AND SOCIALIS

ng gentleness and real humility of his nature was clearly to be seen. He learned patience through his conflict with unsympathetic minds. From the weary experience of working in constant intercourse with men whose temper and practice and many of whose theories were directly antagonistic to his own, although identified with them in the public mind by a common responsibility, he learned

ABBEY

AT THE MERTO

ound it unendurable. Therefore, with a longing glance at his chintz bleaching in the sunlight and pure air of Merton Abbey, he put his shoulder to the wheel again, and, gathering together a few of his sympathisers, inaugurated a new party, the Socialist League, with the famous little Commonweal for its organ, a monthly paper now the joy of collectors on account of the beautiful headings of Walter Crane and the remarkable quality of the contributions by Morris himself. In this new society, for which he was primarily responsible, Morris found his work redoubled. He

r members of the League, was present in court when the prisoners were brought up, and joined in the hisses and cries of "Shame!" when one prisoner was sentenced to two months' hard labour and the others were fined. Morris was arrested, subjected to a little questioning from the magistrate, and dismissed. The following Sunday another meeting,

to as little as possible considering its authorship. It opens with a scene in a court of justice, Justice Nupkins presiding, in which a Mr. La-di-da is found guilty of swindling and of robbing the widow and the orphan. He is sentenced to imprisonment for the space of one calendar month. Next Mary Pinch, a poor woman (the part was taken by Morris's daughter May), is accused of stealing three loaves of bread, and, after absurd and contradictory testimony by witnesses for the prosecution (constables and sergeants), is sentenced to eighteen months of hard labour. Next, John Freeman, a Socialist, is accused of conspiracy, sed

at the hands of the former "lower classes," who are now running affairs to suit themselves. He meets Mary Pinch, who pities his deplorable aspect and invites him to her house, now a pleasant and prosperous home. He cannot believe in the sincerity of her apparent kindness, and flees from her in a panic, only to meet other of his former victims who further alarm

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nthusiastic reception at the Hall of the Socialist League; Mr. Bernard Shaw, who was pre

re. Morris put himself at the head of the Clerkenwell contingent, first delivering a short speech mounted on a cart in company with Mrs. Besant and others. He declared that wherever it was attempted to put down free speech it was a bounden duty to resist the attempt by every possible means, and told his audience that he thought their business was to get to the Square by some means or other; that he intended to do his best to get there, whatever the consequences might be, and that they must press on like orderly people and good citizens. Thus pressing on, with flags flying and bands playing, they were met at the Bloomsbury end of St. Martin's Lane by the police, mounted and on foot, who charged in among them, striking right and l

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ds of the cause to which in 1882 he had also sacrificed the greater part of his valuable library. He had spent much time, which, to one so deeply interested in pursuits for which any one life is far too short, meant infinitely more than the expenditure of money or the relinquishing of property that, after all, may be got back again. And he had worked against the grain with all sorts and conditions of companions, from whom he was as widely separated as the east is from the west-never more widely than when he was marching by their side toward a goal that neither could see clearly. He was now longing more and more to get back to his own life and away from a life so foreign. As he had said in the first flush of his enthusiasm, "Art must go under," he was now prepared "to see all organised Socialism run into the sand for a while." It is not surprising that he "somehow did not seem to care much" when the Socialist League became disintegrated and insolvent. He had done his best for it, but its strongest members had drifted away from it, the executive control had been gained by a group of Anarchists, and Morris had been by these deposed from the editorship of the Commonweal. Before the society reached its lowest depths he resigned, giving expression in the Commonweal for the 15th of November, 1890, to his feeling in the form it then t

here would be nothing to take their place. We are not ready for such a change as that!" The time was favourable, he thought, for preaching the simple principles of Socialism regardless of the policy of the passing hour, nor was any more active work desirable. "I say, for us to make Socialists," he concluded, "is the business at present, and at present I do not t

possible. When we have enough people of that way of thinking, they will find out what action is necessary for putti

paration had been made because the members of the new society did not hold the Anarchistic views of the majority of the old society's members, and would be likely to waste in bickering time "which should be spent in attacking capitalism." The business of the Hammersmith Society was to spread the principles of Socialism, the method so warmly re

s the familiar note as positively as ever, and contains all that is required to represent the creed of his later years. "I hold firmly to the opinion," he says in this letter, "that all worthy schools of art must be in the future, as they have been in the past, the outcome of the aspirations of the people towards the beauty and true pleasure of life. And, further, now that democracy is building up a new order, which is slowly emerging from the confusion of the commercial period, these aspirations of the people towards beauty can only be born from a condition of practical equality, of economical condition amongst the whole population. Lastly, I am so confident that this equality will be gained that I am prepared to accept, as a consequence of the process of that gain, the apparent disappearance of what art is now left us, because I am sure that that will be but a temporary loss, to be followed by a genuine new birth of art which will be the spontaneous expression of the pleasure of life innate in the whole people. This, I say, is the art which I look forward to, not as a vague dream, but as a practical certainty, founded on the general well-being of the people. It is true that the blossom of it I shall not see; therefore I may be excused if, in common with other artists, I try to express myself through the art of to-da

n without society is not only impossible but inconceivable." Thus he argued and thus he believed. His militant Socialism had, while it lasted, a very dangerous side. His Socialist "principles" are easily torn to ribbons by the political economist in possession of facts showing the increasing prosperity of the working classes and their increasing interest under existing conditions in the arts and in education; but regarding his views merely as representing one aspect of his impressive personality, it is easy to find them attractive. To quote what the Pall Mall Gazette said of the Sunday evenings at the Hammersmith Hall, "They are patches of bright colour in the great drab, dreary, dull, and dirty world." They bring with them such thoughts as Arnold had of the repose that has fled "for ever the course of the river of Time." The spirit breathed through them in strong contrast to the spirit of many of his co-workers, ennobles all efforts toward true reform, diffuses the love of humanity among a cold people, and makes for the innocent and exquisite happiness which our human nature is so apt paradoxically to deny us. In Morris's world we should all be very happy if we were like Morris. He was not very happy in our world, yet perhaps he managed to get out of it as much of the joy of doing as

ed even to the least pretentious purpose and in every kind of handicraft; to protest against the absolute subjection of Art in its applied form to the interests of that extravagant waste of human energy which is called economic production; to claim for the artist or handicraftsman, whose identity it has been the rule to hide and whose artistic impulse it has been the custom to curb (until he was really in da

r. Mackail calls attention to the fact that Morris at this stage of his life was so thoroughly imbued with the idea that the general public were ignorant of and indifferent to decorative art, as to feel more sceptical of the success of the exhibitions than was justified by their outcome. He lent his aid, however, with his customary energy, guaranteeing a considerable sum of money, and contributing some valuable papers and lectures, the exhibitions being combined with instruction by acknowledged masters of handicraft. In 1891 he was elected President of the Society, holding that office until the time of his death, when he was succeeded by Walter Crane. He was a member of the Art Workers' Guild as well, and was elected Master of the Guild in 1892. He also belonged to the Bibliographical Society form