A DAY WITH LORD TENNYSON.

Otago Witness, Issue 1933, 25 February 1892, Page 32

A DAY WI TH LO RD TENNYSON.

Sill EDWIN ARNOLD AS INTERVIEWER.

In the December number of the "Forum" Sir EJwin Arnold desoribes a day which he spent with Lord Tennyson in his house at Udworth, near Hasdmere. The Laureate's residence .at Hajelmtra is some three miles from the railway station, and the road to ifc leads through a beautiful bit of country. Of the poet himself Sir Edwin Arnold gives the following description : —

" Everybody knows by photograph tho manner of man he is — surely a beautiful facp, if ever the adjective could bo applied to masculine features, and never more beautiful in any stage of life than now, when age has fixed allthe finer features, and lent them a new dignity and majesty. Everybody is familiar with the broad forehead, the clear, derp eyes, the strongly cut nose and finely chiselJed lips, the long hair fringing those temples— -shriDcs of high thought— and the genial, massive, ard commanding aspect of tho poet. Albeit past his eighty-second birthday, Lord Tennyson's figure i 3 only weakened, not broken, by a?e. His hair preserves much of its old dark colour, and, excepting in place?, is hardly more than 'sable-silvered.' His spirit is as alert, his glace as keen ami bright, n< ever. Though he does not rise upon our entrance, making no ceremony with frienda, ho leads at once an animated conversation. . . . His band* am manly and powerful in outline, bat delicately and finely formed, as those of a poet should be. On his head, as an additional protection from the caprices of the English weather, he wears a small black velvet cap,"

The Laureate egreod with his visitor in earnest praise of the English language as an instrument, now become almost perfect for the uses of the orator, the philosopher, the historian, and the poet; but "when I observed that by the help of America it, was destined to become the common speech o£ the world be laughingly shook his head, and said, ' That is very bad ior us.' At first I did not understand the drift of this observation ; bub he went on to remark, • When a language dies out, like Latin and Greek, and your black Sansciir, the literary monuments contained in it are, so to speak, embalmed. They remain fitaniards ; and all ages, in proportion as people master these dead class-ice, admire them, form their style upon them, and perpetuate tho memory and the name of the bygone writer?. But when a language endures it gradually changes; and the time will come, Arnold, when you and I will be as difficult for Englishmen and Americans to read and understand as Chaucer is to-day. This was quite a new view."

When Sir Edwin Arnold rose to leave — " To my surprise and pleasure, Lord Tennyson declared his intention of accompanying me part of the way. HalJatn threw over his shoulders the great black cloak familiar to those who possess photographs of the poe% and, taking a big stick and two or three of the dogs, lie get forth up tho broad garden path to trudge across the heath with me. The wind was blowing keenly, and Lord Tennyson was not quite free from his old enemy ; but with fair strength and sturdiness he faced the gorse-ciad hill, staying now and then to recover his breath, partly to complete some point of interest in his delightful conversation."

On the way Lord Tennyson asked Sir Edwin Arnold to repeat the lines which ho had written under the window in S*\ Margaret's Churcb, Westminster, to the memory of Mr Ed war J Lloyd. Lord Tennyson repeated twice a line in the verse—" The pens that break the sceptres 1 the pens that break the ? ceptres," and eaid, •• I Jike tnaf, St Edwfn ! Write that down, Hallara." Three-quarters of a mile from his gate the Laureate drew up.

"I have one thing to ask you," he saH. "It was on, this snot that I parted with General Gordon. He eaid that he wanted me to promote the interest of his Boys' Home. ' You, in all 'England,' Gordon exclaimed, 'are (he man to do it.'" And Lord Tenryson added, " I wish I were." " Get me, if you can," ho continued, " £40,000 to set that home upon' if s legs." "I will try," was my answer, " if .you will send me a letter which I can publish." Since then the effort has been made. " Come again and come often I " said Lord Tennyson, grasping my hand at the summit of the hill. And when lie turned to walk back with HalUm to his garden gate I forgot all about the titnas of: the trains and lingeied long amid the furzs bushes, watering the flutter of bis black cloak, and the rcce 'ing'/i^ure of ihe great singer whose miji^'ic and niflodious vena has furnished expression for the thoughts of the centut v.