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[Illustration: JAMES M'NEILL WHISTLER
From a sketch from life by Rajon. Courtesy of Frederick Keppel.]
WHISTLER STORIES
COLLECTED AND ARRANGED BY DON C. SEITZ
AUTHOR OF
"WRITINGS BY AND ABOUT
JAMES ABBOTT McNEILL WHISTLER"
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
MCMXIII
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
PUBLISHED OCTOBER 1913
TO SHERIDAN FORD,
DISCOVERER OF THE ART OF FOLLY AND OF MANY FOLLIES OF ART
PREFACE
Following the example set by Homer when he "smote his bloomin' lyre,"
as cited by Mr. Kipling, who went "an' took what he'd admire," I have
gleaned the vast volume of Whistler literature and helped myself in
making this compilation. Some few of the anecdotes are first-hand.
Others were garnered by Mr. Ford in the original version of _The
Gentle Art of Making Enemies_. The rest have been published many
times, perhaps. But it seemed desirable to put the tales together
without the distraction of other matter. So here they are.
D.C.S.
Cos Cob, CONN., _July, 1913_.
WHISTLER STORIES
The studios of Chelsea are full of Whistler anecdotes. One tells of a
female model to whom he owed some fifteen shillings for sittings. She
was a Philistine of the Philistines who knew nothing of her patron's
fame and was in no way impressed with his work. One day she told
another artist that she had been sitting to a little Frenchman called
Whistler, who jumped about his studio and was always complaining that
people were swindling him, and that he was making very little money.
The artist suggested that if she could get any piece of painting out
of Whistler's studio he would give her ten pounds for it. Although
skeptical, the model decided to tell her "little Frenchman" of this
too generous offer, and selected one of the biggest and finest works
in the studio. "What did he say?" asked the artist who had made the
offer, when the model appeared in a state of great excitement and
looking almost as if she had come second best out of a scrimmage. "He
said, 'Ten pounds--Good heavens!--ten pounds!' and he got so
mad--well, that's how I came in here like this."
* * * * *
Mr. W.P. Frith, R.A., following the custom of artists, talked to a
model one day to keep her expression animated. He asked the girl to
whom she had been sitting of late, and received the answer:
"Mr. Whistler."
"And did he talk to you?"
"Yes, sir."
"What did he say?"
"He asked me who I'd been sitting to, same as you do; and I told him
I'd been sitting to Mr. Cope, sir."
"Well, what else?"
"He asked me who I'd been sitting to before that, and I said Mr.
Horsley."
"And what next?"
"He asked me who I'd been sitting to before that, and I said I'd been
sitting to you, sir."
"What did he say then?"
"He said, 'What a d----d crew!'"
* * * * *
Whistler once came very near painting a portrait of Disraeli. He had
the commission; he even went down to the country where Disraeli was;
but the great man did not manage to get into the mood. Whistler
departed disappointed, and shortly afterward took place a meeting in
Whitehall which was the occasion of a well-known story: Disraeli put
his arm in Whistler's for a little way on the street, bringing from
the artist the exclamation, "If only my creditors could see!"
* * * * *
Whistler's ideas, the reverse of commercial, not infrequently placed
him in want. He pawned his portrait of his mother, by many considered
the best of his productions.
Miss Marion Peck, a niece of Ferdinand Peck, United States
Commissioner to the Paris Exposition, wanted her portrait done by
Whistler. She sat for him nineteen times. Further, she requested, as
the picture was nearing completion, that extra pains be taken with its
finishing. Also, she inquired if it could, without danger of injury,
be shipped.
"Why?" asked Whistler.
"Because I wish to send it to my home in Chicago," explained Miss
Peck.
Whistler threw down his brush, overturned the easel, and ran around
the studio like a madman. "What!" he shrieked. "Send a Whistler to
Chicago! Allow one of my paintings to enter Hog Town! Never!"
Miss Peck didn't get the painting.
* * * * *
Once he met what seemed to be a crushing retort. He had scornfully
called Balaam's ass the first great critic, and the inference was
plain until a writer in _Vanity Fair_ called his attention to the fact
that the ass was right.
Whistler acknowledged the point. But the acknowledgment terminates in
a way that is delicious. "I fancy you will admit that this is the only
ass on record who ever did 'see the Angel of the Lord,' and that we
are past the age of miracles."
Even in defeat he was triumphant.
* * * * *
Whistler found that Mortimer Menpes, once his very dear friend,
sketched in Chelsea. "How dare you sketch in my Chelsea?" he
indignantly demanded.
A vigorous attack on Mr. Menpes then followed in the press. One of the
first articles began in this style, Menpes, of course, being an
Australian: "I can only liken him to his native kangaroo--a robber by
birth--born with a pocket!" "He is the claimant of lemon yellow"--a
color to which Mr. Whistler deemed he had the sole right; and when he
thought he had pulverized him in the press (it was soon after the
Parnell Commission, when Pigott, the informer, had committed suicide
in Spain), Whistler one evening thrust this pleasant note into Mr.
Menpes's letter-box, scrawled on a half-sheet of paper, with the
well-known butterfly cipher attached:
"You will blow your brains out, of course. Pigott has shown you what
to do under the circumstances, and you know the way to Spain.
Good-by!"
Speaking at a meeting held to complete the details of a movement for
the erection of a memorial to Whistler, Lord Redesdale gave a
remarkable account of the artist's methods of work. "One day when he
was to begin a portrait of a lady," said Lord Redesdale, "the painter
took up his position at one end of the room, with his sitter and
canvas at the other. For a long time he stood looking at her, holding
in his hand a huge brush as a man would use to whitewash a house.
