The splendid and sombre procession has passed, leaving us to muse as
to how far the poet has fulfilled his own ideal. There could be no
new epic: he gave a chain of heroic Idylls. An epic there could not
be, for the Iliad and Odyssey have each a unity of theme, a narrative
compressed into a few days in the former, in the latter into forty
days of time. The tragedy of Arthur's reign could not so be
condensed; and Tennyson chose the only feasible plan. He has left a
work, not absolutely perfect, indeed, but such as he conceived, after
many tentative essays, and such as he desired to achieve. His fame
may not rest chiefly on the Idylls, but they form one of the fairest
jewels in the crown that shines with unnumbered gems, each with its
own glory.



CHAPTER VIII.--ENOCH ARDEN. THE DRAMAS.



The success of the first volume of the Idylls recompensed the poet
for the slings and arrows that gave Maud a hostile welcome. His next
publication was the beautiful Tithonus, a fit pendant to the Ulysses,
and composed about the same date (1833-35). "A quarter of a century
ago," Tennyson dates it, writing in 1860 to the Duke of Argyll. He
had found it when "ferreting among my old books," he said, in search
of something for Thackeray, who was establishing the Cornhill
Magazine. What must the wealth of the poet have been, who,
possessing Tithonus in his portfolio, did not take the trouble to