"For the most part he wrote of the every day loves and duties of men and
women; of the primal pains and joys of humanity; of the aspirations and
trials which are common to all ages and all classes and independent even
of the diseases of civilization, but he made them new and surprising by
the art which he added to them, by beauty of thought, tenderness of
feeling, and exquisiteness of shaping."--_Stopford A. Brooke_.

"The tenderness of Tennyson is one of his remarkable qualities--not so
much in itself, for other poets have been more tender--but in combination
with his rough powers. We are not surprised that his rugged strength is
capable of the mighty and tragic tenderness of Rispah, but we could not
think at first that he could feel and realize the exquisite tenderness of
_Elaine_. It is a wonderful thing to have so wide a tenderness, and only
a great poet can possess it and use it well."--_Stopford A. Brooke_.

"Tennyson is a great master of pathos; knows the very tones that go to
the heart; can arrest every one of these looks of upbraiding or appeal by
which human woe brings the tear into the human eye. The pathos is deep;
but it is the majesty not the prostration of grief."--_Peter Bayne_.

"Indeed the truth must be strongly borne in upon even the warmest
admirers of Tennyson that his recluse manner of life closed to him many
avenues of communication with the men and women of his day, and that,
whether as a result or cause of his exclusiveness, he had but little of
that restless, intellectual curiosity which constantly whets itself upon
new experiences, finds significance where others see confusion, and
beneath the apparently commonplace in human character reaches some
harmonizing truth. _Rizpah_ and _The Grandmother_ show what a rich
harvest he would have reaped had he cared more frequently to walk the
thoroughfares of life. His finely wrought character studies are very few