Memories of the Tennysons . practical enough to please him,and, as Fitzgerald has left on record, ** he ratherresented his young guests making so serious abusiness of verse-making, though he was so wiseand charitable as to tolerate everything and every-body, except poetry and poets. He was jealous ofhis son James applying his great talents, whichmight have been turned to public practical use, tosuch nonsense. It is easy to understand how it came to pass thatmost of the reading of the MS. poems in the littlered note-book was done of a night when the housewas mute. How late at night one can easi
Memories of the Tennysons . practical enough to please him,and, as Fitzgerald has left on record, ** he ratherresented his young guests making so serious abusiness of verse-making, though he was so wiseand charitable as to tolerate everything and every-body, except poetry and poets. He was jealous ofhis son James applying his great talents, whichmight have been turned to public practical use, tosuch nonsense. It is easy to understand how it came to pass thatmost of the reading of the MS. poems in the littlered note-book was done of a night when the housewas mute. How late at night one can easily guessfrom the fact that the custom of the householdappears to have been to go to sleep till about tenin the evening, and then wake up and talk brilliantlyand earnestly till past midnight. What a time ofit they must have had, those three friends, in thosenocturnal sessions at Mirehouse, when they variedtheir criticism upon the draft of the Lord of Bur-leigh and Morte dArthur by making fun of > > J» > > , \ ^. re < c TENNYSON AT THE ENGLISH LAKES 85 Wordsworth at his prosiest, and seeing who could invent the weakest hne in the most Wordsworthian manner. Fitzgerald claimed the palm with his hne : A Mr. Wilkinson, a clergyman.^ Some time towards the end of May, Tennysonwent over the Raise Gap, and saw did not call on Wordsworth, though JamesSpedding did his best to get him there, as Sped-ding wrote to Fitzgerald, He would and wouldnot (sulky one), and it was not till after Southeysdeath that he met Wordsworth at Moxons. But he saw Lile Hartley, and was charmedwith his talk. Hartley was wonderfully eloquent;I liked Hartley ; he was a loveable httle was his verdict; and how well Hartley Cole-ridge returned the compliment may be judged byall who read his sonnet, To Alfred Tennyson, afterseeing him for the first time, which concludes : Knowing thee now a real earth-treading man,Not less I love thee, and no more I can. Tennyson stayed a few
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