Suddenly he ran forward and smashed the brush full of color upon the
canvas. Then he ran back, and forty or fifty times he repeated this.
At the end of that time there stood out on the canvas a space which
exactly indicated the figure and the expression of his sitter."
This portrait was to have belonged to Lord Redesdale, but through
circumstances nothing less than tragic it never came into his
possession. There were bailiffs in the house when it was finished.
This was no novelty to Whistler. He only laughed, and, laughing, made
a circuit of his studio with a palette-knife, deliberately destroying
all the pictures exposed there. The portrait of the lady was among
them.
* * * * *
Moncure D. Conway in his autobiography relates this:
"At a dinner given to W.J. Stillman, at which Whistler (a Confederate)
related with satisfaction his fisticuffs with a Yankee on shipboard,
William Rossetti remarked: 'I must say, Whistler, that your conduct
was scandalous.' Stillman and myself were silent. Dante Gabriel
Rossetti promptly wrote:
"'There is a young artist called Whistler,
Who in every respect is a bristler;
A tube of white lead
Or a punch on the head
Come equally handy to Whistler.'"
On one occasion a woman said to Whistler:
"I just came up from the country this morning along the Thames, and
there was an exquisite haze in the atmosphere which reminded me so
much of some of your little things. It was really a perfect series of
Whistlers."
"Yes, madam," responded Whistler, gravely. "Nature is creeping up."
* * * * *
Richard A. Canfield, who sat for the portrait now called "His
Reverence," though Canfield was something quite unclerical, recites:
"After I had my first sitting on New Year's Day, 1903, I saw Whistler
every day until the day I sailed for New York, which was on May 16th.
He was not able to work, however, on all those days. In fact, there
were days at a time when he could do nothing but lie on a couch and
talk, as only Whistler could talk, about those things which interested
him. It was mostly of art and artists that he conversed, but now and
again he would revert to his younger days at home, to the greatness to
which the republic had attained, and to his years at West Point.
"In spite of all that has been said of him, I know that James McNeill
Whistler was one of the intensest Americans who ever lived. He was
not what you call an enthusiastic man, but when he reverted to the old
days at the Military Academy his enthusiasm was infectious. I think he
was really prouder of the years he spent there--three, I think they
were--than any other years of his life. He never tired of telling of
the splendid men and soldiers his classmates turned out to be, and he
has often said to me that the American army officer trained at West
Point was the finest specimen of manhood and of honor in the world.
"It was in this way that I spent every afternoon with Whistler from
New Year's until May 15th, the day before I sailed. When he was able
to work I would sit as I was told, and then he would paint, sometimes
an hour, sometimes three. At other times he would lie on the couch and
ask me to sit by and talk to him. On the morning of the day of the
last sitting he sent me a note asking me to take luncheon with him,
and Adding that he felt quite himself and up to plenty of work.
"So I went around to his studio, and he painted until well into the
late afternoon. When he was done he said that with a touch or two here
and there the picture might be considered finished. Then he added:
"'You are going home to-morrow, to my home as well as yours, and you
won't be coming back till the autumn. I've just been thinking that
maybe you had better take the picture along with you. His Reverence
will do very well as he is, and maybe there won't be any work in me
when you come back. I believe I would rather like to think of you
having this clerical gentleman in your collection, for I have a notion
that it's the best work I have done.'
"Whistler had never talked that way before, and I have since thought
that he was thinking that the end was not far away. I told him, more
to get the notion, if he had it, out of his mind than anything else,
that I would not think of taking the picture, and that if he didn't
put on one of those finishing touches until I got back, so much the
better, for then I could see him work. That seemed to bring him back
to himself, and he said:
"'So be it, your Reverence. Now we'll say _au revoir_ in a couple of
mint-juleps.' He sent for the materials, made the cups, and, just as
the sun was setting, we drank to each other and the homeland, and I
was off to catch a train for Liverpool and the steamer. So it was that
Whistler and his last subject parted."
* * * * *
A group of American and English artists were discussing the manifold
perfections of the late Lord Leighton, president of the Royal Academy.
"Exquisite musician--played the violin like a professional," said one.
"One of the best-dressed men in London," said another.
"Danced divinely," remarked the third.
"Ever read his essays?" asked a fourth. "In my opinion they're the
best of the kind ever written."
Whistler, who had remained silent, tapped the last speaker on the
shoulder.
"Painted, too, didn't he?" he said.
* * * * *
A patron of art asked Whistler to tell him where a friend lived on a
certain street in London, to which the artist replied:
"I can't tell you, but I know how you can find it. Just you ring up
houses until you come across a caretaker who talks in B flat, and
there you are."
* * * * *
A friend of Whistler's saw him on the street in London a few years ago
talking to a very ragged little newsboy. As he approached to speak to
the artist he noticed that the boy was as dirty a specimen of the
London "newsy" as he had ever encountered--he seemed smeared all
over--literally covered with dirt.
Whistler had just asked him a question, and the boy answered:
"Yes, sir; I've been selling papers three years."
"How old are you?" inquired Whistler.
"Seven, sir."
"Oh, you must be more than that."
"No, sir, I ain't."
Then, turning to his friend, who had overheard the conversation,
Whistler said: "I don't think he could get that dirty in seven years;
do you?"
