No More Learning

O Ringlet, O Ringlet,
I count you much to blame,
For Ringlet, O Ringlet,
You put me much to shame,
So Ringlet, O Ringlet,
I doom you to the flame.
For what is this which now I learn,
Has given all my faith a turn?
Burn, you glossy heretic, burn,
Burn, burn.




LII

=Song=

[This first form of the Song in _The Princess_ ('Home they brought her
warrior dead') was published only in _Selections from Tennyson_.
London: E. Moxon & Co, 1864. ]

Home they brought him slain with spears.
They brought him home at even-fall:
All alone she sits and hears
Echoes in his empty hall,
Sounding on the morrow.

The Sun peeped in from open field,
The boy began to leap and prance,
Rode upon his father's lance,
Beat upon his father's shield--
'Oh hush, my joy, my sorrow. '




LIII

=1865-1866=

[Published in _Good Words_ for March 1, 1868 as a decorative page,
with an accompanying full page plate by T. Dalziel. The lines were
never reprinted. ]

I stood on a tower in the wet,
And New Year and Old Year met,
And winds were roaring and blowing;
And I said, 'O years that meet in tears,
Have ye aught that is worth the knowing?

'Science enough and exploring
Wanderers coming and going
Matter enough for deploring
But aught that is worth the knowing? '

Seas at my feet were flowing
Waves on the shingle pouring,
Old Year roaring and blowing
And New Year blowing and roaring.
=The Lover's Tale=
1833

[It was originally intended by Tennyson that this poem should
form part of his 1833 volume. It was put in type and, according to
custom, copies were distributed among his friends, when, on the eve of
publication, he decided to omit it. Again, in 1869, it was sent to
press with a new third part added, and was again withdrawn, the third
part only--'The Golden Supper,' founded on a story in Boccaccio's
_Decameron_--being published in the volume, 'The Holy Grail. ' In 1866,
1870 and 1875, attempts had been made by Mr Herne Shepherd to publish
editions of 'The Lover's Tale,' reprinted from stray proof copies of
the 1833 printing. Each of these attempts was repressed by Tennyson,
and at last in 1879 the complete poem, as now included in the
collected Works, was issued, with an apologetic reference to the
necessity of reprinting the poem to prevent its circulation in an
unauthorised form. But the 1879 issue is considerably altered from the
original issue of 1833, as written by Tennyson in his nineteenth year.
Since only as a product of Tennyson's youth does the poem merit any
attention, it has seemed good to reprint it here as originally
written. ]

A FRAGMENT

The Poem of the Lover's Tale (the lover is supposed to be himself a
poet) was written in my nineteenth year, and consequently contains
nearly as many faults as words. That I deemed it not wholly unoriginal
is my only apology for its publication--an apology lame and poor, and
somewhat impertinent to boot: so that if its infirmities meet with
more laughter than charity in the world, I shall not raise my voice in
its defence. I am aware how deficient the Poem is in point of art, and
it is not without considerable misgivings that I have ventured to
publish even this fragment of it. 'Enough,' says the old proverb, 'is
as good as a feast. '--(Tennyson's original introductory note. )

Here far away, seen from the topmost cliff,
Filling with purple gloom the vacancies
Between the tufted hills the sloping seas
Hung in mid-heaven, and half-way down rare sails,
White as white clouds, floated from sky to sky.
Oh! pleasant breast of waters, quiet bay,
Like to a quiet mind in the loud world,
Where the chafed breakers of the outer sea
Sunk powerless, even as anger falls aside,
And withers on the breast of peaceful love,
Thou didst receive that belt of pines, that fledged
The hills that watch'd thee, as Love watcheth Love,--
In thine own essence, and delight thyself
To make it wholly thine on sunny days.
Keep thou thy name of 'Lover's bay': See, Sirs,
Even now the Goddess of the Past, that takes
The heart, and sometimes toucheth but one string,
That quivers, and is silent, and sometimes
Sweeps suddenly all its half-moulder'd chords
To an old melody, begins to play
On those first-moved fibres of the brain.