Morris, as has been said before, proceeds on a different principle. His first object is to tell a tale, and to tell it as nearly as possible in the spirit and according to the letter of the old Sagas. In this he has succeeded in a manner at once indicative of his high poetic gifts and of a deep sympathy with the spirit of the Northern Myth, which breathes in every line and in every turn of his phraseology. To compare the peculiar tinge of his language with the ordinary archaisms and euphonisms of literary poets would be mistaking a field flower for its counterpart in a milliner's shop window. It is true that he also hints at the larger philosophic and moral issues of the tale. But when he refers to the end of the gods brought about by their own guilt or to the redeeming mission of Sigurd, it is done in the mysterious, not to say half conscious manner of the saga itself, and the effect is such as from his own point of view he intended it and could not but intend it to be. Between the publication of _The Defence of Guenevere_ and that of Jason ten years elapsed. During most of this time the poet was employed in artistic pursuits. In 1861 he started in conjunction with a number of friends the business of decorator and artistic designer which still bears his name. Growing from very modest beginnings this enterprise was destined to work an entire change in the external aspect of English homes. It soon extended its activity to every branch of art-workmanship. D. G. Rossetti, Madox Brown, and Burne Jones drew cartoons for the stained glass windows to be seen in many of our churches and colleges. Morris himself designed wall-papers and the patterns of carpets. The latter are woven on hand-looms in his factory at Merton Abbey, which stands on the banks of the river Wandle surrounded by orchards, and looks as like a medieval workshop as the modern dresses of the workgirls will allow. Another member of the firm, Philip Webb, was the first modern architect to build houses of red brick in the style vaguely and not quite correctly described as "Queen Anne." At present these houses count by thousands in London and a whole village of them has been built at Turnham Green. The members of the firm did not confine their attention to any particular style or age or country. Wherever beautiful things could be found they collected them and made them popular. Old china English, and foreign, Japanese fans and screens, Venetian glass and German pottery were equally welcome to them and through them to the public generally. It may be said that the "aesthetic" fashion as it came to be called will like other fashions die out, and that people in the course of time will grow tired of "living up to" their furniture and dresses. At the same time the idea thus insisted upon that beauty is an essential and necessary ingredient of practical modern English life is not likely to be without beneficial and permanent effect.