* * * * *
Benrimo, the dramatist, who wrote "The Yellow Jacket," relates that
when he was a young writer, fresh from the breezy atmosphere of San
Francisco, he visited London. Coming out of the Burlington Gallery one
day, he saw a little man mincing toward him, carrying a cane held
before him as he walked, whom he recognized as Whistler. With Western
audacity he stopped the pedestrian, introduced himself, and broke into
an elaborate outburst of acclamation for the works of the master, who
"ate it up," as the saying goes.
Waving his wand gently toward the famous gallery, Whistler queried:
"Been in there?"
"Oh, yes."
"See anything worth while?"
"Some splendid things, magnificent examples--"
"I'm sorry you ever approved of me," observed the master,
majestically, and on he went, leaving Benrimo withered under his
disdain.
* * * * *
Whistler had a French poodle of which he was extravagantly fond. This
poodle was seized with an affection of the throat, and Whistler had
the audacity to send for the great throat specialist, Mackenzie. Sir
Morell, when he saw that he had been called to treat a dog, didn't
like it much, it was plain. But he said nothing. He prescribed,
pocketed a big fee, and drove away. The next day he sent posthaste for
Whistler. And Whistler, thinking he was summoned on some matter
connected with his beloved dog, dropped his work and rushed like the
wind to Mackenzie's. On his arrival Sir Morell said, gravely: "How do
you do, Mr. Whistler? I wanted to see you about having my front door
painted."
* * * * *
Whistler used to tell this story about Dante Gabriel Rossetti in his
later years. The great Pre-Raphaelite had invited the painter of
nocturnes and harmonies to dine with him at his house in Chelsea, and
when Whistler arrived he was shown into a reception-room. Seating
himself, he was soon disturbed by a noise which appeared to be made by
a rat or a mouse in the wainscoting of the room. This surmise was
wrong, as he found the noise was in the center of the apartment.
Stooping, to his amazement he saw Rossetti lying at full length under
the table.
"Why, what on earth are you doing there, Rossetti?" exclaimed
Whistler.
"Don't speak to me! Don't speak to me!" cried Rossetti. "That fool
Morris"--meaning the famous William--"has sent to say he can't dine
here to-night, and I'm so mad I'm gnawing the leg of the table."
* * * * *
One of the affectations of Whistler was his apparent failure to
recognize persons with whom he had been on the most friendly terms. An
American artist once met the impressionist in Venice, where they spent
several months together painting, and he was invited to call on
Whistler if he should go to Paris. The painter remembered the
invitation. The door of the Paris studio was opened by Whistler
himself. A cold stare was the only reply to the visitor's effusive
greeting.
"Why, Mr. Whistler," cried the painter, "you surely haven't forgotten
those days in Venice when you borrowed my colors and we painted
together!"
"I never saw you before in all my life," replied Whistler, and slammed
the door.
This habit of forgetting persons, or pretending to do so, for nobody
ever knew when the lapses of recognition were due to intention or
absent-mindedness, often tempted other artists to play pranks upon
him. He was a man who resented a joke at his own expense, except on a
few occasions, and this trait was often turned to good account.
He was at Naples soon after the incident just related had gained wide
circulation. A conspiracy was entered into whereby the Whistler
worshipers there were to be unaware of his presence. He tried to play
billiards with a company of young artists. They met his advance with a
stony glare.
"Oh, I say," persisted he, "I think I know something of that game. I'd
like to play."
A consultation was held, and the artists shook their heads, inquiring
of one another, "Who is he?" Whistler retired crestfallen, and a roar
of laughter which rang through the room added to his discomfiture.
"Oh, well," he said, pulling nervously at his mustache, and his tone
was petulant, "I don't care."
* * * * *
Whistler had a great penchant for white hats, kept all those he had
ever worn, and had a large collection. The flat-brimmed tall hat was a
whim of his late years, imported from France, _via_ the head of
William M. Chase.
* * * * *
Mr. Chase has contributed largely to the budget of Whistler anecdotes.
One day when the two men were painting together in Whistler's studio
in London, a wealthy woman visited them with the demand, which she had
made many times before, that Whistler return to her a picture by
himself which he had borrowed several years before to place on
exhibition. The suave voice of Whistler was heard in argument, and he
finally induced his patron to depart without the work of art.
When she had gone he returned to his work, muttering something about
the absurdity of some persons who believed that because they had paid
two hundred pounds for a picture they thought they thereby owned it.
"Besides," he said, "there is absolutely nothing else in her house to
compare with it, and it would be out of place."
* * * * *
"Chase," said Whistler one day, "how-is it now in America? Do you find
there, as you do in London, that in houses filled with beautiful
pictures and superb statuary, and other objects of artistic merit,
there is invariably some damned little thing on the mantel that gives
the whole thing away?" Mr. Chase replied, sadly: "It is even so, but
you must remember, Whistler, that there are such things as birthdays.
People are not always responsible."
* * * * *
Mr. Chase came up for discussion once at a little party, and
Whistler's sister observed, "Mr. Chase amuses James, doesn't he,
James?" James, tapping his finger-tips together lightly: "Not often,
not often."
* * * * *
"I'm going over to London," said he once to Chase, "and there I shall
have a hansom made. It shall have a white body, yellow wheels, and
I'll have it lined with canary-colored satin. I'll petition the city
to let me carry one lamp on it, and on the lamp there will be a white
plume. I shall then be the only one."
He gave Mr. Chase some pretty hard digs. He said to him one time in
the heat of a discussion on some technical point: "Chase, I am not
arguing with you. I am telling you."
* * * * *
Reproved by Mr. Chase for antagonizing his friends, Whistler retorted:
"It is commonplace, not to say vulgar, to quarrel with your enemies.
