My dear Alfred—I must thank you, as I ought, for your second note. The best return I can make is not to listen to Mrs. Tennyson’s P.S., which bids me send another Omar:—for I have only got Omar the Second, I am sure now you would not like him so well as the first (mainly because of “too much”). I think he might disgust you with both.
So though two lines from you would have done more to decide on his third appearance (if Quaritch still wishes that), I will not put you to that trouble, but do as I can alone—cutting out some, and retaining some; and will send you the result if it comes into type.
You used to talk of my crotchets: but I am quite sure you have one little crotchet about this Omar: which deserves well in its way, but not so well as you write of it. You know that though I do not think it worth while to compete with you in your paltry poetical capacity, I won’t surrender in the critical, not always, at least. And, at any rate, I have been more behind the scenes in this little matter than you. But I do not the less feel your kindness in writing about it: for I think you would generally give £100 sooner than write a letter. And I am—Yours ever,
E. F. G.
The next year, in 1873, he wrote again, touching on the same theme and others:
Dear Mrs. Tennyson—I remember Franklin Lushington perfectly—at Farringford in 1854; almost the last visit I paid anywhere: and as pleasant as any, after, or before. I have still some sketches I made of the place: “Maud, Maud, Maud,” etc., was then read to me, and has rung in my ears ever after. Mr. Lushington, I remember, sketched also. If he be with you still, please tell him that I hope his remembrance of me is as pleasant as mine of him.
I think I told you that Frederick came here in August, having (of course) missed you on his way. The Mistress of Trinity wrote to me some little while ago, telling me, among other things, that she, and others, were much pleased with your son Hallam, whom they thought to be like the “Paltry Poet” (poor fellow).
The Paltry one’s Portrait is put in a frame and hung up at my château, where I talk to it sometimes, and every one likes to see it. It is clumsy enough, to be sure; but it still recalls the old man to me better than the bearded portraits[18] which are now the fashion.
But oughtn’t your Hallam to have it over his mantelpiece at Trinity?
The first volume of Forster’s Dickens has been read to me of a night, making me love him, up to 30 years of age at any rate; till then, quite unspoilt, even by his American triumphs, and full of good humour, generosity, and energy. I wonder if Alfred remembers dining at his house with Thackeray and me, me taken there, quite unaffected, and seeming to wish any one to show off rather than himself. In the evening we had a round game at cards and mulled claret. Does A. T. remember?