present themselves to persons who read poetry "for human pleasure."

I have not often dwelt on parallels to be found in the works of
earlier poets. In many cases Tennyson deliberately reproduced
passages from Greek, Latin, and old Italian writers, just as Virgil
did in the case of Homer, Theocritus, Apollonius Rhodius, and others.
There are, doubtless, instances in which a phrase is unconsciously
reproduced by automatic memory, from an English poet. But I am less
inclined than Mr Bradley to think that unconscious reminiscence is
more common in Tennyson than in the poets generally. I have not
closely examined Keats and Shelley, for example, to see how far they
were influenced by unconscious memory. But Scott, confessedly, was
apt to reproduce the phrases of others, and once unwittingly borrowed
from a poem by the valet of one of his friends! I believe that many
of the alleged borrowings in Tennyson are either no true parallels at
all or are the unavoidable coincidences of expression which must
inevitably occur. The poet himself stated, in a lively phrase, his
opinion of the hunters after parallels, and I confess that I am much
of his mind. They often remind me of Mr Punch's parody on an
unfriendly review of Alexander Smith -


"Most WOMEN have NO CHARACTER at all." --POPE.
"No CHARACTER that servant WOMAN asked." --SMITH.


I have to thank Mr Edmund Gosse and Mr Vernon Rendall for their
kindness in reading my proof-sheets. They have saved me from some
errors, but I may have occasionally retained matter which, for one
reason or another, did not recommend itself to them. In no case are