Quarrel with your friends! That's the thing to do. Now be good!"
* * * * *
"The good Lord made one serious mistake," he rasped to Chase, in
Holland.
"What?"
"When he made Dutchmen."
* * * * *
When he had finished his portrait of Mr. Chase he stood off and
admired the work. "Beautiful! Beautiful!" was his comment. Chase, who
had irked under the queer companionship, retorted, "At least there's
nothing mean or modest about you!"
"Nothing mean and modest," he corrected. "I like that better! Nothing
mean _and_ modest! What a splendid epitaph that would make for me!
Stop a moment! I must put that down!"
* * * * *
During the Chase sittings, the creditors were always calling. Whistler
divined their several missions with much nicety by the tone of the
raps on the door.
A loud, business-like bang brought, out this comment:
"Psst! That's one and ten."
Later came another, not quite so vehement.
"Two and six," said Whistler. "Psst!"
"What on earth do you mean?" asked Chase.
"One pound ten shillings; two pounds six shillings! Vulgar tradesmen
with their bills, Colonel. They want payment. Oh, well!"
A gentle knock soon followed.
"Dear me," said Whistler, "that must be all of twenty! Poor fellow! I
really must do something for him. So sorry I'm not in."
* * * * *
Riding one day in a hansom with Mr. Chase, Whistler's eye caught the
fruit and vegetable display in a greengrocer's shop. Making the cabby
maneuver the vehicle to various viewpoints, he finally observed:
"Isn't it beautiful? I believe I'll have that crate of oranges moved
over there--against that background of green. Yes, that's better!" And
he settled back contentedly!
A kindly friend told him of a pleasant spot near London for an
artistic sojourn. "I'm sure you'll like it," he added,
enthusiastically.
"My dear fellow," replied Whistler, "the very fact that you like it is
proof that it's nothing for me."
He went, however, and liked the place, but on the way some of his
canvases went astray. He made such a fuss that the station-master
asked Mr. Chase who was his companion: "Who is that quarrelsome little
man? He's really most disagreeable."
"Whistler, the celebrated artist," Mr. Chase replied.
At that the man approached Whistler and respectfully remarked:
"I'm very sorry about your canvases. Are they valuable?"
"Not yet!" screeched Whistler. "Not yet!"
"I only know of two painters in the world," said a newly introduced
feminine enthusiast to Whistler, "yourself and Velasquez."
"Why," answered Whistler, in dulcet tones, "why drag in Velasquez?"
Mr. Chase once asked him if he really said this seriously.
"No, of course not," he replied. "You don't suppose I couple myself
with Velasquez, do you? I simply wanted to take her down."
* * * * *
Sir John E. Millais, walking through the Grosvenor Gallery with
Archibald Stuart Wortley, stopped longer than usual before the
shadowy, graceful portrait of a lady, "an arrangement in gray, rose,
and silver," and then broke out: "It's damned clever! It's a damned
sight too clever!"
This was his verdict on Whistler's portrait of Lady Meux. Millais
contended that Whistler "never learned the grammar of his art," that
"his drawing is as faulty as it can be," and that "he thought nothing"
of depicting "a woman all out of proportion, with impossible legs and
arms!"
* * * * *
In 1874 there was a suggestion that Whistler's portrait of Carlyle
should be bought for the National Gallery. Sir George Scharf, then
curator of that institution, came to Mr. Graves's show-rooms in Pall
Mall to take a look at it.
When Mr. Graves produced the painting he observed, icily:
"Well, and has painting come to this?"
"I told Mr. Graves," said Whistler, "that he should have said,' No, it
hasn't."'
It was nearly twenty years after when Glasgow finally bought the
masterpiece. Indeed, Whistler had little market for his works until
1892.
He often found, as he said, "a long face and a short account at the
bank." Complaining to Sidney Starr one day of the sums earned by a
certain eminent "R.A.," while he received little or nothing, Starr
reminded him that R.A.'s painted to please the public and so reaped
their reward.
"I don't think they do," demurred Whistler; "I think they paint as
well as they can."
Of Alma-Tadema's work he observed, "My only objection to Tadema's
pictures is that they are unfinished."
Starr spoke approvingly of the promising work of some of the younger
artists. "They are all tarred with the same brush," said Whistler.
"They are of the schools!" Of one particular rising star Whistler
remarked: "He's clever, but there's something common in everything he
does. So what's the use of it?"
Starr indicated a distinguishing difference between the work of a
certain R.A. and another. "Well," he replied, "it's a nasty
difference."
* * * * *
M.H. Spielmann, the art-critic, spoke of "Ten o'Clock " as "smart but
misleading." Whistler retorted, "If the lecture had not seemed
misleading to him, it surely would not have been worth uttering at
all!"
* * * * *
Walter Sickert, then a pupil of Whistler's, praised Lord Leighton's
"Harvest Moon" in an article on the Manchester Art Treasure
Exhibition. Whistler telegraphed him at Hampstead:
"The Harvest Moon rises at Hampstead and the cocks of Chelsea crow!"
* * * * *
Apropos of his spats with Sickert he remarked, "Yes, we are always
forgiving Walter."
Another pupil, foreseeing the end of Whistler as president of the
Royal Society of British Artists, resigned some months before the
time. "The early rat," said Whistler, grimly, "the first to leave the
sinking ship."
* * * * *
In the Fine Art Society's gallery one day he spoke to a knighted R.A.
"Who was that?" Starr asked.
"Really, now, I forget," was the reply. "But whoever it was it's some
one of no importance, you know, no importance whatever."
