Pub. AWS, I, 531.
Draft in B. L. Add. MS 45,298A, f. 45

Draft in B. L. Add. MS 45,298A, ff. 37v-40 in what may be Morris's adolescent hand. This and nos. 4-9, 13, 14, and 16-18 below are all written in a large, loose, symmetrical script, quite different from that used by the copyist of "The Mosque Rising in the Place of the Temple of Solomon" (formerly known as "The Dedication of the Temple"), a poem which May Morris received in the same batch of poems from her niece Effie Morris in 1921, and which she describes as written out "for or by" her aunt. May Morris apparently hesitated to identify her aunt's handwriting, but at least did not assume that the very different "Fame" script was hers. The uncertainty is resolved, however, by the one surviving Emma Morris letter (to her niece Jenny, 1887, William Morris Gallery MS J77), written in the script of "The Mosque Rising" copyist. Emma was not the copyist for "Fame" or the other poems in the same handwriting which were found in her drawer; other possibilities include Henrietta Morris or Morris himself. Morris's handwriting varied widely; although the handwriting of "Fame" is less compressed than that of the Fitzwilliam early script, the capital letters are similarly formed. May Morris often mentioned whether drafts were in her father's hand, but here said nothing. See also the note on 10.

Drowned

What is the bottom of the river like?
       O! green it is with swinging weeds,
              O! yellow with bright gravel,
       O! blue with the water overhead,
              Through which the pike does travel,
Tenderly poised is the yellow-eyed pike.

I said `the water overhead'
      For I lie here a-dying,
The pike looks down on my weedy bed,
      How sweet it is to be dying!

Pub. AWS, I, 531.

What is the bottom of the river like?
O! green it is with swinging weeds,
O! yellow with bright gravel,
       O! blue with the water overhead,
Through which the pike does travel,
Tenderly poised is the yellow-eyed pike.
I said "the water overhead!"
For I lie here a-dying.
The pike looks down on my weedy bed,
How sweet it is to be dying!