University of Virginia Library

V.

The evidence concerning the pamphlets of minor poems is not easily understood. To recapitulate, the only available evidence concerning the minor poems in the 1870 reprint consists of one sentence by Shepherd (p.9): in comparison with the 1875 reprint "it lacked completeness in regard to the collection of Minor Poems, while including some others afterwards acknowledged and restored." In other words, in 1870 Shepherd did not reprint all the minor poems which Tennyson had published before that time only in periodicals and the like, and he did reprint some minor poems which before 1875 Tennyson gathered from their places of first publication into his collected works. As no complete copy of the 1870 reprint has been located, and the standard description has been proved unreliable, we cannot be sure exactly what Shepherd's sentence means. Turning to the year 1875, we may recall that Shepherd made no reference to any pamphlet of minor poems in his advertisements of April and May. In his letter of 27 July he offered to sell to H. J. Smith not only a copy of the Tale, but some "other poems." The volume which Shepherd sent to Swinburne in the first days of August contained a gathering of 16 pages, numbered [49]-64, which bears 16 minor poems. Shepherd sold an exactly similar gathering, similarly paged and containing the same poems, to the British Museum on 21 January 1876.

In his Bibliography of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1901), a description of a set of the poet's works gathered together by Dodd, Mead and Company, Luther S. Livingston announced the existence of two undated pamphlets of minor poems (pp. 58, 66). He gratefully acknowledged the assistance he had derived from the proof-sheets of Wise's Bibliography in which, seven years later, more detailed descriptions of both pamphlets appeared (II, 10-12, 14-16). As neither pamphlet appears in the catalogue of the Ashley Library, or now exists among Wise's books in the British Museum, one is thrown back upon the Dodd, Mead set of Tennyson, which was acquired by George H. Richmond, a book-dealer, and then purchased in 1904 by Pierpont Morgan. The two pamphlets may be separately considered.

(A) According to Livingston, Shepherd issued with his 1870 reprint of the Tale an undated second part of sixteen pages, containing sixteen minor poems by Tennyson, which he also sold separately, at 2 shillings. Livingston gives the collation as "Title and text, pp. 1-16"; reference to Wise's bibliography shows that the pamphlet of sixteen

pages should be described as having no title or half-title, but a dropped head on the first page, reading Poems. One is surprised to discover that the Morgan Library holds no example of the pamphlet, nor according to its records did it receive one in the Dodd, Mead set. Yet Richmond wrote to Morgan on 9 December 1904, referring to himself in the third person, "The set sold you comprises everything purchased by Mr. Richmond from the former owners, and every addition made by him to it. . . .[41] Again, one should suppose that any ordinary entry in Livingston's list was unquestionable evidence that an example of the item was included in the Dodd, Mead set, for though his titlepage promises "notes referring to items not included in the set," these notes are distinguished not only by smaller type, but by the prefixed warning, NOTE. Livingston's entry for the 16-page pamphlet is certainly not a note. But if a copy of the pamphlet existed in the Dodd, Mead set, it does not seem to have passed to Richmond, and certainly did not pass to Morgan. One may consult neither the example described by Wise, nor that described by Livingston. Unfortunately, the census conducted by the present writer has not located any other copy.

A look at the list of minor poems subjoined by Livingston is even more perturbing, for the poems are exactly the same as those in the 1875 gathering. Shepherd remarked that his 1870 reprint, in comparison with that of 1875, "lacked completeness in regard to the collection of Minor Poems": it is therefore clear that the pamphlet cannot be considered the second part of Shepherd's 1870 reprint. Further, the pamphlet cannot have been printed by Shepherd before 1875, because it includes one poem, beginning "Here often as a child I lay reclined," which he said (p. 22) he did not know until it was reprinted by another man in 1875.

Wise lists the poems, of course, as occurring on the relevant pages of his "Second Pirated Edition: 1870." His description of the edition has already been termed unreliable because it includes a titlepage, whereas Shepherd said his 1870 reprint had none; we now have a second reason to doubt the description. The minor poems which it lists cannot, according to Shepherd, have been those he reprinted in 1870; and the list includes one poem which Shepherd had not heard of before 1875.

Returning to the pamphlet, one must reject the date of 1870 given it by Livingston and Wise. Did it appear in 1875? It differs in only

one point from the gathering Shepherd sent to Swinburne (as part of a volume) in 1875 and sold to the British Museum in January 1876: its pages are numbered [1]-16 rather than [49]-64. No such gathering exists in any known example. The only auction record of the Tale which mentions that in the copy the minor poems have separate pagination, also asserts that the minor poems are preceded by a half-title;[42] and the gathering here in question has no half-title. The auction record of separate pamphlets of minor poems is also disappointing. Of the 6 records, 5 turn out on recourse to the sales catalogues to refer to pamphlets containing not 16, but 32 pages, so that they must be considered under (B), below. The single remaining record concerns the sale at Sotheby's, in the B. B. MacGeorge sale (#1305), on 1 July 1924, of a copy of Shepherd's 1875 reprint of the Tale, including his monograph. The catalogue adds, "At the end of the vol. appears a Collection of Minor Poems, 16 pp., issued in 1870. . . ."[42] After the first moment, one recollects that the fourth issue of Shepherd's 1875 reprint does include his monograph and, at the end, 16 pages of minor poems — paged [49]-64; and according to the standard accounts of Livingston and Wise, the last item had appeared in 1870. The record may conceivably refer to an example of a gathering paged [1]-16, but it is far more likely to refer to one paged [48]-64.

In sum, the evidence for the existence of an undated pamphlet, paged [1]-16, containing 16 minor poems, consists at present of Livingston's entry and its probable source, known to be unreliable, in Wise. The evidence is insufficient. At present, one must suppose no such pamphlet to have existed.

(B) According to Livingston, Shepherd issued with his 1875 reprint of the Tale an undated second part of 32 pages, containing 18 minor poems by Tennyson, which he also sold separately. The pamphlet has a half-title, reading Poems, with blank reverse.

The Morgan Library holds two examples (one unopened), received as part of the Dodd, Mead set. The auction record consists of the five sales already mentioned, of which one refers to the example now held by the Huntington Library, and all five possibly may so refer.[43] Only

the three examples have been located. There are also records of two sales which conceivably referred to other copies.[44]

An examination of the poems in the pamphlet causes cheerful confusion. It lacks 3 poems which the known 1875 gathering contains.[45] It contains 5 poems which the known 1875 gathering lacks, and which were published by Tennyson in the Imperial Library Edition of his works, in 1872.[46] In other words, in comparison with the known 1875 gathering the 32-page pamphlet lacks completeness in regard to the collection of minor poems, while including others acknowledged and restored to his canon by Tennyson in 1872. The 32-page pamphlet fulfills the fragmentary description, the only one we possess, of the second part of Shepherd's 1870 reprint. For the moment its identity seems clear.

But one further matter remains. Livingston and Wise not only dated the 32-page pamphlet as of 1875, they listed "an absolute reprint" of it: The New Timon and the Poets (1876).[47] When examples of the 32-page pamphlet and The New Timon are placed side by side for close inspection, it is immediately clear that they were printed from the same rather careless setting of slightly battered type. Many botched overprintings and occasional cracked types appear in the same places in both.[48] It seems advisable to consider the known history of The New Timon.