WHISTLER THE FRIEND BY ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL . WITH 2O ILLUSTRATIONS PHILADELPHIA LONDON J. B. LIPPINCOtT COMPANY I a I. w 3 Q i Preface OF THE writing of books about Whistler, there threatens to be no end, and I am adding still one more to their number. But, all the saine, I believe I have some claim to originality, and this is my reason. It is about Whistler the Enemy that most of the books have been written, he having set the fashion joyously with his Gentle Art of Making Enemies. The public saw him always as one well armed for battle, a warrior of a butterfly, darting here, there, and everywhere that long twisting tail with the sting at the end of it, and the venom was not soon or easily forgotten by those who were stung. My good fortune, however, was to know only Whistler the Friend, and I can not be too thankful for it In all his relations with Joseph Pennell and myself, this is the one side of his many-sided character that he was charming enough to show us. We knew well enough that he did not come undeservedly by his reputation as Enemy. We had been in London during many 6 PREFACE of his most famous battles. We had watched the gaiety and sometimes, it must be confessed, the cruelty of the attack we had heard the groans and fury of the wounded. To us, luckily, he turned only his friendly face a fact we more than appreciated, for he could be loyalty itself to all those he cared for, and also the gayest, wittiest, best company in the world, ready with sympathy, abounding in little kindnesses. I do not diink, however, that I fully appreciated his genius for friendship until his early letters to Fantin-Latour fell into my hands. They are letters written when he was young-hisenthusiasm for art and for life in its first unspoiled ardour, his faith in his fellow artists unshaken. Of the stu dents he fell in with during his first years in Paris, friendly as he was with them all, there were two he turned to instinctively for the special compan ionship and sympathy that mean so much to youth on the threshold of life. In the annals of art no more beautiful friendship is recorded than his with PREFACE 7 Henri Fantin-Latour and Alphonse Legros the Society o Three and I hope my small book will emphasize the fact Even as I write I hear that in this summers great Delacroix Exhibition in Paris, Fantins Hommage h Delacroix, enshrined in palms, is placed conspicuously at the entrance. It is only just that it should be. To begin with, a great deal of the history of art in the Nineteenth Century is in it for those who can read aright. It is a helpful reminder of the respect the younger generation of the day. Realists and followers of Courbet though they were, felt for Romanticism that had reached its full splendour and was passing with Delacroix. At that seemingly remote period the artist who identified himself with the new school did not necessarily throw off all appreciation for the old. The canvas also is Fantins masterpiece the finest of his large, ambitious compositions. To us now it has the further interest of recalling the relations of three of the famous men that tri 8 PREFACE angular friendship who posed for it. The picture was painted before the smallest shadow had fallen over the relations of the Society of Three Whistler, Fantin, Legros and in it Fantin ar ranged them in a little group within the group of worshippers at the shrine of one of the great masters ofthe century. No enemies had yet ap peared to be immortalized. The Butterfly with its sting was still fluttering in the far future. The young, serious Whistler, who stands there with his offering of flowers in his hand, is Whistler the Student, Whistler the Friend, not as yet disillusioned by the malice and misunder standing of his contemporaries the Whistler who figures in the early letters to Fantin. ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL 449 Park Avenue New York City ACKNOWLEDGMENT It is a pleasure to acknowledge my indebtedness to Mr...
