feiste , 7 Shedd d = itor Meh bid by Sarg eho eT Flay by) Ressarseyecs peabee tira . Pi ohe? Smee ECONO rte cS teed a) nee Ks vib} aegn le si ‘ mie vebapeee se: * inte itn idtaimalejeleveree ettiensseetis 44 var ieipiebepalbraiataratiig Hes aa tei te yates eee) tats rare eororarertrieereseney + ‘ un Fa ; y tinsel Hike ‘gist tel nitat is et La) THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR MOSTLY IN FOLLOWING HIS AUTHORS IN AMERICA & EUROPE BY JOSEPH PENNELL N. A. DBEEEOW FOPSTHE AMERT CAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS - MEMBER iN AGO INTUSUNS TILU TE ARTS AND LETTERS - MEM BER NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN -: HONORARY ASSOCIATE ROYAL BELGIAN BOADEMY “HONORARY ASSOCIATE OF ROYALINSTI LUTE OF BRITISH ARCHI LEGS = HONORARY ASSO CIATE OF AMERICAN IN SITLIUTE OF ARCHITECTS PeopeistikHD BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY THIRTY-FOUR BEACON STREET, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS IN THE YEAR 1925 PRINTED IN THE Unitep STATEs OF AMERICA av THE Printinc Housr or Wirt1am Epwin Rupes, Inc. New Yorx Crry a, DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO E ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL WHO HAS ADVENTURED WITH ME FOR FORTY YEARS \ Re eS s ie THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR PREFACE i A THE BETHLEHEM STEEL WORKS - WASH DRAWING 1881 - DRAWN FOR THE ARTICLE ON THE MORAVIANS IN THE CENTURY BUT NOT USED + FIRST IMPORTANT WONDER OF WORK DRAWING HIs book is the outcome of a suggestion, made to me twenty-five or thirty years ago by the late Charles F. Chichester of the original Century Company, that I should do a volume for them, containing some of my drawings which had appeared in their Magazine with notes by myself. The result is far different, and I hope far better, than the first scheme, and the book is due to Mr. Alfred R. McIntyre of Messrs. Little, Brown and Company, who have carried it out, and Dr. R. U. Johnson, who suggested it to them, though in the meantime chapters had been printed anda number of publishers had asked for the Volume. S CARCE any of the artists, engravers, authors, editors and printers with whom I worked are alive in this country, and few of those with whom I was associated in Europe. But there are several persons whom I must specially thank for their aid: Mrs.A. W. Drake, Mr. John F. Braun, Mr. H. Devitt Welsh and Messrs. Frederick Keppel and Company in this country, and Mr. T. Fisher Unwin, Sir Frederick and Lady Macmillan in England. I have acknowledged the sourceand permission to use thedrawings either in the text or List of Illustrations. But Imost sincerely thank the artists, authors, editors and publishers who have helped me. Once again Mrs. Pennell has read my proofs and, more than this, she has gone over them again and again with me. AP HE books Mrs. Pennell and I have written and illustrated, and our adventures in making them, are not here described, because they have already been published. { VII | VII THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR - PREFACE ome of the chapters were printed in Tur Century, Tue ILtustrateD LonDoN News, S Tur New York Tes, Toe Booxman, but all have been rewritten and revised. The book is finished, but the making of it has been still another and a great Adventure. BROOKLYN, OcTOBER IsT, 1925. IosEpH PENNELL yen Pay Artic a wow S ow f Ty } 114, Seat PA te Ales he 1 ii ae ph IRL 9 ihe a lh Se eee = ~ lena ay ATS f AE fii Race 7 x THE ARNO NEAR EMPOLI : PEN DRAWING 1884 - FROM TWO