Published 1874, Cabinet Edition. Written or pondered 31 May 1870 (Mem. ii 97–8; see CT, p. 389), on the occasion of the funeral of T.’s friend and neighbour Sir John Simeon, who died 21 May at Fribourg. E.T. wrote to H.T.: ‘Nightingales were singing, beautiful roses were all about the house and gardens and lilacs were in full bloom and the contrast only added to the sadness’ (1 June 1870); and 28 Nov. 1871: ‘Thou wilt be glad to hear that Papa has done a little song about the day of our dear Sir John’s burial. It is not quite finished yet, perhaps’ (Letters of E.T., pp. 258, 279). The ‘three dead men’ (l. 15) were Arthur Hallam, Henry Lushington and Simeon (T.). Cp. the elegy In the Valley of Cauteretz (p. 590).
Nightingales warbled without,
Within was weeping for thee:
Shadows of three dead men
Walked in the walks with me,
Shadows of three dead men and thou wast one of the three.
Nightingales sang in his woods:
The Master was far away:
Nightingales warbled and sang
Of a passion that lasts but a day;
Still in the house in his coffin the Prince of courtesy lay.
Two dead men have I known
In courtesy like to thee:
Two dead men have I loved
With a love that ever will be:
Three dead men have I loved and thou art last of the three.
[1871. The Last Tournament – see p. 920.
1872. Gareth and Lynette, and To the Queen: Idylls of the King – See pp. 693, 973.
1874. Balin and Balan – See p. 787]
¶357. 6–7. L. G. Whitbread notes the fame (long before the Simeon family came) of the nightingales at Swainston, and says of ‘The Master’: ‘the title by which Sir John had been regularly addressed… Before his conversion to Rome in 1851 he had been a prominent Island Freemason, several times Master of the Newport lodge; and for three successive seasons, in 1854–6, he served as Master of the Isle of Wight Foxhounds’ (VP xiii, 1975, 61–9).
10. Martin (p. 495n) compares Balin and Balan 252, where ‘Arthur is described as “the king of courtesy”, as if to establish Hallam’s primacy in the trinity of T.’s affections’. T. wrote of Simeon as ‘the very Prince of Courtesy’ in a letter to Lady Simeon, 27 June 1870 (Letters ii 551).