Haden. Sawley Abbey
Sawley Abbey stands by a salmon river, the Ribble, which here is enlarged into a wide
pool. Seymour Haden often came here for his salmon fishing.
Size of the original etching, 10 × 14⅞ inches
While in New York, he visited the exhibition of paintings at the National Academy of Design, and was escorted through the galleries by the late James D. Smillie, N.A. When his eye fell upon a certain painting, he suddenly stopped as if he were paralyzed. “Who did that picture?” “It is the work of one of our New York artists, Miss So-and-So.” “Why do you allow such dreadful things on your walls?” “Well,” said Mr. Smillie, “we like to exemplify various phases in art.” “Hum,” rejoined Seymour Haden, while glaring at the picture; “she ought to be disemboweled!”
Of at least one of our well-known American artists, Seymour Haden expressed the strongest admiration. This was the late John Lafarge, N.A., and he also spoke with enthusiasm of the original American etchings of thirty years ago, the work of such men as Stephen Parrish, Charles A. Platt, Peter Moran, and Joseph Pennell. On seeing a very large, intricate plate by Mr. Parrish, Mr. Haden made the remark to me, “That young man does not know what the sense of fatigue in making a picture is.” Even at this period, Seymour Haden was known throughout Europe as being the judge par excellence of a fine print, and he was also recognized as an admirable judge of paintings.
While on this subject of Haden’s learned judgment of pictures, I will record what he remarked to me after he had visited Niagara for the first time. What he said was: “No artist, except Turner, should have ever dared to attempt making a picture of the Falls of Niagara.”
One of Seymour Haden’s exceptionally good days was the Sunday which he spent in visiting that famous art collector and admirable man, James L. Claghorn, of Philadelphia. On that occasion, I myself was included as a sort of “make-weight.” The Englishman, with genuine zeal, went through Mr. Claghorn’s collection of prints, and he wrote with pencil on several of them that they were exceptionally fine.
On another side Mr. Haden excelled as a judge, and that was in the matter of first-class food and first-class cooking. At lunch, our host treated us to a delicious dish of terrapin. Seymour Haden found it wonderfully good and declared that not only had he never tasted terrapin before, but he had never heard of the dish. “Oh, yes,” said I to him; “you certainly have heard of terrapin; don’t you remember at church on Sundays, when they sing the ‘Te Deum,’ they sing, ‘Terrapin and Seraphim.’” “Oh, tut, tut,” said he, “I want to hear no irreverence.”
Seymour Haden had ranked as a very able physician. An incident occurred while we were at Mr. Claghorn’s house which shows how wise he was in this respect: Mr. Claghorn was a huge and corpulent man of about sixty, but he was full of force and energy. While we were in his library he got up and bustled out on some errand, and Seymour Haden said to me: “Your friend will not live long, and when he dies he will go off very suddenly.” I was shocked on hearing such an unexpected prophecy, and I asked Mr. Haden how long Mr. Claghorn was likely to live. In answer he said, “Just about two years.” Two years later, within ten days of the time Haden had designated, Mr. Claghorn suddenly fell dead.