PILGRIMS’ PROGRESS - LONGMANS soma — eed THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR : TABLE OF CONTENTS TOLEDO FROM MONOCHROME OIL PAINTING - 1894 * ORIGINALLY PRINTED IN WASHINGTON IRVING’S ALHAMBRA WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY MRS. E. R. PENNELL - MACMILLAN & CO. PREFACE TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS CHAPTER I THE BEGINNING CHAPTER II AT THE COPES’ OFFICE CHAPTER III FRIENDS’ SCHOOL IN GERMANTOWN CHAPTER IV AT THE INDUSTRIAL ART SCHOOL CHAPTER V IN THE ACADEMY SCHOOL CHAPTER VI THE FIRST COMMISSION FOR THE CENTURY CHAPTER VII IN AND OUT OF THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO . CHAPTER VIII THE START FOR THE SOUTH . CHAPTER IX WITH CABLE IN NEW ORLEANS CHAPTER X THE JOURNEY TO EUROPE CHAPTER XI FLORENTINE DAYS WITH HOWELLS CHAPTER XII SIENA AND SOME OTHER TOWNS CHAPTER XIII A LITTLE JOURNEY WITH THREE LADIES CHAPTER XIV THE HOME OF CRISTOFO COLOMBO CHAPTER XV SAN GIMIGNANO CHAPTER XVI IN VENICE WITH BUNCE AND DUVENECK CHAPTER XVII BACK TO LONDON AND ON TO EDINBURGH CHAPTER XVIII OUR CYCLING JOURNEYS IN ENGLAND AND ITALY CHAPTER XIX SHAW AND SOME OTHERS CHAPTER XX THE ENGLISH CATHEDRALS CHAPTER XXI HAMERTON AND THE SAONE CHAPTER XXII THE LONDON CITY COMPANTES CHAPTER XXIII THE FRENCH CATHEDRALS . - CHAPTER XXIV BEARDSLEY AND THE YELLOW BOOK LIX} X CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER CHAPTER XXV GETTING INTO RUSSIA XXVI THROWN OUT OF RUSSIA XXVII WHISTLER XXVIII ILLUSTRATED DAILY JOURNALISM XXIX HENRY JAMES XXX MAURICE HEWLETT - THE ROAD IN TUSCANY XXXI MARION CRAWFORD AND VENICE XXXII KING EDWARD'S FUNERAL XXXIII KING GEORGE S CORONATION XXXIV GETTING ARRESTED XXXV WORK IN THE YEARS 1912 AND 1913 XXXVI THE OUTBREAK OF WAR IN GERMANY XXXVII WAR WORK IN ENGLAND XXXVIII IN FRANCE IN WAR XXXIX AT THE FRONT IN FRANCE XL THE RETURN IN WAR TIMES XLI THE END OF MY ADVENTURES BOOKS ILLUSTRATED AND WRITTEN BY JOSEPH PENNELL INDEX TABLE OF CONTENTS els 230 aod, 247 258 268 280 290 3,00 our 332 Ee 326 349 346 354 358 363 365 OLD MILLION EYES - COAL BREAKER AT MAHANOY CITY PENNSYLVANIA * LITHOGRAPH 1908 THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR: LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS THE FORD 1884 + WASH DRAWING ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY EVANS FOR CENTURY WAR SERIES ALL ILLUSTRATIONS OF WHICH THE AUTHORSHIP OR OWNERSHIP IS NOT STATED ARE BY ORIN THE POSSESSION OF JOSEPH PENNELL. THE REPRODUCTIONS, UNLESS OTHERWISE STATED, HAVE BEEN MADE BY THE BECK ENGRAVING COMPANY PORTRAIT OF JOSEPH PENNELL : End Paper From the medallion by John Flanagan, A.N.A. , by permission of the attist, 1920. PORTRAIT OF JOSEPH PENNELL ; End Paper From the relief by Dr. R. Tait Mackenzie, by permission of the artist, 1918. PORTRAIT OF JOSEPH PENNELL : . Frontispiece By William Strang, R.A., colored chalk ey 1903. J. AND E. R. PENNELL : . Vv Pen drawing, Our Journey To THE Hesripgs, T. Fisher Unwin. Redeaen for this book. (Dedication page, top.) J- AND E. R. PENNELL : . ° Vv Pen drawing, Two Piterims’ Procress, Longmans. Redrawn for this book. (Dedication page, bottom.) THE BETHLEHEM STEEL WORKS : ; ‘ VII Wash drawing, 1881. (Preface.) THE ARNO NEAR EMPOLI - 4 é c Vill Pen drawing, 1884. (Preface. TOLEDO . Ix Monochrome oil, 1894, from Washington Irving’: s ALHAMBRA. (Table of Contents. Ny [XI] XII THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR OLD MILLION EYES Lithograph, 1908. (Table of Contents. ) THE FORD . Wash drawing, 1884. (List of Illustrations. ) BUILDING