Ready, be ready to meet the storm!
Riflemen, Riflemen, Riflemen, form!

Let your reforms for a moment go!
Look to your butts, and take good aims!
Better a rotten borough or so

Than a rotten fleet or a city in flames!
Form form! Riflemen, form!

Ready, be ready to meet the storm!
Riflemen, Riflemen, Riflemen, form!

Form, be ready to do or die!

Form in Freedom's name and the Queen's! True that we have a faithful ally,

But only the devil can tell what he means.
Form! form! Riflemen, form!
Ready, be ready to meet the storm!
Riflemen, Riflemen, Riflemen, form!

THE RINGLET

Printed in the 'Enoch Arden' volume, 1864, but afterwards suppressed.

'YOUR ringlets, your ringlets,

That look so golden-gay,

If you will give me one, but one,
To kiss it night and day,

Then never chilling touch of Time

Will turn it silver-gray;

And then shall I know it is all true gold

To flame and sparkle and stream as of old.
Till all the comets in heaven are cold,

And all her stars decay.'
Then take it, love, and put it by;
This cannot change, nor yet can I.'

2

'My ringlet, my ringlet,

That art so golden-gay,

Now never chilling touch of Time
Can turn thee silver-gray;

And a lad may wink, and a girl may hint,
And a fool may say his say;

For my doubts and fears were all amiss,
And I swear henceforth by this and this,
That a doubt will only come for a kiss,
And a fear to be kiss'd away.'
'Then kiss it, love, and put it by:
If this can change, why so can I.'

Contributed to 'Good Words,' March, 1868.

I STOOD on a tower in the wet,

And New Year and Old Year met,
And winds were roaring and blowing,
And I said, 'O years that meet in tears,
Have ye aught that is worth the knowing?
Science enough and exploring,
Wanderers coming and going,
Matter enough for deploring,

But aught that is worth the knowing?'
Seas at my feet were flowing,
Waves on the shingle pouring,
Old Year roaring and blowing,
And New Year blowing and roaring.

STANZA

Contributed to the 'Shakespearean ShowBook,' printed in March, 1884, for a fair got up for the Chelsea Hospital for Women.

Nor he that breaks the dams, but he
That thro' the channels of the State
Convoys the people's wish, is great;
His name is pure, his fame is free.

COMPROMISE

Addressed to Mr. Gladstone, then Prime Minister, in November, 1884, when the Fran

The following 'unpublished fragment' was printed in Ros Rosarum,' an anthology edited by Hon. Mrs. Boyle, 1885:

The night with sudden odor reel'd,
The southern stars a music peal'd,
Warm beams across the meadow stole;
For Love flew over grove and field,
Said, Open, Rosebud, open, yield
Thy fragrant soul.'

The following prefatory stanza was contributed in 1891 to Pearl,' an English poem of the 14th century, edited by Mr. Israel Gollancz:

We lost you for how long a time,
True Pearl of our poetic prime!
We found you, and you gleam reset
In Britain's lyric coronet.

[Other poems by Tennyson mentioned by Shepherd and Luce in their Bibliographies (neither of which is invariably accurate) as. printed, but omitted in the collected editions, are the following: a stanza in the volume of his poems presented to the Princess Louise of Schleswig-Holstein by representatives of the nurses of England; lines on the christening of the daughter of the Duchess of Fife; and lines to the memory of J. R. Lowell. These are not referred to in the Memoir,' and I have not been able to find copies of them.]

She brought a vast design to pass,
When Europe and the scattered ends
Of our fierce world were mixt as friends
And brethren in her halls of glass.

For an early version of the poem (from a MS. in the Library of the Drexel Institute, Philadelphia), see Jones's 'The Growth of the Idylls of the King,' p. 152. Nine of the thirteen stanzas are entirely unlike the poem as finally published.

Page 2. And statesmen at her councils met, etc. This stanza was once quoted by Mr. Gladstone in the House of Commons with remarkable effect. Lord John Manners, in an argument against political change, had quoted the poet's description of England as

A land of old and wide renown

Where Freedom slowly broadens down. The retort was none the less effective because the passage was taken from a different poem. Page 4. LEONINE ELEGIACS.

The title in 1830 was simply 'Elegiacs.' In line 6' wood-dove' was 'turtle,' and in 15' or ' was 'and.'

For the allusion in The ancient poetess singeth,' etc., compare Locksley Hall Sixty Years After': Hesper, whom the poet call'd the Bringer home of all good things.' The reference is to the fragment of Sappho:

Εσπερε, πάντα φέρεις· Φέρεις οἶνον, φέρεις αἶγα, Φέρεις ματέρι παῖδα.

Byron paraphrases it in 'Don Juan' (iii. 107):—
O Hesperus! thou bringest all good things-
Home to the weary, to the hungry cheer,
To the young bird the parent's brooding wings,
The welcome stall to the o'er-labor'd steer;
Whate'er of peace about our hearth-stone clings,
Whate'er our household gods protect of dear,
Are gather'd round us by thy look of rest;
Thou bring'st the child, too, to the mother's breast.

