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Notes
Baum, Tennyson Sixty Years After (Chapel Hill, 1948), p. 247; Binyon, "The English Ode," Essays by Divers Hands, N. S., II (1922), 14; Nicolson, Tennyson: Aspects of His Life, Character, and Poetry (London, 1923), p. 229; Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson (New York, 1949), p. 272—hereafter cited as A. T.
The letter, addressed to the Right Honourable Spencer H. Walpole, Home Secretary, was printed in the second edition of The Times, Sept. 22, 1852, and was reprinted in the first edition, Sept. 23, p. 4. For Nov. 11 as the opening date of Parliament, see the first leader in The Times, Sept. 23, 1852, p. 4. See also the Illustrated London News, XXI (Sept. 25, 1852), 243.
A. T., pp. 265-266. "Britons, Guard Your Own," Examiner, Jan. 31, 1852; "The Third of February, 1852," and "Hands All Round," Examiner, Feb. 7, 1852; "Lines Suggested by Reading an Article in a Newspaper," Examiner, Feb. 14, 1852; "For the Penny Wise," Fraser's Magazine, Feb., 1852. Twenty early lines related to final lines 171, 185-186 (which exist in Tennyson's wife's autograph on a half-leaf of white laid note-paper, tipped into the Pierpont Morgan copy 1 of the first edition of the Ode) show the topical antipathy to Napoleon III which was no doubt part of the inspiration of the poem, but which Tennyson subdued in the published version: But O remember him who led your hosts And take his counsel ere too late. There sits a silent man beyond the strait Guard guard guard your coasts. His are all the powers of the state His are all the passions of the rabble A man of silence in a world of babble. Sudden blows are strokes of fate Yet to be true is more than half of great. By the hollow blatant cry Half-godded underneath a scornful sky Their great Napoleons live and die With rolling echoes by the nations heard. But shall we count them Gods who break their word The word is God: thou shalt not lie. Was our great Chief (his life is bare from youth To all men's comment till his latest hour) A man to dodge and shuffle with the Truth And palter with Eternal God for power? His eighty winters &c The poet's wife adds, "This might perhaps have been altered had it been intended for publication made stronger I mean." For permission to print these lines and other autograph variants in the Pierpont Morgan Library, I am indebted to the Director, Mr. Frederick B. Adams, Jr.
A. T., pp. 265, 271. See Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd. S., CXXII (1852), 721, for the number of militia to be raised; see pp. 728-731 for the Duke of Wellington's speech in support of the bill on the motion for a second reading in the House of Lords. This was the Duke's last important speech in Parliament.
"National Song," "English War-Song," and "We Are Free," which appeared in Poems, Chiefly Lyrical (1830), Tennyson suppressed in the edition of 1842.
Mary Joan Donahue, "Tennyson's Hail Briton! and Tithon in the Heath Manuscript," PMLA, LXIV (1949), 386-393. Miss Donahue discusses the constancy of Tennyson's political attitude and points out four of the six lines in the 1852 edition of the Ode that were drawn from "Hail, Briton!" For Tennyson's use of these lines and his suppression of two of them, see below, pp. 174, 176. "The Queen of the Isles" is printed in Edgar F. Shannon, Jr., and W. H. Bond, "Literary Manuscripts of Alfred Tennyson in the Harvard College Library," Harvard Library Bulletin, X (1956), 261-262.
A. T., pp. 259-271; Hallam Tennyson, Alfred Lord Tennyson: A Memoir by His Son (London and New York, 1897), I, 340-361—hereafter cited as Memoir.
For Tennyson's literary eminence, see Edgar F. Shannon, Jr., Tennyson and the Reviewers . . . 1827-1851 (Cambridge, Mass., 1952), pp. 141-154. "The Poetry of Sorrow," The Times, Nov. 8, 1851, p. 8; Critic, XI (Feb. 1852), 68-70.
This previously unpublished letter is tipped into a copy of the first edition of the Ode in the Pierpont Morgan Library (W27 / B copy 1). For permission to print it here, I am grateful to the Director, Mr. Frederick B. Adams, Jr.
In A Bibliography of the Writings of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (London, privately printed, 1908), I, 122-123, Thomas J. Wise gives a satisfactory bibliographical description of this edition; but he retails the persistent misconception that the poem was published on the day of the funeral. For the correct day of publication, see R. H. Super, "Landor on a Waterloo Poem," Notes and Queries, CXCIV (Aug. 1949), 349. I am indebted to Professor Super for calling this note to my attention. See also Spectator, XXV (Nov. 13, 1852), 1099, where Moxon advertised that the Ode would be published "On Tuesday next"— i. e. Nov. 16.
