to tell. The readers who are least interested in poetry are most
interested in tattle about the poet. It is the privilege of genius
to retain the freshness and simplicity, with some of the foibles, of
the child. When Tennyson read his poems aloud he was apt to be moved
by them, and to express frankly his approbation where he thought it
deserved. Only very rudimentary psychologists recognised conceit in
this freedom; and only the same set of persons mistook shyness for
arrogance. Effusiveness of praise or curiosity in a stranger is apt
to produce bluntness of reply in a Briton. "Don't talk d-d nonsense,
sir," said the Duke of Wellington to the gushing person who piloted
him, in his old age, across Piccadilly. Of Tennyson Mr Palgrave
says, "I have known him silenced, almost frozen, before the eager
unintentional eyes of a girl of fifteen. And under the stress of
this nervous impulse compelled to contradict his inner self
(especially when under the terror of leonisation . . . ), he was
doubtless at times betrayed into an abrupt phrase, a cold
unsympathetic exterior; a moment's 'defect of the rose.'" Had he not
been sensitive in all things, he would have been less of a poet. The
chief criticism directed against his mode of life is that he WAS
sensitive and reserved, but he could and did make himself pleasant in
the society of les pauvres d'esprit. Curiosity alarmed him, and
drove him into his shell: strangers who met him in that mood carried
away false impressions, which developed into myths. As the Master of
Balliol has recorded, despite his shyness "he was extremely
hospitable, often inviting not only his friends, but the friends of
his friends, and giving them a hearty welcome. For underneath a
sensitive exterior he was thoroughly genial if he was understood."
In these points he was unlike his great contemporary, Browning; for
instance, Tennyson never (I think) was the Master's guest at Balliol,
mingling, like Browning, with the undergraduates, to whom the