Chapter III

Yet never did there meet my sight,
In any town, to left or right,
A little room so exquisite,
With two such couches soft and white;
Not any room so warm and bright,
Wherein to read, wherein to write.

[Footnote D: 'As soon as this poem was published, I altered the second line to "All books and pictures ranged aright"; yet "Dear room, the apple of my sight" (which was much abused) is not as bad as "Do go, dear rain, do go away."' [Note initialed 'A.T.' in _Life_, vol. I, p. 89.] The worthlessness of much of the criticism lavished on Tennyson by his coterie of adulating friends may be judged from the fact that Arthur Hallam wrote to Tennyson that this poem was 'mighty pleasant.']