". . . the Ode was . . . abused in all directions by the Press."—Memoir, I, 362; "The Ode was heartily abused in all directions."—Hugh I'A. Fausset, Tennyson: A Modern Portrai (London, 1923), p. 177; "This Ode was greeted, as he acknowledged, with 'all but universal depreciation.'" — Baum, Tennyson Sixty Years After, p. 246; ". . . the poem completely missed fire with the critics. Hardly a voice was raised in its defence." — A. T., p. 272.
Page 8. Among the plunderers of this review were the Aberdeen Journal, Nov. 24, 1852, p. 7; Bell's New Weekly Messenger, Nov. 21, p. 3; Birmingham Mercury, Nov. 20, p. 3; Bristol Mercury, Nov. 20, supplement, p. 3; Caledonian Mercury, Nov. 18, p. [4]; Edinburgh News and Literary Chronicle, Nov. 20, p. 7; Glasgow Herald, Nov. 19, p. 6; Kelso Mail, Nov. 20, p. [2]; Leeds Times, Nov. 20, p. 6; Magne, Nov. 22, p. 3; News of the World, Nov. 21, p. 3; Northern Whig [Belfast], Nov. 18, p. [4].
Such London daily and weekly newspapers as the Daily News, Nov. 18, 1852, p. 5; Express, Nov. 18, p. 3; Globe, Dec. 1, p. [3]; Lady's Newspaper, Nov. 20, p. 314; Observer, Nov. 21 and 22, supplement, p. 2, contented themselves with printing substantial extracts from the poem. So also did the Ayr Advertiser, Nov. 25, p. 3; Birmingham Journal, Nov. 20, p. 6; Breechin Advertiser, Nov. 23, p. [4]; Bristol Gazette, Nov. 25, p. 6; Dumfries and Galloway Courier, Nov. 23, p. [2]; Greenock Advertiser, Nov. 19, p. [4]; Manchester Times and Examiner, Nov. 17, p. 3; Nottingham Guardian, Dec. 2, p. 3; Scotsman, Nov. 20, p. [3].
For Lewes's treatment of In Memoriam and Maud, see Shannon, Tennyson and the Reviewers, p. 142, and "The Critical Reception of Tennyson's "'Maud,'" PMLA, LXVII (1953), 399.
Lewes's marked file of the Leader, which is in the Yale University Library contains no record of contributions by Lewes between July 19, 1851 and January 1, 1853. (I am grateful to Miss Marjorie Wynne for this information.) He wrote for the Leader during this period, however, and it seems unlikely that he would delegate the responsibility of reviewing a new work by Tennyson. Professor Gordon S. Haight has kindly re-examined this review and others by Lewes and from internal evidence confirms my belief that Lewes was its author.
Page 1263. For Harvey's authorship, see Leslie A. Marchand, The Athenaeum: A Mirror of Victorian Culture (Chapel Hill, 1941), p. 278.
Correspondence of Henry Taylor, ed. Edward Dowden (London and New York, 1888), p. 201. See also Memoir, I, 362-363.
He may also have thought that the review in the Examiner would carry little weight, for he seems to have presumed that Forster's regard for him was generally understood. On January 23, 1852, he wrote of the publication of his political verses in the Examiner, "The readers of the Examiner will no doubt guess the authorship from knowing Forster's friendship for me." — Memoir, I, 348.
XVIII, 425-428. This seems to be the only critique of the Ode that appeared in the magazines and quarterly reviews.
In an unpublished letter owned by Harold, Baron Tennyson. I am grateful to Lord Tennyson for permission to quote from it.
The new edition appears in the list of PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED during the week of Feb. 26 to March 5 by the Spectator, XVI (March 5, 1853), 230. For a bibliographical description, see Wise, Bibliography of . . . Tennyson, I, 123.
The manuscripts now in the Harvard College Library fail to sustain Hallam Tennyson's contention, "Many of the alterations which appeared in the second edition of the poem were in the original MS." — Poems (The Works of Tennyson, Eversley Edition, London, 1908), II, 366. "Boundless" for "Most unbounded" (l. 157), "His foes were thine" for "His martial wisdom" (l. 91), and "He" for "The man" (l. 271) are the only instances of return in the second edition to an earlier MS reading that I have discovered. In the light of the extensive corrections and additions that Tennyson made for the 1853 edition, these examples are inconsequential.
Correspondence of Henry Taylor, p. 201. In the Memoir, I, 362, Hallam Tennyson omits, without signal, the paragraph of Taylor's letter containing this remark.
The germ for ll. 154-155 exists in a deleted passage in MS 4, "Thanks to the high hand of that God who set / This land apart." But this fact does not detract from the possibility that Tennyson's decision to embody the idea in new lines and insert them was influenced by the English Review.
Pages 280-281. I am indebted to Professor Leslie A. Marchand for identifying Heraud as the author of this review from the marked files of the Athenaeum, now in the offices of the New Statesman and Nation. For a commentary on Heraud and his reviewing for the Athenaeum, see Marchand, The Athenaeum, pp. 214-215.
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