The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1879-07-05
SATURDAY, MORNING, JULY 5.
charming drop-curtain, 50 to say, for his dra-

charming drop-curtain, so to say, for his dra-
ma in monologue:
Here, far away, seen from the topmost cliff,
Filling with purple gloom the vacancies
Between the tufted hills the sloping seas ,
Hung in mid-heaven, and half way down rare Sails
White as white clouds loated from sky to sky.
1t is not difficult to see in this early sketch
the studies for the magnificent marine pictures
of Ulysses, and the Lotus-Eaters In descrip-
tive work, and in musical cadences, we find
Alfred Tennyson at the age of eighteen already
skillful and mastery. His metaphors vary in
merit-sometimes they have the peculiar apt
ness so unfailing to his recent work; again they
are such as his present taste would let pass UNI
challenged only in the desire to present hon
estly the work of his youth. His imagination
was richly developed, even then; and expresses
itself in frequent phrases of rare poetic beauty
His study of nature was remarkably Close and
he wrote like a youth who saw with we'll
opened eyes of his own, and with much of the
accurate sight and fortunate touches of descrip-
ton that are so admirable in his later poems.
A few commonplaces it would have been
strange if Mr. Tennyson had not adopted al
most unconsciousy, from the machinery OF
poetry as it existed in the first half of this
tury-"the urn of Hope "the Goddess of the
past" and the description of the heroine ring
lets, which weakens very much a passionate
passage Again occur lines: notable for high
poetry, as:
had Heaven from her doors
With all her golden threshold elashing, rolld
Her heaviest thunder
the few lines of che episode of Time and Grief
Zines that seem like the shut bud from which
sonnet might at any moment bloom):
The dragon-fy
Shot by me like flash of purple fire.
A vessel in mid-ocean. her heaved PROV
Clambering, the mast bent and the raying wind
In her sail roaring
The stones
Strewn in the entry of the moaning cave;
A morning air, sweet after rain, ran
The ripping levels of the lake. and blew
Goodness and moisture and all smells of bud
And foliage from the dark and dripping woods
my heart
Shrank in me like snowflake in the hand,
and the wild, ringing close of the poem are in
the very manner whitehall it painting or
music as you will, for it is akin to both-is the
charm of Mr. Tennyson's vivid, melodious
verse of to-day.
Ofsthe Golden Supper, the sequel which the
poet wrote later, little need be said. 1t has
been fully reviewed in recent years by news
papers and magazines on both sides of the At
lantic. But somewhat curious proof of the
sense of fitness which so greatly distinguishes
Mr.. Tennysons gift, is the resemblance which
the early and late portions of the poem bear to
each other. 1t seems kindly courtesy of Mr..
Tennyson toward his younger self, that he has
changed a little his present manner, SO that
the lapse of time between the parts of the poem
be less perceptible. He even repeats some lit
tie faults of heayiness of smile, of over-many
words, for sake of this boy who was, and is not
now because of the crown of years and laurel
leaves.
Briefly, the poem may be summed up as
notably clear prophecy of the authors great
ness; and all we who foretell after the event
may surely say this-that the reading of the
Lovers Tale confirms the faith that needs no
reinforcement, of the soundness and poetic
power of the genius that, more than any other,
has influenced modern verse.