MEMOIR. xv 



find that he was just as delightful at work as in the 

 world. 



"The peculiar half shy yet eager way in which he rushed 

 into the front room, with a smile and a nod of recognition 

 for each of us, always struck me. But until he got to work 

 he always seemed preoccupied, as if while apparently 

 engaged in earnest discussion of some matter an under- 

 current of thought was running the while, and as if he were 

 devising something wherewith to beautify his work even 

 when arranging business affairs. 



" This certainly must have been the case, for frequently 

 he broke off in the midst of his talk to turn to a board and 

 sketch out some design, or to alter a detail he had sketched 

 the day before with a few vigorous pencil-strokes. This 

 done, he would return to business, only to glance off again 

 to some other drawing, and to complete what would not 

 come the day before. In fact he was exactly like a bird 

 hopping from twig to twig, and from flower to flower, as he 

 hovered over the many drawings which were his daily 

 work, settling here a form and there a moulding as the 

 impulse of the moment seized him. 



" And though at times we were puzzled to account for, or 

 to anticipate his ways, and though the work was often 

 hindered by them, we would not have had it otherwise. 



" Those * gentillesses d'oiseaux,' as Hugo says, those 

 little birdy ways, so charming from their unexpectedness, 

 kept us constantly on the alert, for we never quite knew 

 what he would do next. It was not his custom to move in 

 beaten tracks, and his everyday life was as much out of the 

 common as his inner life. His ways with each of us were 

 marked by an almost womanly tenderness. He seemed to 

 regard us as his children, and to have a parent's intuition 

 of our troubles, and of the special needs of each with 

 reference to artistic development. 



" He would come, and taking possession of our stools 



c 2 



