The Portland daily press., 1881-01-08
Recent Publications.

his neaQ. Inc rise, nelgnJ ana decline OF Mr..
Tennyson's genius is as clearly defined as the
suns path from east to west. 1t arose slowly,
brilliantly, from the early studies of verse by
which Mr.. Tennyson secured command over
words, and steady, apt and strong hold of po-
etic forms which never failed to convey with
effect and precision the themes that his geni-
us chose 1t is not easy to over-rate the worth
ofsuch careful poetic study as was his; per-
hans no English poet has balanced more deli
cately the weight of words, and none has so
closely kept pace with the advance of his
times. He was accused of some literary affec-
tations in the extreme elaboration of such ex-
ercises in poetic counterpoint as his Norman
and Mermaid songs, Claribel, Oriana, and 9TH
ers-but the superb musical effects of the Bu-
gle Song, Turn Fortune, Turn Thy Wheel, or
The Swallow are directly due to these studies.
Mr.. Tennyson has "a rare instinct for useful
practice, and disciplined his poetic gift to de-
gree which could not have been expected of
genius so luxuriant and natural. Sound and
sense go hand in hand, and support each other
in the poems which may fairly be considered
as representative of the laureate. His merid-
ian was touched in the first group of Idyls of
the King, those which recorded the pure splen- /
doris of the Arthurian legends; and the very
climax of tragic powera and poetic beauty was
attained in the magnificent scene where Ar
thur parts from the repentant Guinevere. At
ter this the shadow that fell upon the Round
Table seemed to dishearten the poet The lat
ter Idyls were far beneath the earlier in poetic
beauty as in theme. Tragedy was the form of
poetry to which Mr.. Tennyson next directed
his thought-understandi with his notable .
perception of the requirements of the time,
that dramatic period OF literature would be
the coming development. His two tragedies,
Queen Mary and Haroll, no doubt served to
hasten and strengthen this dramatic tendency
of the age and, though they lack much of the
music of the blank verse of his idyls-
(and we who are born too late to
have known the idyls as novel wonder Of
music, have no doubt missed a keen delight)
are finely planned, and are digniied eontri-
button to the English drama. They contain
superbly resonant lines; and the extraordinary
beauty of the Lutte Song of Queen Mary, and
Edith's song in Harold, and the hard, metal
lie stroke, iron on iron, of the soldiers song,
fully attest that the poets voice and skill are
not abated. 1t is perhaps again the specula-
tive and intellectually didactic turn of the age
which is greatly given over to accepting mar
wells without note or comment, and cracking
its wits over plain matters which do not ask
for exposition-that leads Mr.. Tennyson to
write poems so alien to his best manner as Sir
John Oldcastle, and Columbus, in the present
volume. Here we find him astray from the
ay0nisita m at ba hos rnada y,Ia aiv. aaI
wandering off into the briers of Browning;
and the lines in which remain some echoes of
his olden music are out of tune In his earlier
poems the felicity of his manner was notable,
even in the judicious fashion of their opening
lines, which were set to play delicate prelude
to the poetic theme which was to follow. In
the two poems now under consideration, a GER
tain hardness of touch rather compels than
wins the ear, and the immediate .fortissimo
is not needed or in keeping with the dynamic
degree of the rest of the poem. This sharp
opening chord is, by the way, poetic parallel
to similar effects in much of the extreme
school of modern music. 1t might be named
an affectation,L except that every reviewer
ought to remember that this word is the east
est to apply, and the hardest to verify. Judg-
ing of motives, in literature as in life, is an
uncertain and an ill-considered thing; and the
charge of affectation is quite as often the proof
of limited sympathy in the critic as of any
self-consciousness on the poets part. The dia-
lect ballads, of which Mr.. Tennyson seems so
greatly to enjoy the writing, do not display his
talent to advantage. Mr.. Barnes's Dorset
shire Ballads are better than the laureate's
similar work, in possessing rural sweetness
which Mr.. Tennyson's fail to catch, though
these have much dramatic power and some
shrewd humor. The Revenge is fine and
stirring sea-song, with wild and varied meas
ure. The Sisters is decidedly weak poem,
built on sandy foundation of mild psychol-
ogy, and the song The Tables Tnrned, has to
It's disadvantage an unpoetic title, and
lacks the tuneabe beauty and fortunate
balance of words that we have right to ex-
poet from song of Mr.. Tennyson's. In the
Children's Hospital is sweet and good little
theme; but, touching and tender as it is
there is nothing that marks it as from the pen
of great poet. in it and in the Defence of
Lucknow, a fine and stirring war-poemA Mr..
Tennyson employs the same metre which he
has chosen for his dialect ballads, a needless
monotony for him who can command every me-
tire at will, andlsurely not suited to each of these
very diverse themes. The Voyage of Mael-
dune-in the same metre again-contains some
magnificent descriptive lines. De Profundis
is conglomerate attempt at the orchestral
splendors of Mr. Swinburnes verse, and the
philosophers of the modern scientists. 1t
breaks into its most tortuous line of un
poetic jargon in such splitting of tangled hairs
as this: --~+. ra
OF this divisible-indivisble world So
Among the numerable-in -innumerable
Sun, sun, and sun through fnte-inhnite space
In ffnite-infnite Time. N a9i q .afr-sf -a
Also in this poem the opening line is at fault
in failing to set clearly the metre to be en-
ployed, indeed it requires false stress of sylla-
bles to make it conform to the measure; and
though this might pass well enough in the
midst of a poem the metrical quality of the
first lines ought to be apparent, that the read
ers' ear may take at once and without doubt,
the verse that the writer intended. The Pre-
fatory Sonnet is fine and characteristic. The
sonnet to W. III. Brookfeld is in an admirable
vein, as is the courtly sonnet to Victor Hugo.
The Saxon poem is interestingly translated
and the version Of Achilles over the Trench is
return to Mr.. Tennyson's glorious manner
that we knew of other years. 1t is happi-
ness to see, in such lines as these from Homer,
that despite the present injustice which Mr..
Tennysons work does him, it is not yet the
sunset of his genius, but rather a cloud
of concession to some caprices of his
own or perhaps some false criticisms
made by men who did not know the tenn
per but only the polish of his genius
a cloud, we may say, under which this great
light Of song stays now, but soon will appear
again in all the splendor gathered throughout
his bright long course. Mr.. Tennyson needs
only to use his genius in the fashion which his
superb poetic instinct and his patient and ex-
quistte studies have formed, to take his own
kingdom again and restore his praise that he
won in the days of his singing of the Round
Table.
1t should be said here that Messrs. Osgood's
edition of this latest work of Mr.. Tennyson il
the only one sanctioned by the author, and in
which he has a direct pecuniary interest.
Messrs. Osgood & Co. paid large sum to Mr.