PREFACE
The most fitting introduction to the pages that follow would be Bruce Glasier's own words in an article called 'Why I am a Socialist.' He is describing his early life when during the summer months he kept his father's sheep on the braes of Kyle: 'Then came the days of herding, with Burns's poems turned over page by page among the heather, and the never-ceasing song of the streams down the glens.'[1]
The whole passage—too long to quote—is steeped in the wonder of wild places; he who wrote it and possessed this memory of romance had the poet's heart, the poet's vision, and when, before mid-life, a treasure of friendship came to him, it was a gift for which he was spiritually prepared, prized at its full value. What he gave in return for the pure joy that the friendship with William Morris brought into his life can be judged in reading the memories written here. The man of Scottish and Highland blood and he of the Welsh kin had much in common; both gave unconsciously, with the simplicity of wise children, and to us who look back and begin to see their lives in due proportion, the record of such kindliness, such steadfastness, as united these two men in their labour for the common good, is something to rejoice over. For surely if ever an earthly love was illumined with light from the Unknown, it was the affection that Bruce Glasier bore my father. The feeling was neither blind nor uncritical, nor does it show in the younger man any abnegation of independence of spirit. In one of the last letters Bruce wrote to me, he says: 'I know I must have tried his
- ↑ Labour Leader, 1 June 1906.
