Though indeed we could spare nothing of Tennyson, however small or
however peculiar--not "Break, Break," nor "Flower in the Crannied
Wall," nor the old, eternally-told passion of "Edward Gray:"
Love may come and love may go,
And fly like a bird from tree to tree.
But I will love no more, no more
Till Ellen Adair come back to me.
Yes, Alfred Tennyson's is a superb character, and will help give
illustriousness, through the long roll of time, to our Nineteenth
Century. In its bunch of orbic names, shining like a constellation
of stars, his will be one of the brightest. His very faults, doubts,
swervings, doublings upon himself, have been typical of our age. We
are like the voyagers of a ship, casting off for new seas, distant
shores. We would still dwell in the old suffocating and dead haunts,
remembering and magnifying their pleasant experiences only, and more
than once impell'd to jump ashore before it is too late, and stay
where our fathers stay'd, and live as they lived.
May-be I am non-literary and non-decorous (let me at least be human,
and pay part of my debt) in this word about Tennyson. I want him to
realize that here is a great and ardent Nation that absorbs his songs,
and has a respect and affection for him personally, as almost for no
other foreigner. I want this word to go to the old man at Farringford
as conveying no more than the simple truth; and that truth (a little
Christmas gift) no slight one either. I have written impromptu, and
shall let it all go at that.
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