9 April 1882 : Dante Gabriel Rossetti died atBirchington-on-Sea near Margate. Apparently he `threw his arms out;screamed out loud two or three times and died'. Morris'sassessment: `what a great man he would have been but for thearrogant misanthrophy that marred his work, and killed him beforehis time: the grain of humility which makes a great man one of thepeople, and no lord over them, he lacked, & with it lost theenjoyment of life which would have kept him alive, and would havesweetened all his work for him and us. But I say he has left a holein the world which will not be filled in a hurry.'
7 June 1881 : Morris recorded in hisDiary that he had signed the lease for the seven acreMerton Abbey Works in Surrey. The rent was £200. The Mertonworks were on the River Wandle and only seven miles from CharingCross Station. De Morgan found a separate site at Merton Abbeywhere he remained until 1884. Prior to taking the site Morris andDe Morgan had considered a disused silk mill in Blockley inGloucestershire. Morris found the last notice of wage reductionsstill posted to the door.
13 February 1868 : William Rossetti wrote inhis Diary: `Browning expresses (as I had before been told)a very high opinion of Morris's Jason.'
26 March 1867 : Morris wrote to Morgan thatfollowing his inspection of the work on Jesus College Chapel: `Ishall not be able to give it up to you this week; it will howeverbe finished by the week after, (week ending April 7th).'
March 1868 : Morris commissioned Rossetti topaint a portrait of Jane. This portrait is known as `Mrs WilliamMorris in a Blue Silk Dress.'
20 September 1885 : Morris was scheduled togive his lecture `The Guilds of the Middle Ages' before theHammersmith Branch of the SL at Kelmscott House, Hammersmith. Ameeting held in Dod Street to protest against the recentprosecutions for `obstruction' was charged by the police. Eightmembers of the crowd were accused of resisting the police or ofobstruction including Mowbray, Kitz, Mahon and Lewis Lyons. Themeeting was reported in the Daily News, 22 September1885(p.2) and the Pall Mall Gazette, 21 September 1885 (p.6).
16 February 1885 : A demonstration of between3,000 to 4,000 unemployed workers assembled on the Embankment andthen marched to Westminster to demand that the Local GovernmentBoard institute public works: `I suppose you saw the reports of ourwould be leader's [Hyndman's] speech on the Thames embankment ...more preposterous humbug I never heard of. However it will answerhis purpose for the time and make him notorious.' The SL sent aresolution to a number of papers expressing its pleasure at therecent fall of Khartoum.
25 January 1885 : Morris gave an unnamedlecture to the Woolwich Branch of the SDF in Woolwich. TheDaily News printed an article in which it was stated that`Mr. William Morris, the poet of English Socialism - and of otherthings besides - will issue the first number of his new journalThe Commonweal next Wednesday.'
13 July 1883 : Burns and Williams held asocialist meeting in Hyde Park following a large demonstration infavour of the reform of local government in London. According toMorris `they got together five thousand people who cheeredthem lustily.' It is not clear if Morris attended this meeting.
1886 : The Co-operative Printing Company ofEdinburgh published Morris's The Labour Question from theSocialist Standpoint as No. 5 in their `Claims of LabourLectures'. A Selection of the Poems of William Morris,edited with a memoir by Francis Hueffer, appeared as one of theTauchnitz Collection of British Authors (c.f. 23 July1885).
11 July 1884 : Morris delivered a lectureentitled `Textile Fabrics' at the International Health Exhibitionat the South Kensington Museum, London. This lecture wassubsequently published as a pamphlet by William Clowes & Sonson behalf of the International Health Exhibition.
18 February 1884 : Over 1,500 people attended ameeting held in Blackburn which was advertised as `How the Workersare Legally Robbed'. Morris, Hyndman, Williams and Macdonald allspoke. This is not mentioned by LeMire.
: In the afternoon Morristravelled from Manchester to Leicester. In the evening he delivered before the Leicester Secular Society at theSecular Hall, Humberstone Gate, Leicester. This lecture was laterprinted as a booklet by W Reeves. While in Leicester he stayed withSydney Gimson the brother of Ernest Gimson. Gimson recalled thatafter supper the Rev J Hopps said to Morris: `That's an impossibledream of yours Mr Morris, such a Society would need God Almightyhimself to manage it'. According to Gimson `Mr Morris got up andwalked round his chair, then going across to Mr. Hopps and shakinghis fist to emphasise his words he said "Well, damn it man, youcatch your God Almighty - we'll have him".'