SUPPOSED CONFESSIONS, etc.

of a Second-rate Sensitive Mind not in Unity The original title was 'Supposed Confessions with Itself. In the poem as restored the following lines, after line 39, were omitted:

A grief not uninformed, and dull,
Hearted with hope, of hope as full
As is the blood with life, or night
And a dark cloud with rich moonlight.
To stand beside a grave, and see
The red small atoms wherewith we
Are built, and smile in calm, and say-
'These little motes and grains shall be
Clothed on with immortality

More glorious than the noon of day.
All that is pass'd into the flowers,
And into beasts and other men,

And all the Norland whirlwind showers
From open vaults, and all the sea
O'erwashes with sharp salts, again
Shall fleet together all, and be
Indued with immortality.'

The only other changes are rosy fingers' for waxen fingers' in 42, and man formen' in

169.

The Westminster Review' (January, 1831) recognized in this poem an extraordinary combination of deep reflection, metaphysical analysis, picturesque description, dramatic transition, and strong emotion.' Arthur Hallam, in the Englishman's Magazine' (August, 1831), said of it: The Confessions of a Second-rate Sensitive Mind" are full of deep insight into human nature, and into those particular trials which are sure to beset men who think and feel for themselves at this epoch of social development. The title is perhaps ill chosen; not only has it an appearance of quaintness, which has no sufficient reason, but it seems to us incorrect. The mood portrayed in this poem, unless the admirable skill of delineation has deceived us, is rather the clouded season of a strong mind than the habitual condition of one feeble and second-rate.'

Page 8. MARIANA.

In the 4th line the first reading was the peach to the garden-wall.' Bayard Taylor, writing in 1877 (in International Review,' vol. iv.), quotes the poet as saying: There is my Mariana," for example. A line in it is wrong, and I cannot possibly change it, because it has been so long published; yet it always annoys me. I wrote That held the peach to the garden-wall." Now this is not a characteristic of the scenery I had in mind. The line should be "That held the pear to the gable-wall." Whether this conversation occurred during Taylor's visit to Tennyson in 1857 I cannot say; but the line was changed in the printed poem in 1860, or seventeen years before the review was written.

zas,

which was made in 1842. The only other change (except the spelling airy' for aery') isamorously' for three times three' in the last stanza (in the errata of the 1830 volume).

Page 10. RECOLLECTIONS OF THE ARABIAN NIGHTS.

In line 29 the 1830 volume has 'Of breaded blosms'; in 78 'Blackgreen' for 'Black'; in

1 In the volumes of 1830 and 1833, compound words are, with rare exceptions, printed without the hyphen; as silverchiming,' 'gardenbowers,'' mountainstreams,'

etc.

And in the bordure of her robe was writ
WISDOM, a name to shake

Hoar anarchies, as with a thunderfit,
And when she spake, etc.

The 9th had 'a' for 'one'; and the 14th 'hurl'd' for whirl'd.'

In the 1st stanza, the hate of hate,' etc., clearly means the hatred of hate, etc. Rev. F. W. Robertson explains it thus: That is, the Prophet of Truth receives for his dower the scorn of men in whom scorn dwells, hatred from men who hate, while his reward is the gratitude and affection of men who seek the truth which they love, more eagerly than the faults which their acuteness can blame.' A very intelligent lady once told me that she had always understood hate of hate' to mean the utmost intensity of hate, etc., the poet's passions and sensibilities being to those of ordinary men 'as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine.'

Shake hands, my friend, across the brink
Of that deep grave to which I go.
Shake hands once more: I cannot sink

So far far down, but I shall know
Thy voice, and answer from below.

The only changes in the next three stanzas were 'scritches of the jay' for 'laughters of the jay,' and 'darnel' for darnels.'

The following stanzas, with which the poem originally ended (connected closely with the preceding, there being only a comma after the woodbines blow '), have not been restored:

VI

If thou art blest, my mother's smile Undimmed, if bees are on the wing: Then cease, my friend, a little while, That I may hear the throstle sing His bridal song, the boast of spring.

·

VII

Sweet as the noise in parched plains
Of bubbling wells that fret the stones
(If any sense in me remains),

Thy words will be; thy cheerful tones

As welcome to my crumbling bones.

The Quarterly Review' for July, 1833, had its fling at the line, If any sense in me remains.' 'This doubt,' it says, is inconsistent with the opening stanza of the piece, and, in fact, too modest; we take upon ourselves to reassure Mr. Tennyson that, even after he shall be dead and buried, as much "sense" will still remain as he has now the good fortune to pos

I. The original version has 'a confused dream' in the 3d line; Altho' I knew not' in the 12th; and for the 14th And each had lived in the other's mind and speech.' In the 8th ‘hath' is italicized.

