Two friends of the Venetian days, Mr. Harper Pennington and Mr. Ralph Curtis, have sent us their impressions. Mr. Harper Pennington writes us: "He gave me many lessons there in Venice. He would hook his arm in mine and take me off to look at some Nocturne that he was studying or memorising, and then he would show me how he went about to paint it—in the daytime. He let me—invited me, indeed, to stand at his elbow as he set down in colour some effect he loved from the natural things in front of us. What became of many such—small canvases, all of them—I do not know. The St. George Nocturne, Canfield has. Who owns The Façade of San Marco?[9]
"There was an upright sunset, too, looking from my little terrace on the Riva degli Schiavoni over towards San Giorgio, and others that I saw him work on in 1880."
Mr. Curtis gives us other details: "Shortly before his return to England with some of the etchings and the pastels, he gave his friends a tea-dinner. As seeing the best of his Venetian work was the real feast, the hour for the hors d'œuvre, consisting of sardines, hard-boiled eggs, fruit, cigarettes, and excellent coffee prepared by the ever-admirable Maud, was arranged for six o'clock. Effective pauses succeeded the presentation of each masterpiece. During these entr'actes Whistler amused his guests with witty conjectures as to the verdict of the grave critics in London on 'these things.' One of his favourite types for sarcasm used to be the eminently respectable Londoner who is 'always called at 8.30, closed-shaved at a quarter to 9, and in the City at 10.' 'What will he make of this? Serve him right too! Ha ha!'
"Whistler was a constant and ever-welcome guest at Casa Alvisi, the hospitable house of Mrs. Bronson, whom he often called Santa Cattarina Seconda. During happy years, from lunch till long past bedtime, her house was the open rendezvous for the rich and poor, the famous and the famished, les rois en exil and the heirs-presumptive to the thrones of fame. Whistler there had his place, and he held the floor. One night a curious contrast was the great and genial Robert Browning commenting on the projected form of a famous 'Jimmy letter' to the World.
"Very late, on hot scirocco nights, long after the concert crowd had dispersed, one little knot of men might often been seen in the deserted Piazza, sipping refreshment in front of Florian's. You might be sure that was Whistler in white duck, praising France, abusing England, and thoroughly enjoying Italy. He was telling how he had seen painting in Paris revolutionised by innovators of powerful handling: Manet, Courbet, Vollon, Regnault, Carolus Duran. He felt far more enthusiasm for the then recently resuscitated popularity of Velasquez and Hals.
"The ars celare artem of Terborgh and Vermeer always delighted him—the mysterious technique, the discreet distinction of execution, the 'one skin all over it,' of the minor masters of Holland was one of his eloquent themes. To Whistler it was a treat when a Frenchman arrived in Venice. If he could not like his paint, he certainly enjoyed his language. French seemed to give him extra exhilaration. From beginning to end he owed much to the French for first recognising what he had learned from Japan."
Footnotes
[9] Mr. J. J. Cowan was for some years the owner, and he sold it to the French Gallery.