And with this patience went a gentleness,
a sweetness, a delicate sensitiveness, and an abounding humanity and
sympathy. He could be almost ruthless in the assertion of his will when
the interests of his art or of justice seemed to demand it, yet there
was a tender-heartedness in him which made it distressing to him to
inflict pain on any one. The conflict of these elements in his nature
sometimes made his actions seem inconsistent and indecipherable even to
those who knew him. He would be long-suffering, compromising,
disinclined to strike; but when he was at last roused the blow would be
as staggering as it was unexpected. It was as if he struck the harder to
have done with it and to spare himself the pain of striking again.
It was his whole-hearted devotion to his art which caused his rare acts
of self-assertion, and it was this same devotion, no less than his
natural kindliness, that made him ever helpful to younger artists who
showed any promise of future worth. Even in his last days of unspeakable
suffering he would summon what was left of his old strength to give a
word of criticism and advice, above all, a word of commendation, to any
one who needed the one or had earned the other. The essential goodness
of the man was most felt by those who stood nearest him, and most of
all, perhaps, by his actual coworkers.
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