persuaded that his Socialist agitation, so far from doing his health harm, refreshed his spirit, and was physically beneficial to him. He never, so far as I can ascertain, was more vigorous or freer from ailments, or more cheerful and happy, in the latter half of his life, than during the five years of his most active participation in Socialist propaganda.
Doubtless the irritation and worry of the internal strife in the movement in later years tended to depress him; but even then, may we not say that, so far from the strain of his exertions being the cause of his break-down, it was not until these dissensions led to his retirement from active propaganda that his health began to give way? Who knows but, had he been able to keep clear of these irritating controversies and had continued in the thick of the agitation, he might have lived another twenty years? And anyway, let us remember that countless men and women of robust constitutions, who never put foot on a public platform or become embroiled in political strife, die long before they reach Morris' age, which was sixty-two years.
I have, I think, already, as Mackail and others have done, likened Morris in many ways to a child. This characteristic of childlikeness has been frequently noted in men of creative and imaginative minds. Goldsmith, Blake, and Shelley are familiar instances. But in Morris the trait of childlikeness was the more singular because of the otherwise dominantly manly, self-reliant, and exceedingly manifest practical capacity of the man. In Shelley's case the childlikeness marked the poet's whole disposition, and constantly showed itself in his thoughtlessness concerning not only the feelings and interests, but even the existence of others, including his wife and family, in the common affairs of life, and in wholly wayward and irrational impulses and fancies. He was full of superstition about ghosts and dreams, and, grown man and father of a family as he was, would at times run truant in the woods for days, or burst naked into a drawing-room assembly of men and women. Morris showed none of these more 'infantile' (shall I say?) peculiarities.
