her parents. "I can remember," she says, "on one occasion, through a cloud of smoke, looking across a darkening room at the noble, grave head of the Poet Laureate. He was sitting near my father in the twilight, after some family meal in the old house at Kensington. It is Mr. Tennyson himself who has reminded me how, upon this occasion, while my father was speaking to me, my little sister looked up suddenly from the book over which she had been absorbed, saying, in her sweet childish voice, 'Papa, why do you not write books like Nicholas Nickleby?' Then again I seem to hear, across the same familiar table, voices without shape or name, talking and telling each other that Mr. Tennyson was married-that he and his wife had been met walking on the terrace at Clevedon Court; and then the clouds descend again, except, indeed, that I still see my father riding off on his brown cob to Mr. and Mrs. Tennyson's house at Twickenham, to attend the christening of Hallam, their eldest son."

The incidents of the next year or two are meagre. In November, 1852, the Duke of Wellington died; and, on the day of his burial

Tennyson's noble tribute to the "last great Englishman"-"the great World-victor's victor"— was published. In the same year, Messrs. Parker and Son, anxious to obtain the opinions of the leading authors on the bookselling question, sent out circulars with this object. Tennyson's reply was, "I am for free-trade in the bookselling question, as in other things."

The year 1853 produced nothing new of importance from his pen. Indeed at this time the sacra fames for literary production may have moderated its fierceness in the presence of rival interests. There was a year-old baby, "crazy with laughter and babble and earth's new wine," to share his attention. In this same year Miss Mitford relates that Tennyson had recently been staying with Charles Kingsley, "improved by the birth of his child." The Tennysons were then looking out for a house, and Miss Mitford was anxious that they should choose one in her own neighbourhood. Ultimately, however, they went to live at Freshwater, in the Isle of Wight. The year 1854 was, again, a period of comparative rest, yielding but one short poem, though that in its way was a notable

one, "The Charge of the Light Brigade." As a matter of military record, the charge of the Heavy Brigade was even a more memorable exploit than that of the gallant Six Hundred, but it was not until many years later that the Laureate commemorated that heroic episode. Even this little piece has undergone several alterations. In spite of some evidence of hasty composition, it has always been a great favourite with the English people, partly because the brave deed it records with such fire is one of which no one can help being proud. In the following year, the final version was printed on a quarto sheet of four pages, with this note at the bottom: "Having heard that the brave soldiers before Sebastopol, whom I am proud to call my countrymen, have a liking for my Ballad on the Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava, I have ordered a thousand copies of it to be printed for them. No writing of mine can add to the glory they have acquired in the Crimea; but if what I have heard be true, they will not be displeased to receive these copies of the Ballad from me, and to know that those who sit at home love and honour them. -ALFRED TENNYSON, 8th August, 1855."

CHAPTER VII.

SOME time before this, Tennyson had made the acquaintance of Sir John Simeon, a gentleman of refined tastes, and a rare urbanity of disposition which won for him the poetic epithet of "prince of courtesy." The introduction was brought about by Carlyle, at Bath House, when the Chelsea sage made the oft-quoted speech, "There he sits upon a dung heap, surrounded by innumerable dead dogs"-his expressive, if not very elegant way of referring to the poet's classical studies. "I was told of this," said Mr. Tennyson on one occasion, "and, some time after, I repeated it to Carlyle: 'I'm told that is what you say of me.' He gave a kind of guffaw. Eh, that wasn't a very luminous description of you,' he answered.” *

*Harper's Magazine.

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Sir John Simeon and Tennyson became frequent companions after the latter's removal to the Isle of Wight, and there was constant intercourse between Swainston and Farringford.

Allusion has already been made to the Laureate's intimacy with Maurice, that bold thinker and gentle soul, who in theological speculation exerted such a powerful influence upon contemporary schools of opinion. This was one of the close and sacred intimacies of the poet's life, as may be judged from the relationship in which Mr. Maurice stood to his eldest boy, Hallam. In 1854, Maurice published his well-known volume of "Theological Essays," which he dedicated to the Laureate in the following graceful terms :—

"To Alfred Tennyson, Esq., Poet Laureate. "MY DEAR SIR,

"I have maintained in these Essays that a Theology which does not correspond to the deepest thoughts and feelings of human beings cannot be a true Theology. Your writings have taught me to enter into many of those thoughts and feelings. Will you forgive me the presump