III. In the 1st line 'full' was originally 'fierce'; and in the 12th warm was great.

VI. The 10th line was originally How long shall the icy-hearted Muscovite.'

VII. The 1st line had originally 'dainty' for 'slender.'

VIII. The 5th line had 'waltzing-circle' for 'whirling dances.'

X. The first line originally began 'But were I loved, etc.

XI. The bridesmaid' was Emily Sellwood, who afterwards became the poet's wife; and the marriage was that of his brother Charles to Louisa Sellwood, May 24, 1836. See the 'Memoir,' vol. i. p. 148.

Page 27. THE LADY OF SHALOTT.

The last four lines of the 1st stanza were originally as follows:

The yellow leaved waterlily,
The greensheathed daffodilly,
Tremble in the water chilly,
Round about Shalott.

The next stanza began thus: —

Willows whiten, aspens shiver.

The sunbeam-showers break and quiver
In the stream that runneth ever, etc.

The first reading of the 3d and 4th stanzas

was:

Inderneath the bearded barley, The reaper, reaping late and early, Hears her ever chanting cheerly, Like an angel, singing clearly,

O'er the stream of Camelot. Piling the sheaves in furrows airy, Beneath the moon, the reaper weary Listening whispers, 't is the fairy, Lady of Shalott.'

The little isle is all inrailed
With a rose-fence, and overtrailed

No time hath she to sport and play:
A charmed web she weaves alway.
A curse is on her, if she stay
Her weaving, either night or day,

To look down to Camelot.

She knows not what the curse may be;
Therefore she weaveth steadily,
Therefore no other care hath she,
The Lady of Shalott.

She lives with little joy or fear.
Over the water, running near,
The sheepbell tinkles in her ear.
Before her hangs a mirror clear,

Reflecting towered Camelot.
And as the mazy web she whirls,
She sees the surly village churls, etc.

The next stanza (Sometimes a troop,' etc.) is unchanged; and the only alteration in the next is went to Camelot' for 'came from Camelot.'

In Part III. the 5th line of the 2d and 3d stanzas had down from Camelot; ' the last line of the 3d had ' over green Shalott; 'the 8th line of the 4th was Tirra lirra, tirra lirra; ' and the 3d line of the 5th had water-flower." In Part IV. the latter part of the 1st stanza was as follows:

With a steady stony glance
Like some bold seer in a trance,
Beholding all his own mischance,
Mute, with a glassy countenance-
She looked down to Camelot.
It was the closing, etc.

The remaining stanzas were as follows:

As when to sailors while they roam,
By creeks and outfalls far from home,
Rising and dropping with the foam,
From dying swans wild warblings come,

Blown shoreward; so to Camelot
Still as the boathead wound along
The willowy hills and fields among,
They heard her chanting her deathsong,
The Lady of Shalott.

A longdrawn carol, mournful, holy,
She chanted loudly, chanted lowly,

Till her eyes were darkened wholly, And her smooth face sharpened slowly, Turned to towered Camelot:

For ere she reached, etc.

Under tower and balcony,
By gardenwall and gallery,
A pale, pale corpse she floated by,
Deadcold, between the houses high,
Dead into towered Camelot.
Knight and burgher, lord and dame,
To the planked wharfage came:
Below the stern they read her name,
The Lady of Shalott.'

They crossed themselves, their stars they blest,
Knight, minstrel, abbot, squire, and guest.
There lay a parchment on her breast,

That puzzled more than all the rest,
The wellfed wits at Camelot.

'The web was woven curiously,
The charm is broken utterly,
Draw near and fear not this is I,
The Lady of Shalott.'

The ending of the poem is much improved by the revision. The wellfed wits' (the epithet seems out of keeping here) might well be puzzled' by the parchment, which is as pointless as it is enigmatical; but the new ending, with its introduction of Lancelot, is most pathetic and suggestive.

In line 157 the reading in 1842 (and down to 1873) was A corse between,' etc.

According to Palgrave (Lyrical Poems by Tennyson'), the poem was suggested by 'an Italian romance upon the Donna di Scalotta, in which Camelot, unlike the Celtic tradition, was placed near the sea.' It is in a very different form that the legend reappears in the 'Idylls of the King.'

Page 29. MARIANA.

The original form was as follows:

Behind the barren hill upsprung

With pointed rocks against the light,
The crag sharpshadowed overhung
Each glaring creek and inlet bright.
Far, far, one lightblue ridge was seen,
Looming like baseless fairyland;
Eastward a slip of burning sand,
Dark-rimmed with sea, and bare of green.
Down in the dry salt-marshes stood
That house darklatticed. Not a breath
Swayed the sick vineyard underneath,
Or moved the dusty southernwood.

Madonna,' with melodious moan
Sang Mariana, night and morn,
Madonna! lo! I am all alone,
Love-forgotten and love-forlorn.'

She, as her carol sadder grew,

From her warm brow and bosom down
Through rosy taper fingers drew
Her streaming curls of deepest brown
On either side, and made appear,
Still-lighted in a secret shrine,
Her melancholy eyes divine,
The home of woe without a tear.

'Madonna,' with melodious moan
Sang Mariana, night and morn,
'Madonna! lo! I am all alone,
Love-forgotten and love-forlorn.'

When the dawncrimson changed, and past
Into deep orange o'er the sea,