CRITICAL OPINIONS
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<The Princess, as we now possess it, is the outcome of carefuland sustained effort on the poet’s part, the offspring of his maturepowers, polished and refined through several editions, and maythus be fairly regarded as a work upon which its author hasbestowed the utmost of his critical after-thought as well as creativepower. And when we consider with what marked success Ten-nyson has throughout his career maintained the high standard ofexcellence that he early trained us to expect from his pen, whetherwe look for healthiness and sobriety of thought, artistic treatmentof materials, or splendor and grace of language, this poem willappear worthy in an especial degree of our earnest and reverentstudy, with respect both to his handling of the various problemsand points at issue in the main theme of the story, and to themanner and form of their presentation.”—P. M. WALLACE, ““To describe his command of language by any ordinary termsexpressive of fluency or force would be to convey an idea bothinadequate and erroneous. It is not only that he knows everyword in the language suited to express his every idea; he canselect with the ease of magic the word that above all others is bestfor his purpose; nor is it that he can at once summon to his aidthe best word the language affords; with an. art which Shake-speare never scrupled to apply, though in our day it is apt to becounted mere Germanism, and pronounced contrary to the geniusof the language, he combines old words into new epithets, he- daringly mingles all colors to bring out tints that never were onsea or shore. His words gleam like pearls and opals, like rubiesandemeralds. He yokes the stern vocables of the English tongueto the chariot of his imagination, and they become gracefullybrilliant as the leopards of Bacchus, soft and glowing as theCytherean doves, He must have been born with an ear for verbal 10°
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