' 'Everybody should have a
_raison d'etre_' was one of his phrases. 'Mrs--'s articles
are not good but they are her _raison d'etre_.' I had but
little knowledge of art, for there was little scholarship in the
Dublin Art School, so I overrated the quality of anything that
could be connected with my general beliefs about the world. If I
had been able to give angelical, or diabolical names to his lions
I might have liked them also and I think that Nettleship himself
would have liked them better, and liking them better have become a
better painter. We had the same kind of religious feeling, but I
could give a crude philosophical expression to mine while he could
only express his in action or with brush and pencil. He often told
me of certain ascetic ambitions, very much like my own, for he had
kept all the moral ambition of youth with a moral courage peculiar
to himself, as for instance--'Yeats, the other night I was
arrested by a policeman--was walking round Regent's Park
barefooted to keep the flesh under--good sort of thing to do--I
was carrying my boots in my hand and he thought I was a burglar;
and even when I explained and gave him half a crown, he would not
let me go till I had promised to put on my boots before I met the
next policeman.
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