A Key to Lord Tennyson's 'In Memoriam' Part 13

He asks the ambrosial air of evening, which is so "sweet after showers,"

and is "slowly breathing bare the round of s.p.a.ce,"[60] clearing the sky of clouds, and "shadowing" the divided stream by raising ripples on its surface, to fan the fever from his cheek, till Doubt and Death can no longer enchain his fancy, but will let it fly to the rising star, in which

"A hundred spirits whisper, 'Peace.'"

This Poem is remarkable as being one sustained sentence.

Lx.x.xVII.

He revisits Cambridge, the chief scene of past intimacy with Hallam, and roams about the different colleges.

The expression "high-built organ," probably alludes to the organ being here, as in some cathedrals, reared above the screen which separates the choir from the nave.

"The prophets blazon'd on the panes,"

refers to the stained gla.s.s windows, and more particularly to those, perhaps, in King's College chapel. The scenery at the back of the colleges is vividly recalled.

He stops at the door of Hallam's old room, now occupied by a noisy wine party. It was there that his friend used to achieve such controversial triumphs--ever as the master-bowman hitting the mark in argument, when

"we saw The G.o.d within him light his face,"

like the martyr Stephen's;

"And over those ethereal eyes The bar of Michael Angelo"--

whose brow was straight and prominent--the sign of intellectual power.

_Michael Angelo had a strong bar of bone over his eyes._

Mrs. Frances A. Kemble in _Record of a Girlhood_, vol. ii. p. 3, thus describes young Hallam's appearance. "There was a gentleness and purity almost virginal in his voice, manner, and countenance; and the upper part of his face, his forehead and eyes (perhaps in readiness for his early translation), wore the angelic radiance that they still must wear in heaven. Some time or other, at some rare moments of the divine Spirit's supremacy in our souls, we all put on the heavenly face that will be ours hereafter, and for a brief lightning s.p.a.ce our friends behold us as we shall look when this mortal has put on immortality. On Arthur Hallam's brow and eyes this heavenly light, so fugitive on other human faces, rested habitually, as if he was thinking and seeing in heaven."

Lx.x.xVIII.

He asks the "wild bird," probably the nightingale, whose liquid song brings a sense of Eden back again, to define the feelings of the heart, its emotions and pa.s.sions. In the "budded quicks" of Spring the bird is happy; in the "darkening leaf," amid the shadowing foliage, though its happiness be gone, its grieving heart can still cherish "a secret joy."

The notes of the nightingale are supposed to be both sorrowful and joyous.

Even so, the Poet cannot wholly govern his own muse; for, when he would sing of woe,

"The glory of the sum of things,"

the grandeur of life's experience, will sometimes rule the chords.

Lx.x.xIX.

This Poem is like a picture by Watteau of a summer holiday in the garden or the woods.

He recalls the lawn of Somersby Rectory, with the trees[61] that shade it, and Hallam as being present on one of his repeated visits. He has come down from his law readings in the Temple,

"The dust and din and steam of town;"

and now, in a golden afternoon, sees

"The landscape winking thro' the heat"

as he lies and reads Dante, or Ta.s.so, aloud to his companions; until later on, when some lady of the group would bring her harp, and fling

"A ballad to the brightening moon."

Or the family party may have strayed farther away, for a picnic in the woods; and are there discussing the respective merits of town and country.

They are described as returning home,

"Before the crimson-circled star[62]

Had fall'n into her father's grave,"

that is, before the planet Venus had sunk into the sea--"her father's grave."--_This planet is evolved from the Sun--La Place's theory._

The evening sounds are very charming--

"The milk that bubbled in the pail, And buzzings of the honied hours,"

when the bees were gathering their last stores of the day. Tender recollections of the past!

XC.

He is indignant at the idea that if the dead came back to life again, they would not be welcome; and declares that whoever suggested this, could never have tasted the highest love.

Nevertheless, if the father did return to life, he would probably find his wife remarried, and his son unwilling to give up the estate. Even if matters were not so bad as this, still

"the yet-loved sire would make Confusion worse than death, and shake The pillars of domestic peace."[63]

Though all this may be true,

"I find not yet one lonely thought That cries against my wish for thee."

XCI.

When the larch is in flower, and the thrush "rarely pipes"--exquisitely sings; and "the sea-blue bird of March,"[64] the kingfisher, "flits by;"

come, my friend, in thy spirit form, with thy brow wearing the tokens of what thou hast become. Come to me also in the summer-time, when roses bloom and the wheat ripples in the wind. Don't come at night, but whilst the sunbeam is warm, that I may see thee,

"beauteous in thine after form, And like a finer light in light."

XCII.