But this prophecy was not to be fulfilled, for on the death of Wordsworth, in 1850, Tennyson obtained the office and pension of Poet Laureate. Some years before that event Tennyson had also received a grant from the Government, which aroused the jealousy of his brother poets.
——:o:——
In 1846 Mr. Henry Colburn, of London, published an anonymous satirical poem, entitled The New Timon, which soon became known as the work of Lytton. It contained the following passage:—
“I seek no purfled prettiness of phrase,
A soul in earnest scorns the tricks for praise.
If to my verse denied the Poet’s fame,
This merit, rare to verse that wins, I claim;
No tawdry grace shall womanize my pen!
Ev’n in a love-song, man should write for men!
Not mine, not mine, (O Muse forbid!) the boon