A thousand claims to reverence closed
In her as Mother, Wife, and Queen.

And statesmen at her council met
Who knew the seasons, when to take
Occasion by the hand, and make
The bounds of freedom wider yet.

'It is perhaps natural,' says a contemporary writer, 'for the laureates to
be loyal, but there is no doubt that the sincere tributes which he paid to
the Queen and to her consort contributed materially to the steadying of
the foundation of the British throne. He almost alone among the poets gave
expression to the inarticulate loyalty of the ordinary Englishman, and he
did it without being either servile or sycophantic. If it were only for
his dedication to the Queen and Prince-Consort, he would have repaid a
thousand times over the value of all the bottles of sherry and the annual
stipends the poet-laureates have received since the days of Ben Jonson.'

Mrs Gilchrist writes: 'Tennyson likes and admires the Queen personally
much, enjoys conversation with her. Mrs Tennyson generally goes too, and
says the Queen's manner towards him is childlike and charming, and they
both give their opinions freely, even when these differ from the Queen's,
which she takes with perfect humour, and is very animated herself.' The
Prince-Consort, to whom Tennyson dedicated his _Idylls of the King_,

Since he held them dear,
Perchance as finding there unconsciously
Some image of himself,

had his copy inscribed with the poet's autograph.