sea, and the figures stopped a moment to look and rest. The door of the shelter hung idly on rusted hinges, and the two entered to enjoy the shade. Turning, they saw the whole delicious scene framed in the rude doorway. "Ah," the lady said, "I have found one of your haunts. I think you must sometimes write here." Tennyson looked at her with a smile which said, "I can trust my friends;" and putting his hand up high over the door, he took from the tiny ledge a bit of pencil and paper secreted there, held them out to her for one moment, and then carefully put them back again. There was not much said, but it was an immediate revelation, and a cherished bit of confidence. Perhaps on that sheet was already inscribed,

"Ask me no more; the moon may draw the sea,
The cloud may stoop from heaven and lake the shape,
With fold on fold, of mountain or of cape;"

or perhaps the page was waiting for "The Sailor-Boy," or glimpses of the great "Tyntagel," or "Lyonesse."

I could not know, nor did he, what he was yet to do. I only felt—all who knew him felt—that he knew his work demanded from him the sacrifice of what the world calls pleasure. He endeavored to hold his spirit ready, and his mind trained and responsive.

His constant preoccupation with the business of his life rendered him often impatient of wasting hours in mere "personal talk." He was always eager and ready to hear of large matters of church or state from those who were competent to inform him; but it was his chief joy, when his friends were gathered about him, to read from other poets or from his own books.

In this same visit there was much talk of Milton, of whom he spoke as "the great organist of verse, who always married sound to sense when he wrote." Surely no one ever gave the lines of that great poet as he did. It was wonderful to hear. It would be impossible to forget that grand voice as he repeated:—

"The imperial ensign which full high advanced
Shone like a meteor streaming to the wind,
With gems and golden lustre rich emblazed,
Seraphic arms and trophies; all the while
Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds."

Tennyson's chanting of his own "BoÄdicea" was very remarkable.

"Thine the liberty, thine the glory, thine the deeds to be
celebrated,
Thine the myriad-rolling ocean, light and shadow illimitable."

But nothing could excel the effect of his rendering of "Guinevere," his voice at times tremulous with emotion, and his face turned from the light as he read,

"Let no man dream but that I love thee still,"

and all the noble context glowing with a white heat. It was easy then to find that his own ideal,

"Flos regum Arthuris,"

was not a legend to him alone, but a vision of the Holy Grail toward which he aspired.

It were easy, indeed it is a temptation, to record every detail, stamped as they all are on the memory after several visits at Farringford and at Aldworth; but the beautiful paper printed only a few years ago by Mrs. Anne Thackeray Ritchie, now given to the world in a volume, where Tennyson stands as one of "The Light-Bearers," would make any repetition of the history of his family life worse than unnecessary. Mrs. Ritchie's friendship with the members of that household, and her familiarity with the houses and scenery which surrounded them, have given her the opportunity to do what her genius has executed.

Summer was again here, with a touch of autumn in the air—this autumn in which we write—when we last saw Lord Tennyson at Aldworth. He was already unwell and suffering from a cold. He sat, however, on his couch, which was drawn across the great window, where he could look off, when he turned his head, and see the broad green valley and the hills beyond, or, near at hand, could watch the terrace and his own trees, and catch a glimpse of the garden.

The great frame had lost its look of giant strength; the hands were thinner; but the habit of his mind and spirit was the same. Again we heard the voice; again we felt the uplift of his presence. He was aware that he was not to stay here much longer, and when we bent over him to say good-by, we knew and he knew it was indeed "farewell." He was surrounded with deep love and tenderness and the delightful presence of his little grandchildren, and when, shortly after, his weakness increased, he doubtless heard the words sounding in his mind:—

"Fear no more the heat o' the sun,
Nor the furious winter's rages,

Thou thy worldly task hast done,
Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages."

He asked for "Cymbeline" that he might carry the noble lines clearly in remembrance. Later the moon shone full into the room, and in that dim splendor, and to the music of the autumn wind, his spirit passed.