* * * * *
At an exhibition of Doré's pictures Whistler asked an attendant if a
certain academician's large religious picture was not on view.
"No," said the man; "it's much lower down!"
"Impossible!" replied Whistler, gleefully.
Sidney Starr relates that Whistler was asked one year to "hang" the
exhibits in the Walker Art Gallery at Liverpool. In the center of one
wall he placed Luke Fildes's "Doctor," and surrounded it with all the
pictures he could find of dying people, convalescents, still-life
medicine bottles, and the like. This caused comment. "But," said
Whistler, "I told them I wished to emphasize that particular school."
"And what did you put on the opposite wall?" Starr asked.
"Oh, Leighton's--I really forget what it was."
"But that is different, you know," said Starr.
"No," rejoined Whistler; "it's really the same thing!"
* * * * *
Having seen a picture of Starr's in Liverpool, which he amiably,
termed "a picture among paint," he observed to him on the occasion of
their first meeting: "Paint things exactly as they are. I always do.
Young men think they should paint like this or that painter. Be quite
simple; no fussy foolishness, you know; and don't try to be what they
call 'strong.' When a picture 'smells of paint,'" he said slowly,
"it's what they call 'strong.'"
* * * * *
Riding once with Starr to dine at the Café Royal, Whistler leaned
forward in the hansom and looked at the green park in the dusk, fresh
and sweet after the rain; at the long line of light reflected,
shimmering, in the wet Piccadilly pavement, and said:
"Starr, I have not dined, as you know, so you need not think I say
this in anything but a cold and careful spirit: it is better to live
on bread and cheese and paint beautiful things than to live like Dives
and paint pot-boilers. But a painter really should not have to worry
about--'various,' you know. Poverty may induce industry, but it does
not produce the fine flower of painting. The test is not poverty; it's
money. Give a painter money and see what he'll do. If he does not
paint, his work is well lost to the world. If I had had, say, three
thousand pounds a year, what beautiful things I could have done!"
* * * * *
Before the portrait of little Miss Alexander went to the Grosvenor
Gallery, Tom Taylor, the art-critic of the _Times_, called at the
studio to see it. "Ah, yes--'um," he remarked, and added that an
upright line in the paneling of the wall was wrong and that the
picture would be better without it, adding, "Of course, it's a matter
of taste."
To which Whistler rejoined: "I thought that perhaps for once you were
going to get away without having said anything foolish; but remember,
so you may not make the mistake again, it's not a matter of taste at
all; it is a matter of knowledge. Good-by!"
* * * * *
To a critic who remarked, "Your picture is not up to your mark; it is
not good this time," Whistler replied: "You shouldn't say it is not
good. You should say you do not like it, and then, you know, you're
perfectly safe. Now come and have something you do like--have some
whiskey."
* * * * *
Stopped at an exhibition by an attendant who wished to check his cane,
Whistler laughed: "Oh, no, my little man; I keep this for the
critics."
His troubles with the Royal Society of British Artists bred a round of
biting remarks. When he and his following went out he said,
consolingly: "Pish! It is very simple. The artists retired. The
British remained!"
Another shot at the same subject:
"No longer can it be said that the right man is in the wrong place!"
* * * * *
When an adverse vote ended his leadership of the Royal Society,
Whistler said, philosophically, "Now I understand the feelings of all
those who, since the world began, have tried to save their
fellow-men."
* * * * *
Commenting on B.R. Haydon's autobiography, Whistler said: "Yes;
Haydon, it seems, went into his studio, locked the door, and before
beginning to work prayed God to enable him to paint for the glory of
England. Then, seizing a large brush full of bitumen, he attacked his
huge canvas, and, of course--God fled."
* * * * *
Starr once asked Whistler if the southern exposure of the room in
which he was working troubled him.
"Yes, it does," he answered. "But Ruskin lives in the North, you know,
and a southern exposure troubled him, rather, eh?"
* * * * *
Much that was characteristic of the artist's wit and temper came out
during the famous libel suit he brought against Ruskin. The most
amusing feature of it was the exhibition in court of some of the
"nocturnes" and "arrangements" which were the subject of the suit. The
jury of respectable citizens, whose knowledge of art was probably
limited, was expected to pass judgment on these paintings. Whistler's
counsel held up one of the pictures.
"Here, gentlemen," he said, "is one of the works which have been
maligned."
"Pardon me," interposed Mr. Ruskin's lawyer; "you have that picture
upside down."
"No such thing!"
"Oh, but it is so!" continued Ruskin's counsel. "I remember it in the
Grosvenor Gallery, where it was hung the other way about."
The altercation ended in the correctness of view of Ruskin's lawyer
being sustained. This error of counsel helped to produce the
celebrated farthing verdict. Ever after Whistler wore the farthing on
his watch-chain.
* * * * *
The suit had its origin in Ruskin's comment upon the "Nocturne in
Black and Gold," described as "a distant view of Cremorne Garden, with
a falling rocket and other fireworks." The picture is now the property
of Mrs. Samuel Untermyer, of New York. On the opening of the Grosvenor
Gallery, in 1877, Ruskin wrote in _Fors Clavigera_: "The ill-educated
conceit of the artist nearly approached the aspect of wilful
imposture. I have seen and heard much of cockney impudence before now,
but never expected to have a coxcomb ask two hundred guineas for
flinging a pot of paint in the public's face."
When Whistler was being examined during the trial, Sir John Holker,
the Attorney-General, asked, "How long did it take you to knock off
that 'Nocturne'?"
"I beg your pardon?" said the witness.
