plan * * *. Since the days of his early youth up to
the period when the immediate action of the poem is
supposed to commence, the dreamy recluse has seen
nothing of the family of the man to whom circumstances
have inclined him to attribute his misfortunes. This
individual, although since his accession to prosperity
the possessor of the neighbouring hall and of the
manorial lands of the village, has been residing abroad.
Just at this time however there are workmen up at the
dark old place, and a rumour spreads that the absentees
are about to return. This rumour, as a matter of course,
stirs up afresh rankling memories in the breast of the
recluse, and awakens there old griefs. But with the
group of associated recollections that come crowding
forth, there is one of the child Maud, who was in
happier days his merry playfellow. She will now
however be a child no longer. She will return as the
lady mistress of the mansion (being the only daughter
of the Squire, who is a widower). What will she be
like? He, who wonders, has heard somewhere that
she is singularly beautiful. But what is this to him?
Even while he thinks of her, he feels a chill presentiment,
suggested no doubt by her close relationship to one who
he considered had already worked him so much harm,
that she will bring with her a curse for him."

I shall never forget his last reading1He owned that "Some of the passages are hard to read because they
have to be taken in one breath and require good lungs." of "Maud," on
August 24th, 1892. He was sitting in his high-backed
chair, fronting a southern window which looks over the
groves and yellow cornfields of Sussex toward the long
line of South Downs that stretches from Arundel to
Hastings (his high-domed Rembrandt-like head outlined
against the sunset-clouds seen through the western
window). His voice, low and calm in everyday life,
capable of delicate and manifold inflection, but with

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