Page:Masterpieces of the sea (Morris, Richards, 1912).djvu/25

MASTERPIECES OF THE SEA and he could, even early in life, take note of opportunity with foresight and courage that yielded him the freedom his art required. He knew his strength very justly, and he shrewdly relied on it. Mr. Willcox says: "He amazed me by getting married and resigning his position as designer in order to devote himself entirely to his art. I don't remember which event took place first, but I thought the latter extremely unwise—and so it would have been with anyone else, but timidity had no place in his nature."

All this denotes a touch of life beyond the monopolizing palette, and in the same vein lie the wide sympathies with other intellectual currents which made Mr. Richards' company so alluring. He was apt in all the pleasant devices of conversation, full of humor and quiet laughter, full of diverting stories from his travels and his contact with life in many countries, and full of that large acquaintance with books that furnishes a ripe mind with overflowing talk. His household was 13