The works of Alfred Tennyson. With 25 illustr

My life has crept so long on a broken wing
Thro' cells of madness, haunts of horror and fear,
That I come to be grateful at last for a little thing:
My mood is changed, for it fell at a time of year
When the face of night is fair on the dewy downs,
And the shining daffodil dies, and the Charioteer
And starry Gemini hang like glorious crowns

Over Orion's grave low down in the west,

That like a silent lightning under the stars

She seem'd to divide in a dream from a band of the blest,

And spoke of a hope for the world in the coming wars-
'And in that hope, dear soul, let trouble have rest,

Knowing I tarry for thee,' and pointed to Mars
As he glow'd like a ruddy shield on the Lion's breast.

II.

And it was but a dream, yet it yielded a dear delight
To have look'd, tho' but in a dream, upon eyes so fair,
That had been in a weary world my one thing bright;
And it was but a dream, yet it lighten'd my despair
When I thought that a war would arise in defence of the right,
That an iron tyranny now should bend or cease,

The glory of manhood stand on his ancient height,
Nor Britain's one sole God be the millionnaire :
No more shall commerce be all in all, and Peace
Pipe on her pastoral hillock a languid note,
And watch her harvest ripen, her herd increase,
Nor the cannon-bullet rust on a slothful shore,
And the cobweb woven across the cannon's throat
Shall shake its threaded tears in the wind no more.

III.

And as months ran on and rumour of battle grew,

'It is time, it is time, O passionate heart,' said I
(For I cleaved to a cause that I felt to be pure and true),
'It is time, O passionate heart and morbid eye,

That old hysterical mock-disease should die.'
And I stood on a giant deck and mix'd my breath

With a loyal people shouting a battle cry,

Till I saw the dreary phantom arise and fly

Far into the North, and battle, and seas of death.

IV.

Let it go or stay, so I wake to the higher aims

Of a land that has lost for a little her lust of gold,
And love of a peace that was full of wrongs and shames,
Horrible, hateful, monstrous, not to be told;

And hail once more to the banner of battle unroll'd!
Tho' many a light shall darken, and many shall weep
For those that are crush'd in the clash of jarring claims,
Yet God's just wrath shall be wreak'd on a giant liar;
And many a darkness into the light shall leap,
And shine in the sudden making of splendid names,

And noble thought be freër under the sun,

And the heart of a people beat with one desire;

For the peace, that I deem'd no peace, is over and done,

And now by the side of the Black and the Baltic deep,
And deathful-grinning mouths of the fortress, flames
The blood-red blossom of war with a heart of fire.

Let it flame or fade, and the war roll down like a wind,
We have proved we have hearts in a cause, we are noble still,

And myself have awaked, as it seems, to the better mind;

It is better to fight for the good than to rail at the ill;
I have felt with my native land, I am one with my kind,
I embrace the purpose of God, and the doom assign'd.

A A

IDYLLS OF THE KING.

DEDICATION.

THESE to His Memory-since he held

them dear,

Perchance as finding there unconsciously
Some image of himself-I dedicate,

I dedicate, I consecrate with tears-
These Idylls.

And indeed He seems to me Scarce other than my own ideal knight, 'Who reverenced his conscience as his king;

Whose glory was, redressing human wrong; Who spake no slander, no, nor listen'd

to it;

Who loved one only and who clave to her-'

Her-over all whose realms to their last

isle,

Commingled with the gloom of imminent

war,

The shadow of His loss drew like eclipse, Darkening the world. We have lost

him he is gone :

We know him now: all narrow jealousies Are silent; and we see him as he moved, How modest, kindly, all-accomplish'd, wise,

With what sublime repression of himself, And in what limits, and how tenderly ; Not swaying to this faction or to that; Not making his high place the lawless perch

Of wing'd ambitions, nor a vantage

ground

For pleasure; but thro' all this tract of

years

Wearing the white flower of a blameless

life,

Before a thousand peering littlenesses, In that fierce light which beats upon a throne,

And blackens every blot : for where is he, Who dares foreshadow for an only son

A lovelier life, a more unstain'd, than his? Or how should England dreaming of his

sons

Hope more for these than some inheritance Of such a life, a heart, a mind as thine, Thou noble Father of her Kings to be, Laborious for her people and her poorVoice in the rich dawn of an ampler day— Far-sighted summoner of War and Waste To fruitful strifes and rivalries of peaceSweet nature gilded by the gracious gleam Of letters, dear to Science, dear to Art, Dear to thy land and ours, a Prince indeed,

Beyond all titles, and a household name, Hereafter, thro' all times, Albert the Good.

Break not, O woman's-heart, but still

endure ;

Break not, for thou art Royal, but endure, Remembering all the beauty of that star Which shone so close beside Thee, that ye made

One light together, but has past and leaves The Crown a lonely splendour.

May all love,

His love, unseen but felt, o'ershadow Thee, The love of all Thy sons encompass Thee, The love of all Thy daughters cherish

Thee,

The love of all Thy people comfort Thee, Till God's love set Thee at his side again !

Came night and day, and rooted in the

fields,

And wallow'd in the gardens of the King. And ever and anon the wolf would steal The children and devour, but now and then,

Her own brood lost or dead, lent her fierce teat

To human sucklings; and the children, housed

In her foul den, there at their meat would growl,

And mock their foster-mother on four feet, Till, straighten'd, they grew up to wolflike men,

Worse than the wolves. And King

Leodogran

Groan'd for the Roman legions here again, And Cæsar's eagle : then his brother king, Urien, assail'd him : last a heathen horde, Reddening the sun with smoke and earth with blood,

And on the spike that split the mother's heart

Spitting the child, brake on him, till,

amazed,

He knew not whither he should turn for aid.

But for he heard of Arthur newly

crown'd,

Tho' not without an uproar made by those Who cried, He is not Uther's son'-the

King

Sent to him, saying, 'Arise, and help us thou!

For here between the man and beast we die.'

And Arthur yet had done no deed of

arms,

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