telling the
story of a lover who passes from morbidness to ecstasy, then to anger and
murder, followed by insanity and recovery. This was Tennyson's favorite,
and among his friends he read aloud from it more than from any other poem.
Perhaps if we could hear Tennyson read it, we should appreciate it better;
but, on the whole, it seems overwrought and melodramatic. Even its lyrics,
like "Come into the Garden, Maud," which make this work a favorite with
young lovers, are characterized by "prettiness" rather than by beauty or
strength.

Perhaps the most loved of all Tennyson's works is _In Memoriam_, which, on
account of both its theme and its exquisite workmanship, is "one of the few
immortal names that were not born to die." The immediate occasion of this
remarkable poem was Tennyson's profound personal grief at the death of his
friend Hallam. As he wrote lyric after lyric, inspired by this sad subject,
the poet's grief became less personal, and the greater grief of humanity
mourning for its dead and questioning its immortality took possession of
him. Gradually the poem became an expression, first, of universal doubt,
and then of universal faith, a faith which rests ultimately not on reason
or philosophy but on the soul's instinct for immortality. The immortality
of human love is the theme of the poem, which is made up of over one
hundred different lyrics. The movement takes us through three years, rising
slowly from poignant sorrow and doubt to a calm peace and hope, and ending
with a noble hymn of courage and faith,--a modest courage and a humble
faith, love-inspired,--which will be a favorite as long as saddened men
turn to literature for consolation. Though Darwin's greatest books had not
yet been written, science had already overturned many old conceptions of
life; and Tennyson, who lived apart and thought deeply on all the problems
of his day, gave this poem to the world as his own answer to the doubts and
questionings of men. This universal human interest, together with its
exquisite form and melody, makes the poem, in popular favor at least, the
supreme threnody, or elegiac poem, of our literature; though Milton's
_Lycidas_ is, from the critical view point, undoubtedly a more artistic
work.

_The Idylls of the King_ ranks among the greatest of Tennyson's later
works. Its general subject is the Celtic legends of King Arthur and his
knights of the Round Table, and the chief source of its material is
Malory's _Mort