New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1892-11-13
TENNYSON.
TUDE-TIS PLLiCION-IIIS HEROIC AND
PATRIOTIC SPIRIT-HIS ART-HIS
PERMANENT FAME

PERMANENT FAME.
London. October %.
word of explanation is due 20 readers Of
these belated notes On the day after Tennysont
death / sent you two letters which hear have
been los. To rcwritc them, as you wr,h, Is not
easy. Weeks have gone by The atmosphere Is
no longer the same. The first feelings and i'm
pulses Of the public have faded out The poet
has been buried tho world has gone about lis
usual business. The freshness of the general
sympathy has grown, not perhaps stale, but l"sS
fresh. There were few days during which
everybody talked about him. If he is mentioned
now, he is mentioned as Wordsworth might he
He has become classic; his place is in the
past II is hardly possible TO return, after
an interval. to the mood in which public
loss leaves one. The sense Of the loss may be
just as keen; ones admiration for the man or
for the poet is no less. But a writer who wishes
to convey TO distant readers the impression made
on his mind by the spectacle Of great people
bowed by great grief must do il AT once or
not at all. Anything one can put on paper now
things ore would like to say, even if one cannot
resay the particular thing first said.
What was most striking at first the ont
burst Of affection for Tcnnyson which seemed
almost universal. The expression Of il in public
was remarkable; In private IL was more re-
mar<ablc still II was most remarkable of all
because il not, and could not have been, TO
any great extent, personal. Few men who have
filed great space in the intellectual life Of
their time have dwet so much alone lie was
almost y Tccuec. lie did NOT care much Cor
society, nor society very much for him He
seldom or never allowed himscIf 70 he lionzcd.
lie had AZ times a house in London, in that
long, unlovry -'rcct," which bears Harlcv's
name, and there Lady 1ennyson sometimes
entertained But lie formed no regular part Of
the social existence which often has so mnch
influence on fame and OH popularity. He wos q
freguentcr Of no club. He never entered the
House of Lords for the business of legislation
lie never seen at Newmarket. which is
not only the Turf headquarters. but 4 great
social centre. lie did not 70 private views
nor 10 first nights, TO Court, except privately
ard never, or hardly ever, was figure in any
Of the great public functions. which are so many
stages which many practised performer en-
hibits himself 10 the gaze Of the public
don't think he ever attended a Lord Mayors
lie chose 10 live at Frcshwatcr or at Aldworth :
places not inaccessible, certainly. but remote in
deed from streaming Londons central roar"
There he exercised a certain hospitality. in n
fashion of his own. lie received his own friends :
rarely his friends friends There or elsewhere he
led q self-ccn'rcG life. Friends he had, OF course
not very many, but deeply attached 10 him. and
in no English household were family ties close"
than his: in the domestic life more heaut-
ful He could draw ont deep feelings Of attach
ment in other men even more self-centred than
himself. Carlyle had almost an affection for him :;
and there were Others though none so remarkable
as that GRIM dour Scotch peasant who dwet
apart in Chelsea and forged thunderbolts for the
world In short II Is 10 he said of 1cnnvson
y that II he was loved. he was loved deeply: in
his own phrrsn he was. to each friend, all in all
or nothing Mt all They who mOurned for him
most bitterly We're they who knew him well. or
who knew him never.
People had certain idea of his personality
OF his appearance; of his masculine force Of char
acter: Of lis remotencss from other men: Of his
cnrt manner ard, on occasion, roughness Of speech
or total silence: of his inpaticncc: of many other
tr1ts. attractive or otherwise: all merging into
q real grandcu: of nature: an individuality that
was impressive II not always attaching But so
far rs he was really known, he known by
his poems. Cut oil 'ne tIDf1N-HNF HlllllOnS ol MS
fellow cou trymen, not more than few thou
sands ever saw him or spoke 70 him. They krrw
what manner of hc was outwardly by in
Vulnerable photographs I!s was as frequent in
the shop windows az professional beauty. They
knew, perhaps Nilaiss portrait OF him: fine
picture hut 700 Electrical in pose and treatment
srch Tcnnyson as he might have looked on
the other side Of the footlichts whittier author
not actor, an unrlflrrd ambition led him. all il
vain And yet there was beyond all question
on the morrow Of his death most general ard
genuine sorrow throughout the land. II must
have been tho poet whom these millions re-
+. GREETED yet the poems were rot dead. only Tho
nan: and the s,rrow which fell upon England is
n testimony TO the unselishncss Of human nature
aud N The sympatlics which are, after all, etcrna
in Tho human breast
Tho canses OF all tins are well worth consider
inc and getting at. if ono could. hut among theH
all there il, il seems 10 mo. one """spcuonSN
false and ono conspcuously true. The 1hIs" ohe
il the religious An effort is made TO represent
Tennyson rs q great religious teacher ana great
nart Of the homage offered him is srt down TO the
religious sentiment which pervodeN This people
There is hut very slight foundation for that
notion One writer tries 10 draw contrast be-
tween Tcnnyson and Rnan; ali 70 the dis1dvan-
faro Of tho latter Of course, since il Is The ortho
dox view which this singular writer presents tn
his readers TcnnysOn. he SAYS lifts us into
another world. +" II he had not Remains learning.
he had a range Of thought far wider and covering
a very different field And he proceeds to al
lego. in his authoritative way, and from posi-
zion Of great authority, that Tcnnyson hal al
most from his first appearance powerful 1nfn-
cnce in forming the minds ard in directing the
thoughts of his kind-meanng the religious
thoughts-and never wasted his efforts in the
wilderness of barren criticism
Not by such eccenlrcites as this is Ten
nysoi,s fame 10 10 advanced. or the sourc.
Of the love bore him 10 he discovered
II. r,s no cccleSias'ic and no theOlDgan. IL