Sir John apologized for his flippancy, and Whistler replied: "About a
day. I may have put a few touches to it the next day."
"For two days' labor you ask two hundred guineas?"
"No, I ask it for the knowledge of a lifetime!"
Then the "Nocturne in Blue and Silver," a moonlight view of Battersea
Bridge, was submitted to the jury. Baron Huddleston, the presiding
justice, asked Mr. Whistler to explain it.
"Which part of the picture is the bridge?" he queried. "Do you say
this is a correct representation?"
"I did not intend it to be a correct portrait of the bridge."
"Are the figures on the top intended for people?"
"They are just what you like."
"Is that a barge beneath?"
"Yes," replied the witness, sarcastically. "I am much encouraged at
your perceiving that! My whole scheme was only to bring out a certain
harmony of color."
"What is that gold-colored mark on the side, like a cascade?"
"That is a firework."
"Do you think now," said the Attorney-General, insinuatingly, "you
could make me see the beauty of that picture?"
"No," said Whistler, after closely scrutinizing his questioner's face.
"Do you know, I fear it would be as hopeless as for the musician to
pour his notes into a deaf man's ear."
"What is that structure in the middle?" asked the irritated attorney.
"Is it a telescope or a fire-escape? Is it like Battersea Bridge? What
are the figures at the top? If they are horses and carts, how in the
name of fortune are they to get off?"
* * * * *
A friend who was in court when the farthing damages verdict was
brought in relates that Whistler looked puzzled for a moment; then his
face cleared. "That's a verdict for me, is it not?" he asked; and when
his counsel said, "Yes, nominally," Whistler replied, "Well, I suppose
a verdict is a verdict." Then he said, "It's a great triumph; tell
everybody it's a great triumph." When the listener dissented, he
condensed all his concentrated scorn of Philistine view into a
sentence: "My dear S., you are just fit to serve on a British jury."
* * * * *
"Whistler _vs._ Ruskin" cost the latter so much more than the farthing
verdict that his friends sent out a circular soliciting funds in these
terms:
"Whistler _vs._ Ruskin. Mr. Ruskin's costs.
"A considerable opinion prevailing that a lifelong, honest endeavor on
the part of Mr. Ruskin to further the cause of Art should not be
crowned by his being cast in costs to the amount of several hundreds
of pounds, the Fine Art Society has agreed to set on foot a
subscription to defray his expenses arising out of the late action of
Whistler _vs._ Ruskin.
"Persons willing to co-operate will oblige by communicating with the
Society, 148, New Bond Street, London."
Mr. Whistler received scant sympathy, the tone of the comment being
well noted by this excerpt from the London _Standard_ of November
30th, 1878:
"Of course, Mr. Whistler has costs to pay too, and the amount he is to
receive from Mr. Ruskin (one farthing), even if economically expended,
will hardly go far to satisfy the claims of his legal advisers. But he
has only to paint, or, as we believe he expresses it, 'knock off,'
three or four 'symphonies' or 'harmonies'--or perhaps he might try his
hand at a Set of Quadrilles in Peacock Blue?--and a week's labor will
set all square."
Arthur Lumley, a New York illustrator, met Whistler once at a costume
ball at George H. Boughton's house in London. The artist appeared as
Hamlet, but in anything but a melancholy mood. Next morning's papers
related that the sheriff had sold the effects in the White House the
day of the ball to satisfy the claims of his creditors!
* * * * *
Isaac N. Ford, when correspondent of the New York _Tribune_ in London,
went with Frederick MacMonnies, the sculptor, to visit Whistler, who
brought out a number of portraits for show. One was that of a woman,
full figure.
"What do you think of her?" he asked.
The sculptor gave "a side glance and looked down."
"Since you force me to speak,", he finally blurted out, "I must tell
you that one leg is longer than the other."
Instead of the expected outburst, Whistler scrutinized the portrait
from several points, and then observed quietly:
"You are quite right. I had not observed the fault, and I shall
correct it in the morning."
"What an eye for a line a sculptor has!" he said to Ford later.
* * * * *
He quarreled regularly with his brother-in-law, Sir F. Seymour Haden,
the famous etcher.
"A brother-in-law is not a connection calling for sentiment," he once
remarked.
Haden came into a gallery on one occasion and, seeing Whistler, who
was there in company with Justice Day, left abruptly.
"I see! Dropped in for his morning bitters," observed Whistler,
cheerfully.
* * * * *
Once in conversation Whistler said: "Yes, I have many friends, and am
grateful to them; but those whom I most love are my enemies--not in a
Biblical sense, oh, no, but because they keep one always busy, always
up to the mark, either fighting them or proving them idiots."
* * * * *
Whistler was very particular about the spelling of his rather long and
complicated group of names. Careless people made the "Mc" "Mac," and
others left the extra "l" off "McNeill." To one of the latter
offenders he wrote:
"McNeill, by the way, should have two l's.' I use them both, and in
the midst of things cannot well do without them!"
* * * * *
When Tom Taylor, the critic, died, a friend asked Whistler why he
looked so glum.
"Me?" said Whistler. "Who else has such cause to mourn? Tommy's dead.
I'm lonesome. They are all dying. I have hardly a warm personal enemy
left!"
* * * * *
While a draughtsman in the Coast Survey from November, 1854, to
February, 1855, he boarded at the northeast corner of E and 12th
Streets, Washington. He is remembered as being usually late for
breakfast and always making sketches on the walls. To the
remonstrating landlord he replied:
"Now, now, never mind! I'll not charge you anything for the
decorations."
* * * * *
Among those with whom Whistler quarreled most joyously were the two
Moores, the illustrious George and his less famous brother, Augustus.
Both took Sir William Eden's side in the celebrated "Baronet _vs_.
Butterfly" case, where Whistler was nonsuited in a French court of
law. Augustus edited a sprightly but none too reputable weekly in
London, called the _Hawk_, a series of unpalatable references in which
so aroused Whistler that, meeting Moore in the Drury Lane Theater on
the first night of "A Million of Money," he struck the editor across
the face with his cane. A scrimmage followed, which contemporary
history closed with the artist on the floor. Whistler's own account of
the unseemly fracas was thuswise:
"I started out to cane the fellow with as little emotion as I would
prepare to kill a rat. I did cane him to the satisfaction of my many
friends and his many enemies, and that was the end of it."
Moore wrote: "I am sorry, but I have had to slap Mr. Whistler. My
Irish blood got the better of me, and before I knew it the
shriveled-up little monkey was knocked over and kicking about the
floor."
Whistler vigorously controverted this version as a "barefaced
falsehood." He added: "I am sure he never touched me. I don't know
why, for he is a much bigger man than I. My idea is that he was
thoroughly cowed by the moral force of my attack. I had to turn him
round in order to get at him. Then I cut him again and again as hard
as I could, hissing out 'Hawk!' with each stroke. Oh, you can take my
word for it, everything was done in the cleanest and most correct
fashion possible. I always like to do things cleanly."
* * * * *
The clash with George Moore came to a head with the challenge to fight
a duel. In his own version of the event given in the London
_Chronicle_ of March 29th, 1895, Mr. Moore laid his troubles to his
efforts to aid the artist. Learning that Sir William Eden wished his
wife's portrait painted, he "undertook a journey to Paris in the depth
of winter, had two shocking passages across the Channel, and spent
twenty-five pounds on Mr. Whistler's business." It was arranged, he
thought, that Whistler was to receive one hundred pounds for a "small
sketch." When the "sketch" materialized it was "small" indeed. The
Baronet and Mr. Moore expected a little more area of canvas. "The
picture in question," remarked Mr. Moore, "is only twelve inches long
by six high. The figure of Lady Eden is represented sitting on a sofa;
the face is about half an inch in length, about the size of a
sixpence, and the features are barely indicated."
But to the duel: In Paris, after the controversy arose, Mr. Moore told
an interviewer he did not think the sketch was worth more than one
hundred pounds. To this Whistler made a furious reply in the _Pall
Mall Gazette_, alleging that Moore had "acquired a spurious reputation
as an art-critic" by praising his pictures. Moore's reply in the
journal produced this response, sent from the Hotel Chatham under date
of March 12th, 1895:
"Mr. Whistler begs to acknowledge Mr. Moore's letter of March 11.
"If, in it, the literary incarnation of the 'eccentric' person, on the
curbstone, is supposed to represent Mr. Moore at the present moment,
Mr. Whistler thinks the likeness exaggerated--as it is absurd to
suppose that Mr. Moore can really imagine that any one admires him in
his late role before Interviewer, or in that of the Expert in the
Council Chamber.
"If, however, Mr. Moore means in his parable to indicate Mr. Whistler,
the latter is willing to accept Mr. Moore's circuitous and coarse
attempt to convey a gross insult--and, upon the whole, will perhaps
think the better of him for an intention to make himself at last
responsible.
"In such case Mr. Whistler will ask a friend to meet any gentleman Mr.
Moore may appoint to represent him; and, awaiting a reply, has the
honor to remain Mr. Moore's," etc.
To which Mr. Moore replied:
"Mr. Moore begs to acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Whistler's letter of
the 12th inst. In Mr. Moore's opinion Mr. Whistler's conduct grows
daily more absurd."
"I hoped," explained Mr. Moore, "that Mr. Whistler's friends would
intervene and persuade him of the strangeness of his action and the
interpretation it would receive in England. But four days later I was
flattered by the following communication:
"PARIS, _le 15 Mars, 1895._
"MONSIEUR:
"A la réception de votre lettre (lettre d'ailleurs rendue publique
dans la _Pall Mall Gazette_), M. Whistler nous a prié de vous demander
soit une rétractation, soit une réparation par les armes.
"Nous vous prions donc de vouloir bien nous mettre en rapport avec
deux de vos amis.
FRANCIS VIELÉ-GRIFFIN,
122 Rue de la Pompe.
OCTAVE MIRBEAU,
Carrière-sous-Passy, Seine-et-Oise."
Mr. Moore's interlocutor asked him if there was any fear of losing his
interesting personality on account of Mr. Whistler's challenge.
To this Mr. Moore said:
"There are three most excellent reasons why I should not fight a duel
with Mr. Whistler, as Mr. Whistler well knows. First, only under the
very gravest circumstances, if under any at all, would an Englishman
accept a challenge to a duel. The duel has been relegated to the
realms of comic opera. As for inviting me to proceed to Belgium for
the purpose of fighting him, he might as well ask me to strip myself
naked and paint my face and stick feathers in my hair--dress myself as
a Redskin, in fact, and walk down St. James's Street flourishing a
tomahawk. Second, supposing I were a Frenchman, Mr. Whistler is
sixty-five years of age, and it is against the custom of dueling for
any one to accept a challenge from so old a gentleman. Moreover, Mr.
Whistler is, unhappily, very short-sighted, and would be unable to see
me at twenty paces. Third, the grounds of the quarrel are so
infinitely trivial that, were we both Frenchmen, it is doubtful if any
seconds would take upon themselves the responsibility of an armed
encounter.
