But the young, young children, O my brothers, They are weeping in the play-time of the others, 2. "For oh," say the children, "we are weary, If we cared for any meadows, it were merely Our knees tremble sorely in the stooping- And, underneath our heavy eyelids drooping, Through the coal-dark underground- 3. "For, all day, the wheels are droning, turningTheir wind comes in our faces Till our hearts turn, our heads with pulses burning, Turns the sky in the high window blank and reeling- 'O ye wheels'-breaking out in a mad moaning- 4. Ay! be silent! Let them hear cach other breathing For a moment, mouth to mouth! Let them touch each other's hands in a fresh wreathing Of their tender human youth! Let them feel that this cold metallic motion Is not all the life God fashions or reveals; Let them prove their inward souls against the notion Grinding life down from its mark; And the children's souls, which God is calling sunward, CHAPTER LXXX.-MISCELLANEOUS. From an Oration at Valley Forge, June 19, 1878. 1. My countrymen, the century that has gone by has changed the face of Nature, and wrought a revolution in the habits of mankind. We to-day behold the dawn of an extraordinary age. Man has advanced with such astounding speed that, breathless, we have reached a moment when it seems as if distance had been annihilated, time made as naught, the invisible seen, the intangible felt, and the impossible accomplished. 2. Already we knock at the door of a new century which promises to be infinitely brighter, and more enlightened, and happier than this. But, in all this blaze of light that illuminates the Present, and casts its reflection into the distant recesses of the Past, there is not a single ray that shoots into the Future. Not one step have we taken toward the solution of the mystery of Life. That remains to-day as dark and unfathomable as it was ten thousand years ago. 3. We know that we are more fortunate than our fathers. We believe that our children shall be happier than we. We know that this century is more enlightened than the last. We believe that the time to come will be better and more glorious than this. We think, we believe, we hope, but we do not know. Across that threshold we may not pass; behind that veil we may not penetrate. Into that country it may not be for us to go. 4. It may be vouchsafed to us to behold it, wonderingly, from afar, but never to enter in. It matters not. The age in which we live is but a link in the endless and eternal chain. Our lives are like sands upon the shore; our voices, like the breath of this summer breeze that stirs the leaf for a moment, and is forgotten. Whence we have come, and whither we shall go, not one of us can tell. And the last survivor of this mighty multitude shall stay but a little while. 5. But in the impenetrable To Be, the endless generations are advancing to take our places as we fall. For them, as for us, shall the earth roll on and the seasons come and go, the snow-flakes fall, the flowers bloom, and the harvests be gathered in. For them, as for us, shall the sun, like the life of man, rise out of darkness in the morning, and sink into darkness in the night. For them, as for us, shall the years march by in the sublime procession of the ages. 6. And here, in this place of sacrifice, in this vale of humiliation, in this valley of the shadow of death, out of which the life of America rose regenerate and free, let us believe, with an abiding faith, that to them union will seem as dear, and liberty as sweet, and progress as glorious, as they were to our fathers, and are to you and me, and that the institutions which have made us happy, preserved by the virtue of our children, shall bless the remotest generations of the time to come. And unto Him who holds in the hollow of His hand the fate of nations, and yet marks the sparrow's fall, let us lift up our hearts this day, and into His eternal care commend ourselves, our children, and our country.Henry Armitt Brown. CHAPTER LXXXI.-ALFRED TENNYSON.—1810. I.-Biographical. 1. Tennyson, the poet-laureate of England, who succeeded Wordsworth in 1850, is the son of a parish clergyman and doctor of divinity who lived at Somersby, in Lincolnshire, at the time of the poet's birth. Tennyson was one of three brothers, who were all educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. There Alfred won the Chancellor's medal for the prize poem of Timbuctoo. His literary carcer commenced with an anonymous volume, entitled Poems, by Two Brothers; Charles Tennyson contributing a part. Alfred was at this time seventeen years of age. His life has been prosperous and uneventful, and his later years have been passed in elegant seclusion in the Isle of Wight. 2. Tennyson is to the romantic school what Pope was to the classical; that is, he has carried its features to the highest elaboration and most exquisite polish. The London Athenæum says of him, "Shakespeare did not tyrannize over the Elizabethans half as much as Tennyson does over the young mind of the present; the art of imitating Tennyson, then, is the fatal facility of our times." Tennyson is a disciple of Wordsworth, who thought him "decidedly the first of our living poets;" but, unlike Wordsworth, he does not choose his themes from humble incidents and the simple aspects of nature. Like Pope, his themes are of society and of man. Like Scott, his characters are refined and proper modern people, appearing in the romantic garb of other times, or in fanciful and unreal situations; and he has something of Shelley's art of making abstractions real. 3. In versification, Tennyson inherits the freedom introduced by Coleridge and practised by Mrs. Browning. Dr. Griswold says, "It is wild as the song of the Elfin King; it is broken and irregular, but often inexpressibly charm ing." In Ralph Waldo Emerson's opinion, "Tennyson is endowed in points where Wordsworth was wanting. There is no finer car, nor more command of the keys of language; but he wants a subject, and climbs no mount of vision to bring its secrets to light." 4. There is a vast store of poems called lyrical, in the English language, which can never be sung; they are not wanting in lyrical form or spirit, but they are not phonetically fitted to musical utterance. But Tennyson has the rare art of catching those melodious articulations which combine most perfectly with song, and, aware of this power, he introduces little songs as episodes into his tales. The English language contains nothing more exquisitely musical than some of these, as the Cradle Songs, the Song of the Brook, and Too Late. 5. That judicious Scotch critic, the Rev. Peter Bayne, describes Tennyson's chief claim to eminence as follows:"His words gleam like pearls and opals, like rubies and emeralds. Such a poct cannot soon be popular with the million; but, as the last and most exquisite culture of educated minds, as the ultimate sublimation of thought and beauty, as the most refined civilization that ever dawned upon the world, his works must continue to exercise a mighty influence upon the leading intellects of those nations which lead the world." 6. In 1847 Tennyson published The Princess, a Medley. It is a fantastic poem concerning women's rights; brilliant, incongruous, melodious, and charming. It abounds in delightful little songs prompted by the movement of the story, and full of the lyrical melody already mentioned. Among these is The Bugle Song," than which Tennyson has written nothing finer. The two great works, how ever, on which Tennyson's reputation rests, are In Me moriam, and The Idyls of the King. The former is the most a See page 75. |