Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 14.djvu/37

* MORRIS. 25 MORRISBURG. ization of the new Government, President Wash- iugttjii uU'ered him the position of Secretary of tlie Treasury. He declined the oiler and recom- mended Alexander Hamilton, who was appointed. At the same time, however, he accepted a seat in ,the United States Senate, where he served with- out special distinction until 1795. Unfortunate business speculations proved disastrous, and on February 16, 17'.I8, he entered a debt- or's prison in Philadelphia, where he was confined until August 20, ISOl. He died May 8, 1806. A short biography of Robert Morris has been written hj W. G. Sumner (New York, 1892). A more comprehensive work by the same author is The Fiitaiickr and the Fiitaiires of the American Rc^^oUltioll (New York, 1891). Con- sult also Bolles, The Financial Administration of Robert Morris (1878). MORRIS, Thom.s (1776-1844). An Ameri- can anti-slavery leader, born in Augusta Count}', Va. His fatli?r removed to Ohio in 1795. ^Yhile Avorking on a farm in Clermont County, he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1804. From 1806 to 1830 he was a member of the Ohio State Legislature. In 1832 he was elected to the United States Senate, as a Democrat. He very soon took ground on the slavery question, however, in radical opposition to that held by the majority of his party. He willingly presented anti-slavery petitions, and ardently defended the right of petition in the Senate. He also spoke strongly against Texan annexation. In 1838, when Calhoun introduced a series of resolutions touching the constitutional status of slavery, ^Morris introduced a set of alternative resolutions embodying a rational and explicit statement of the views of the anti-slavery men. On the ex- piration of his term as Senator his constituents, to whom his views on the slavery question had been displeasing in the extreme, discarded him for Benjamin Tappan. In January, 1840, at the Democratic State convention, he was read out of the party, and later in the year associated him- self politically with the new Liberty Party (q.v. ) movement. In Slay, 1841, he was nominated for Yice-President on the Liberty Party ticket, on which .James G. Birney had been named for President. These nominations, which were for the campaign of 1844, were confirmed at the BufTalo convention of the party in 1843. Con- sult: Smith, The Liberty and Free-Soil Parties in the Xorthircst (New York, 1897) : and B. F. Morris, Life of Thomas Morris (Cincinnati, 1856). MORRIS, ViLLi.A.M (1834-96). An English poet, artist, and socialist, born at Walthamstow, near London. March 24, 1834. Morris's early boyhood was spent in the romantic region near Epping Forest, where he showed at the outset his love for nature. He was educated at Marlbor- ough School and at Exeter College, Oxford. Here he mingled little in the college life, but he read swiftly and widely, thus quickly storing in his strong memory a stock of knowledge which he put to use. In 1854 distress of religion almost cast him upon the wave of Catholic feeling, but the impulse passed. He mastered Church history and Anglican theolog', but he soon left them in a new enthusiasm for Carlyle. Ruskin, and Kingsley. In 1854 Morris visited France, whith- er he went again in 1855 with his friend Edward Burne-Jones (q.v.). On this tour he fell so wholly under the spell of French Gothic that he gave up his earlier purpose of founding a re- ligious brotherhood and became an archi- tect. After trying his hand at architecture and painting, he found his true calling in 1861, when with Rossetti, Burne-.Jones, and other friends, he established a firm in London for designing and manufacturing artistic furni- ture and household decorations. As time went on, Morris took up the manufacture of tapestry and other textiles, dyeing, book-illumination, and printing. Tlic old firm of decorative art was dis- .solved in 1871; and in 1881 Morris transferred his works to Merton in Surrey. In 1890 he founded the famous Kelmscott Press at Hammer- smith. For the practical advancement of the lesser arts, and of the rare doctrine that all things should be made beautiful, Morris did more than any other man of his time. At Oxford, Mor- ris showed his literary talent in several contribu- tions in verse and prose to the Oxford and Cam- bridge Magazine, which he maintiained (1856). Two years later he published the Defence of Guenevere, and Other Poems. This volume, pre- Chaucerian in tone, marks a date in later Roman- ticism; and never again did ilorris equal it in force and concentration. Afterwards, Morris turned for his subjects to Greek, Old French, Norse, and other mediaeval stories, which he clothed in verse with great facility. By the Life and Death of Jason ( 1867) and The Earthly Paradise (1868-70), he proved liimself one of the best stor3'-tellers since Chaucer, his avowed mas- ter. In the summer of 1871 he made a trip through Iceland. In 1876 appeared Sigurd the Tolsung and the Fall of the Niblnngs, a narrative poem approaching the dignity of an epic. Mor- ris wrote many romances in prose or in prose and verse combined: among which are the House of the Wolfings ( 1888), The Roots of the Mountains (1890), The Well at the World's End (1896), and, best of all, the Story of the Glittering Plain (1891). In the same year he published a semi-utopian romance, News from 'Nowhere, in which he sought to popularizehis socialistic ideals. As a translator, he succeeded capitally in his ren- derings from the Sagas. In 1885 he became an active socialist, delivering lectures to workmen and contributing to the Com nioHicea/, the organ of the Socialistic League. He died October 3, 1896, leaving to the world an immortal example of the man who devotes his wealth and his genius to the bettering of visible things and to the spread of manly ideals. A collection of various papers, entitled Architecture. Industrt/. and Wealth, was not published till 1903. Consult: Vallance, William Morris, His Art. etc, (contain- ing a bibliography, London. 1897) : Mackail. The Life of William Morris (London and New York. 1899) ; Cary, William Morris. Poet. Craftsman, and Socialist (New York, 1902); Ricgel, "Die Quellen von William Morris's Dichtung, The Earthly Paradise," in Erlanger Beitrage zur eng- lischen Philologie (Leipzig, 1890) ; and see Pre- RAPII.iELITES. MOR'RISBTJRG. A port of entry of Dundas County, Ontario. Canada, on the left bank of the Saint Lawrence River, opposite Yaddington, N. Y., 43 miles southeast of Ottawa (Map: On- tario, H 3). It is on the Grand Trunk Railway at the entrance to the Rapide du Plat Canal. It has a shipping trade and is the seat of a United