R,CHARD MONCKTON MILNES was born in the year - OUDL Home

106 John Drinkwaterthe best English lyrics\ It is true that this actual poemwas published six years before our decade began, butDixon went on writing verse of the same tender andsubtly personal quality through the 'seventies and, indeed,for many years towards his death in 1900. Hisoutput was small; Dr Bridges in his edition of Dixon'sPoems gives only sixty pieces drawn from a workingperiod of over thirty years. But in the 'seventies his giftwas at its maturity, and in those years its occasionalexercise added much of the best to his fastidiously restrainedbody of work.Lord de Tabley was another poet who, having publishedverse—to the extent of six volumes—before 1870,continued after that date to add at intervals to his mostdistinguished poems. He wrote more freely than Dixon,but with a less constant excellence. Though he has to hiscredit one longer piece, the verse drama Philoctetes publishedin 1866, which is not unworthy of comparison withthe major poems of his greater contemporaries, his lyricaltalent was of very variable merit, and his Collected Poemsneed careful sifting before they are relieved of tedium.But his lucky moments, if rare, had the remote and timelessquality of which we have spoken, and in the 'seventiesmany of these were bearing fruit that was to be gatheredin the two volumes of 1893 and 1895. Misrepresentationsays for itself all that is necessary:Peace, there is nothing more for men to speak;A larger wisdom than our lip's decrees.Of that dumb mouth no longer reason seek,No censure reaches that eternal peace,And that immortal ease.Believe them not that would disturb the endWith earth's invidious comment, idly meant.Speak and have done thy evil; for my friendIs gone beyond all human discontent,And wisely went.