"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: