Tennyson's imagination lived in a palace ample, wondrous fair, with dome and spire and galleries, where eyes of proud old pedigree grew dim with gazing at the portraits of the worthless dead; and there were parks and labyrinths of walks and ways and artificial lakes where sailed the "double swans;" and there were flowers from far-off lands with strange perfume, and men and women of the grander sort, telling of better days and nobler deeds than men in these poor times of commerce, trade and toil have hearts to do; and, yet, from this fair dwelling--too vast, too finely wrought, to be a home--he uttered wondrous words, painting pictures that will never fade, and told, with every aid of art, old tales of love and war, sometimes beguiling men of tears, enchanting all with melody of speech, and sometimes rousing blood and planting seeds of high resolve and noble deeds; and sometimes thoughts were woven like tapestries in patterns beautiful, involved and strange, where dreams and fancies interlaced like tendrils of a vine, like harmonies that wander and return to catch the music of the central theme, yet cold as traceries in frost wrought on glass by winter's subtle art. Tennyson was ingenious--Burns ingenuous. One was exclusive, and in his exclusiveness a little disdain. The other pressed the world against his heart. Tennyson touched art on many sides, dealing with vast poetic themes, and satisfied in many ways the intellectual tastes of cultured men. Tennyson is always perfectly self-possessed. He has poetic sympathy, but not the fire and flame. No one thinks of him as having been excited, as being borne away by passion's storm. His pulse never rises. In artistic calm, he turns, polishes, perfects, embroiders and beautifies. In him there is nothing of the storm and chaos, nothing of the creative genius, no sea wrought to fury, filling the heavens with its shattered cry. Burns dwelt with simple things--with those that touch the heart; that tell of joy; that spring from labor done; that lift the burdens of despair from fainting souls; that soften hearts until the pearls of pity fall from eyes unused to weep. To illustrate his thought, he used the things he knew--the things familiar to the world--not caring for the vanished things--the legends told by artful tongues to artless ears--but clinging to the common things of life and love and death, adorning them with countless gems; and, over all, he placed the bow of hope. With him the man was greater than the king, the woman than the queen. The greatest were the noblest, and the noblest were those who loved their fellow-men the best, the ones who filled their lives with generous deeds. Men admire Tennyson. Men love Robert Burns.