Victorian Art in Britain

The Morris poem on the frame is :-

‘Here lies the hoarded love the key
To All the treasure that shall be
Come fated heart the gift to take
And smite the sleeping world awake.’

The Sleeping Beauty is of course the painter’s adored daughter Margaret, who is reclining and looking very peaceful. The briars are still very evident in the background. We do not see the knight awake the Sleeping Beauty, the painter wishing to leave the scene to the imagination of the viewer.