loth to risk writing about him, lest in so doing I should unwittingly deface in any way the true image of him; and partly because I have hitherto been too much absorbed in my every-day work to afford the leisure for the task—little as it may seem. But now, confined as I am to bed, and with only, as it would seem, a few more months at most in which to write or to do anything more in this realm of life, I feel a longing which I cannot allay to leave some of the treasures of my memories of him as a legacy to the Socialist movement.
And should anyone object to the number of these chapters, and to the minuteness of the details recorded in some of them, I can only plead that to myself and, I hope, to many Socialists at least all that concerns a true appreciation of Morris' character, and the circumstances of his propaganda career, are as interesting and important as anything that can be recorded of any notable thinker and worker in modern history.
It may be asked whether, in recording Morris' conversations, I have relied upon notes taken at the time, or solely upon my memory. I have done neither. Fortunately I have preserved diary notes covering several years of our acquaintance, in which there are brief jottings concerning him. These have enabled me to check dates of meetings and some other details. As for my memory, it is one of the poorest so far as concerns retaining in the ordinary way a recollection of words or phrases, but it is usually exceedingly retentive of visual or pictorial impressions. During the past twenty or thirty years I have often, as I have said, had occasion when talking over early times with friends to recall many of the incidents recorded here, and have rarely found any difficulty in bringing back a vivid recollection of the scenes, but have usually had to content myself with giving the barest indication of the conversations. How then am I to account for being able to set down, as I have done in many instances, what I give as the actual words used by him?
