has not failed to applaud the splendour of the verse and the subtlety
of the mad scenes, the passion of the love lyrics.

These merits have ceased to be disputed, but, though a loyal
Tennysonian, I have never quite been able to reconcile myself to Maud
as a whole. The hero is an unwholesome young man, and not of an
original kind. He is un beau tenebreux of 1830. I suppose it has
been observed that he is merely The Master of Ravenswood in modern
costume, and without Lady Ashton. Her part is taken by Maud's
brother. The situations of the hero and of the Master (whose
acquaintance Thackeray never renewed after he lost his hat in the
Kelpie Flow) are nearly identical. The families and fathers of both
have been ruined by "the gray old wolf," and by Sir William Ashton,
representing the house of Stair. Both heroes live dawdling on, hard
by their lost ancestral homes. Both fall in love with the daughters
of the enemies of their houses. The loves of both are baffled, and
end in tragedy. Both are concerned in a duel, though the Master, on
his way to the ground, "stables his steed in the Kelpie Flow," and
the wooer in Maud shoots Lucy Ashton's brother,--I mean the brother
of Maud,--though duelling in England was out of date. Then comes an
interval of madness, and he recovers amid the patriotic emotions of
the ill-fated Crimean expedition. Both lovers are gloomy, though the
Master has better cause, for the Tennysonian hero is more comfortably
provided for than Edgar with his "man and maid," his Caleb and Mysie.
Finally, both The Bride of Lammermoor, which affected Tennyson so
potently in boyhood


("A merry merry bridal,
A merry merry day"),