Page:The Life of William Morris.djvu/140

ÆT. 24] he seemed to pay little attention, but studied the collection of carved ivories minutely. The visit ended with a very characteristic scene. "When he was to go," Canon Dixon says, "we both, I think, misread the Railway Guide, and drove to the station when there was no train; and there was nothing for it but to wait till next day. I was made aware of this by a fearful cry in my ears, and saw Morris 'translated': it lasted all the way home; it then vanished in a moment; he was as calm as if it had never been, and began painting in water-colours." It was during this visit to Manchester that he wrote the "Praise of My Lady," with the lovely Latin burden, which is one of the jewels of the volume of Poems of 1858.

Mrs. Alfred Baldwin possesses another work of the same period, which Morris gave her when a girl in London during that winter. It is a page of illuminated manuscript on vellum. The text, which is in prose, is founded on a fairy tale from Grimm. The writing, which is in the Gothic character, is rather cramped and uncertain. But the design and colouring of the border, and the treatment of a picture in a large initial letter, show a complete grasp of the principles and methods of the art. It is probable that no illumination had been done since the fifteenth century which was so full of the mediæval spirit.

A holiday during this Red Lion Square time was nearly always spent at the Zoological Gardens. For the greater birds Morris had always a special affection. He would imitate an eagle with considerable skill and humour, climbing on to a chair and, after a sullen pause, coming down with a soft heavy flop; and for some time an owl was one of the tenants of Red Lion Square, in spite of a standing feud between it and Rossetti. The evenings were pretty often spent at