Alack, for Corydon no rival now!-- But when Sicilian shepherds lost a mate, Some good survivor with his flute would go, Piping a ditty sad for Bion’s fate, And cross the unpermitted ferry’s flow. And relax Pluto’s brow, And make leap up with joy the beauteous head Of Prosperine, among whose crownèd hair Are flowers, first open’d on Sicilian air, And flute his friend, like Orpheus, from the dead. If that is a return to an older manner, it is an older manner with a difference, and the difference is one that in the first place was of Tennyson’s invention. Arnold was too personal a poet not to invest even his acquired characteristics with his own stamp, but when we read verse like this we know that Milton, Gray and Wordsworth were not the only masters. And, in fact, Tennyson’s particular “linked sweetness long drawn out” was not more certainly achieved by its originator himself than by Arnold in such passages as-- Too quick despairer, wherefore wilt thou go? Soon will the high Midsummer pomps come on, Soon will the musk carnations break and swell, Soon shall we have gold-dusted snapdragon.... and Thee, at the ferry, Oxford riders blithe, Returning home on summer nights, have met Crossing the stripling Thames at Bablock-hithe, Trailing in the cool stream thy fingers wet.... and Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating to the breath Of the night-wind down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world.... and Dost thou once more assay Thy flight, and feel come over thee, Poor Fugitive, the feathery change Once more, and once more seem to make resound With love and hate, triumph and agony, Lone Daulis, and the high Cephissian vale? Listen, Eugenia-- How thick the bursts come crowding through the leaves! Again--thou hearest! Eternal Passion! Eternal Pain!