A STUDY.

TENNYSON'S poem of "The Princess" has been and continues to be singularly underrated. Seldom, in the universal chorus of admiration, and even adulation, which for years his work has excited, do we meet with appreciation of this his longest continuous poem. A poem, moreover, published at the age when a writer usually produces his best work. -equally removed from the exuberance of youth and the chill of age, and one which has been altered and re-touched during five successive editions, until the utmost effort has been expended, and, in literary form at least, it stands out unsurpassed in perfect finish by anything in modern literature. In that respect, the "Princess" is to Tennyson's other works what the "Elegy" is to Gray's. In the adverse criticism it has called forth, we are reminded of Dr. Johnson's attack upon Milton's

A

"Lycidas;" indeed, both the "Princess" and "Lycidas" have continuously, and with equal justice or injustice, been reproached for the same fault, that of incongruity of plan. Both Milton and Tennyson, moreover, drew their inspiration from ancient art; but the "Lycidas" is an adaptation of Greek form and method; while the "Princess" is a transfusion of the Greek spirit into modern life. Every line of the "Lycidas" breathes of Theocritus; many are even close imitations, but while long passages of the "Princess" are pervaded by the spirit which inspired Theocritus, only in a few lines can an imitation be traced.

'Maud," like the "Princess," was received with great disappointment; but in the case of "Maud that feeling passed away, while the Princess" continues still to be neglected, or to be disparaged -as if it alone were unworthy of the poet's powers. Even Mr. Peter Bayne, a devotee almost of Tennyson, omits all reference to this poem in his "Lessons from my Masters." The "Idylls," "In Memoriam," "Maud," and even all the earliest poems, the "Merman" and "Oriana," receive from him, at the very least, their due meed of worship;

but the "Princess" is silently passed over, as if there, in the prime of his power, the master's skill had failed. As to adverse criticism, its nature is well shown in the following passage from the Edinburgh Review, written in 1855, when the poem had received its last touches:

"The subject of the Princess,'" says the reviewer, "so far from being great in a poetical point of view, is partly even of transitory interest.. This piece, though full of meanings of abiding value, is ostensibly a brilliant serio-comic jeu d'esprit upon the noise about 'women's rights,' which even now ceases to make itself heard anywhere but in the refuge of exploded European absurdities beyond the Atlantic. A carefully elaborated construction, a 'wholeness,' arising out of distinct and well-contrasted parts, which is another condition of a great poem, would have been worse than thrown away on such a subject. In reading the poem, the mind is palled and wearied with wasted splendour and beauty."

It seems difficult to get further astray than this, but the last (188o) edition of Chambers's Cyclopedia of English Literature attempts it; thus:

The mixture of modern ideas and manners with those of the age of chivalry and romance, the attempted amalgamation of the farcical with the sentimental, renders the Princess' truly a medley,' and produces an unpleasant grotesque effect."

The result of criticism is thus summed up by Mr. Wace in the following passage of his "Study of the Life and Works of Tennyson:

Although the 'Princess' was admittedly brilliant, it was thought scarcely worthy of the author. The abundant grace, descriptive beauty, and human sentiment were evident. But the medley was thought somewhat incongruous, and the main web of the tale too weak to sustain the embroidery raised upon it. D. M. Moir, the amiable 'Delta' of Blackwood's Magazine, says :-'Its beauties and faults are so inextricably interwoven, and the latter are so glaring and many, nay,ften apparently so wilful, that as a sincere admirer of Tennyson I could almost wish the poem had remained unwritten. I admit the excellences of particular passages, but it has neither general harmony of design, nor sustained merit of execution.' A verdict more favourable, but somewhat in the same

strain, may be said to be that now generally accepted."

The verdict, however, was never unanimous. There have always been a few critics with a keener sense of appreciation. A writer in the Edinburgh Review, in 1849, before the poem had received its present form, and consequently without the advantages of the previously quoted writer of 1855, could see unity and purpose in it. To the reviewer of 1849 the true sphere of woman's activity is not a subject to be contemptuously relegated to America; and although the lyric interludes had not at that time been inserted, he, in the following passage, instinctively touches the keynote of the poet's meaning:

"Many passages in it have a remarkable reference to children. They sound like a perpetual child-protest against Ida's Amazonian philosophy, which, if realised, would cast the whole of the childlike element out of the female character, and, at the same time, extirpate from the soul of man those feminine qualities which the masculine nature, to be complete, must include."

The review is throughout appreciative, and is