Whistler Stories written by Don C. Seitz
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BOOKS BY DON C. SEITZ
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HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK
[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!"