On  April  5th  he  received  from  Mr  Macready  a  letter
of  thanks  for  the  sonnet  addressed  to  him  on  leaving
the  stage.
Farewell,  Macready,  since  to-night  we  part;
Full-handed  thunders  often  have  confessed
Thy  power,  well  used  to  move  the  public  breast.
We  thank  thee  with  our  voice,  and  from  the  heart.
Farewell,  Macready,  since  this  night  we  part.
Go,  take  thine  honours  home ;  rank  with  the  best,*
Garrick  and  statelier  Kemble,  and  the  rest.
Who  made  a  nation  purer  thro'  their  art.
Thine  is  it  that  our  drama  did  not  die.
Nor  flicker  down  to  brainless  pantomime.
And  those  gilt  gauds  men-children  swarm  to  see.
Farewell,  Macready;   moral,  grave,  sublime;

Our  Shakespeare's  bland  and  universal  eye

Dwells  pleased,  thro'  twice  a  hundred  years,  on  thee.
From  W.  C.  Macready.
Sherborne,  Dorset,  April  ^th,  1851.
My  dear  Mr  Tennyson,

If  I  had  obeyed  the  impulse  of  my  feelings,  I  should
have  written  to  you  long  since,  when  our  friend  Forster  first
communicated  to  me  the  kindness  you  had  shown  me  in  honour-
ing my  name  with  the  glory  of  your  verse.  This  was  some  days
before  the  publication  of  your  lines,  and  he  may  have  told  you
that  the  emotion  they  excited  in  me  was  a  manifestation  of
my  grateful  appreciation  beyond  what  words  can  render  you.
340  MARRIAGE.  [l851

You  have  indeed  embalmed  my  perishable  name,  which  will
not  so  soon  be  lost  in  the  long  night,  as  "  carens  vate  sacro,"
and  I  may  truly  assure  you,  of  no  testimony  have  I  felt  more
proud,  and  on  none  have  I  reflected  with  more  grateful  pleasure,
than  on  that  which  bears  your  name.
I  remain,  dear  Mr  Tennyson,

Always  and  sincerely  yours,

W.  C.  Macready.
