30 NOVEMBER 1895, Page 3

We regret to record the death of Lord De Tabley,

one of the very few poets among the present aristocracy. He died yesterday week. His first poem, " Philoctetes in Lemnos," was probably his best, and a very fine study in the Greek school. But both the volumes of shorter poems which he published within the last few years,—one of them scarcely a year ago,—contained some true poetry. Before he succeeded to the peerage he contested Mid-Cheshire, as a. follower of Mr. Gladstone, in 1868; but before the counties had received household suffrage, which did not occur till seventeen years later, a Liberal had little chance in Mid- Cheshire, and he was defeated. His poetry was most successful when he dealt with classical subjects, but he wrote a very impressive poem on the subject of Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite, though it cannot be said that it breathed a very Hebrew spirit, or in any way embodied the temper of Deborah's great song. Lord De Tabley took a high place among the poeim minores of the day. And indeed, except Lord Houghton's, and the Duke of Argyll's, we cannot at present recall any other name in the House of Lords which has-even put in a claim to be that of a poet at all. The peerage expires with him.