Size of the original drawing, 9 × 8 inches
Being a born and case-hardened controversialist he soon found out that in America no man’s unproved ipse dixit, however eminent he might be, was dutifully accepted as it would have been in one of the older civilizations of Europe, and so it came about that several unprofitable controversies were hotly waged on both sides. Seymour Haden was by nature pugnacious and “toplofty,” and such an attitude went down badly in America. But, all the same, the man himself was treated with distinguished consideration here, and his lectures did genuine good to the cause of true art. He lectured in all our principal cities from New York to Chicago, and although when he landed here I think he had very few personal acquaintances (except myself), yet when he sailed back to England he took with him the cordial friendship and good will of many Americans of the right sort.
His first lecture was delivered before a distinguished audience in Chickering Hall, Fifth Avenue, New York. He had plenty of voice to make his auditors hear him; but his lecture dragged considerably—for a peculiarly British reason: it is known to some of us that in an Englishman’s public oration he is not genteel or distinguished if he speaks freely and fluently. No, no; he must befog and entangle his words with all sorts of hesitations and amendments. It is the same in the British House of Commons. I do not mean such master orators as Gladstone was, but the public speech of the average British member,—let us call him Sir Huddleston Fuddleston—sounds like this: “The honorable, hum—the honorable and gallant member from—ha—hum—from Hull, has been good enough to—a—um—to say—etc.”
Well, Seymour Haden modeled his oratory on this preposterous but genteel British usage; and yet, in private conversation, I have never known a man who used more elegant and appropriate language than he. On the day following that of the lecture, I received a visit from my kind and valued friend the Right Reverend Monsignor Doane, who was a genuine lover of fine prints, and he said to me: “Well, I heard your English friend last evening humming and hawing through his lecture.” Soon afterward I had the opportunity of bringing these two distinguished men together, and after that, during his yearly visit to England, the monsignor used to be a welcome and honored guest of Sir Seymour and Lady Haden. The artist’s lectures in Boston were listened to with earnest attention and he was the guest of honor at a reception given at the St. Botolph Club; but even there storms and tempests arose. He quarreled with the one eminent American whom, the rest of us would think, nobody could quarrel with,—namely, Oliver Wendell Holmes. It was all about a “fool” difference of opinion on some question of medical ethics and usages in America as compared with England.
Haden. Mytton Hall
“Mytton Hall is an old Henry the Seventh house which Mr. Haden was in the habit of staying at for the purpose of his salmon fishing in the river Ribble (the Lancashire River) which runs past it.” Seymour Haden.
Size of the original dry-point, 4¾ × 10⅜ inches
Haden. On the Test