Page:The Life of William Morris.djvu/574

ÆT. 53] "I am going to Croydon to-morrow. Murray is in town, come back to Graham's sale: I saw him at Charing Cross the other day. I go to Dublin on Thursday evening. I see people are making a great fuss about Walker's pictures: I don't much sympathize, but the one that they have bought for the National Gallery is the best he did. Ned's and Gabriel's are to be sold to-day. Millais's Vale of Rest fetched a long price: but at any rate 'tis worth a cartload of the wretched daubs he turns out now."

"I came back from the Irishry all safe last night," he resumes on the 15th; "but I am off to Leeds and Bradford on Saturday and shall not be back thence till Tuesday: after that, peace as far as travelling is concerned till the end of June. I had a good passage back, and did 50 lines of Homer on the boat. Dublin on the whole I rather like: there is a sort of cosy shabbiness about it which, joined to the clear air, is pleasant. The last meeting on the Tuesday evening was peaceful and even enthusiastic. The day I had spent up among the Wicklow mountains, and found it very beautiful. On whatever other points the Irishry are wild, they are quite cool, sensible, and determined on the Home Rule question. I met some very agreeable middle-classers there and had much talk—far too much in fact; I doubt if there is an iron pot in Dublin with a leg on it by this time.

"I was very glad to get home and am very loth to leave it I can tell you. However, the wine is drawn and must be drunk."

The translation of the Odyssey to which this last letter alludes had been just begun; and its inception marks the point at which the extreme tension of the last three years began to relax. For as long a period to come he continued equally active and conscientious