"I have praised Mr. Whistler's pictures that he painted
five-and-twenty years ago as much as it is possible to praise works of
art. I hold the same opinions about them still. I only wish Mr.
Whistler would apply himself to his art instead of wasting his time in
quarreling with his friends."
The outcome of the Eden suit kept Whistler in ill-humor for a long
time, while Moore continued to be a special object of aversion. The
two avoided each other. But, as some philosopher has said, if you
remain long in Paris you will meet all your friends and all your
enemies. So it fell out that the two foregathered at the same atelier
one Sunday afternoon. They nearly collided in entering, but Moore was
the first inside. The hostess heard sounds from the hall something
between china-breaking and the stamping of hoofs. She went out, to
find James in a mighty rage.
"Dear me!" said the lady, "what is the matter, dear master?"
"Whistler won't come in! Whistler won't stay under the same roof with
that wild Irishman!"
Moore, in the inside, remarked in his sweetly modulated voice:
"Why drag in Whistler?"
This play on his best _mot_, "Why drag in Velasquez?" was too much,
and in screaming wrath the painter fled, leaving Moore in full
possession.
* * * * *
An American millionaire, to whom wealth had come rather quickly from
Western mines, called at the Paris studio with the idea of capturing
something for his gallery. He glanced casually at the paintings on the
walls, and then queried:
"How much for the lot?"
"Four millions," said Whistler.
"What?"
"My posthumous prices! Good morning!"
* * * * *
Dante Gabriel Rossetti once showed Whistler a sketch and asked his
opinion of its merits.
"It has good points, Rossetti," said Whistler. "Go ahead with it by
all means."
Later he inquired how it was getting along. "All right," answered
Rossetti, cheerfully. "I've ordered a stunning frame for it."
In due time the canvas appeared at Rossetti's house in Cheyne Walk,
beautifully framed.
"You've done nothing to it since I saw it, have you?" said Whistler.
"No-o," replied Rossetti, "but I've written a sonnet on the subject,
if you'd like to hear it."
He recited some lines of peculiar tenderness.
"Rossetti," said Whistler, as the recitation ended, "take out the
picture and frame the sonnet."
* * * * *
The Scotch once raised a fund by subscription to buy the portrait of
Carlyle, at a price of five hundred guineas, fixed by the painter.
When the sum was nearly complete, he learned that the subscription
paper contained a clause disclaiming any indorsement of his theory of
art. He telegraphed to the committee:
"The price of 'Carlyle' has advanced to one thousand guineas. Dinna ye
hear the bagpipes?"
* * * * *
A dilettante collector in London, after much angling, induced Whistler
to view his variegated collection. As the several objects passed in
review they provoked only a sober "H'm, h'm," that might have meant
anything or nothing. When there was no more to see, the host paused
for an aggregate opinion and got this:
"My dear sir, there's really no excuse for it, no excuse for it at
all!"
To a lady who complained that the frequent sittings commanded for
painting her portrait compelled her to sacrifice much personal
convenience, Whistler replied: "But, my dear lady, that is nothing in
comparison with the sacrifice I have to make on your account. Just
look: since I have been painting your portrait I have not had time to
attend to my correspondence."
There was a mountain of unopened letters on his desk.
* * * * *
Frederick Wedmore, the patient cataloguer of Whistler's etchings, once
appeared in print as saying that he had "no wish to understand
Whistler's works." He wrote "understate," but the wretched compositor
undid him. Whistler's response to the explanation was: "Yes, the
mistake is indeed inexcusable, since not only I, but even the
compositor, might have known that with Mr. Wedmore and his like it is
always a question of understating and never of understanding
anything."
In his _Memories and Impressions_ Ford Madox Hueffer relates that
Madox Brown, going to a tea-party at the White House at Chelsea, was
met in the hall by Mrs. Whistler, who begged him to go to the
poulterer's and purchase a pound of butter. The bread was cut, but
there was nothing in the house to put upon it. There was no money in
the house, the poulterer had cut off his credit, and Mrs. Whistler
said she dared not send her husband, for he would certainly punch the
tradesman's head!
"To think of 'Arry [meaning Harry Quilter, the critic, with whom he
fiercely quarreled] living in the temple I erected!" he said. "He has
no use for it--doesn't know what to do with it. If he had any feeling
for the sympathy of things he would come to me and say: 'Here's your
house, Whistler; take it; you know its meaning, I don't. Take it and
live in it.' But no, he hasn't sense enough to see that. He
obstinately stays there in the way, while I am living in this absurd
fashion, next door to myself."
* * * * *
After the "secession" from the Royal Society, Whistler strolled into
the gallery one evening with some friends. A group of admirers were
gushing before a Leighton canvas.
"Quite exquisite!"
"A gem--really a gem!"
"Yes," said Whistler. "Like a diamond in the sty."
When elected president of the Society of British Artists, Whistler
naturally felt exultant. "Carr," he said, jokingly, to Conryns Carr,
the dramatist, "you haven't congratulated me yet."
"No," was the retort. "I'm waiting till the correspondence begins!"
* * * * *
The Society did not possess a Royal Charter until Mr. Whistler became
president. With some help from the Prince of Wales this was procured.
When the Prince paid his first visit to the gallery, Whistler was
there to welcome him.
"I'm sure," said the Prince at the door, "I never heard of this place,
Mr. Whistler, until you brought it to my notice. What is its history?"
"It has none, your Highness," was the neat rejoinder. "Its history
dates from to-day!"