THE BISMARCK ; Lithograph, July, 1914. (List of Illustrations.) JOSEPH PENNELL, 1863 From a daguerreotype, reproduced by the Walker Engraving Company. JOSEPH PENNELL, 1863 From a daguerreotype, reproduced by the Walker Engraving Company. MARTHA C. BARTON From a silhouette, reproduced by the Walker Engraving Company. A SAMPLER MADE BY MARTHA C. BARTON, 1825 Reproduced by the Electro-Light Engraving Company. PHILADELPHIA WATER WORKS Lithograph, 1912, unpublished. ILLUSTRATION FOR AN UNWRITTEN STORY, 1865 Pencil Bae: reproduced by the Walker Engraving Company. FRIENDS’ MEETING HOUSE - Lithograph, 1908, Our Puitapetpuia, J. B. Lippincott Company. THE COPE BROTHERS From the painting by S. B. Waugh (a copy), in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, reproduced by the Electro-Light Engraving Company, by permission of the Directors. LARKIN PENNELL From a daguerreotype by McClees and Germon, reproduced by the Walker En graving Company. PENCIL DRAWING MADE AT AGE OF SIx, 1866 Reproduced by the Walker Engraving Company. FRIENDS’ ALMS HOUSES 7 Pen drawing, 1882, from the original made for Hanns! s WEEKLY. THE CLASS OF SEVENTY-SIX AT FRIENDS’ SCHOOL Photograph by D. Hinkle loaned by Mrs. Phebe E. Howell Haines. GERMANTOWN MEETING Pencil drawing, 1873. JAMES R. LAMBDIN Portrait by the artist in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, by permission of the Directors. PRIZE PENCIL DRAWING, 1873 MAIN STREET, GERMANTOWN Lithograph, 1908, Our Puitapetpuia, J. B. Lippincott Company. COAL WHARF Pencil drawing, 1879, reproduced by the Electro- Light Engraving Company. BRIDGE NEAR DOWNINGTOWN First lithograph, 1877. COAL BREAKER, WILKES-BARRE Lithograph, 1917, in the Library of Congress, Washington. x XI XXII LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PROFESSOR CHARLES MARQUEDANT BURNS 5 3 3 From the painting by Wayman Adams, A.N.A., 1917, by permission of the artist, reproduced by the Electro-Light Engraving Company. STUDIES Pencil drawings, 1879, at Penasylyania School of Industrial ALE: NOTICE OF EXPULSION FROM THE SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ART PORTRAIT OF JOHN Pencil drawing, 1878, made at the Reading Coal and Iron Company’ s Office. OLD MILL, GERMAN TOWN Etching, 1880. THOMAS EAKINS, N. A. Diploma portrait i: the artist in the National Academy of Design, New York, by per- mission of the Council. PLOW INN YARD Etching, 1881. JOSEPH PENNELL CAPTAIN OF THE GERMANTOWN BICYCLE CLUB Pen drawing, 1881, from a letter to L. Pennell. AN OIL REFINERY Wash drawing, 1880, engraved onwood byJ.F. Jungling, ‘A Day in the Mash,’ ry NER'’S MaGazinE, July 1881, page 346, by permission of the Century Company THE EDITORS OF THE CENTURY From the painting by Orlando Rouland, by permission of the artist. R. W. GILDER. Bust by the Comte de Rosales in ae American Academy of Arts abd Letters, by per- mission of the Board of Directors. A.W. DRAKE . From the portrait by John C. Johanson, N.A. one permission of aie artist. R.U. JOHNSON From the painting by W. M. Chase, N.A., by permission of Dr. R.U. Johnson. MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN 4 From the painting by E. L. Ipsen, N.A., by permission of their Majesties the King and Queen of Denmark, and of the artist. THE BROTHERS’ AND SISTERS’ HOUSES A 5 Wash drawing, 1881, engraved on wood,'‘A Colonial Monastery,’’ Scr1BNER’s MaGa- ZINE, December 1881, page 209, by permission of the Century Company. A SPRING DAY : A Pen drawing, 1882, reproduced by process, “Visiting the Gypsies,’’ TaECEntTury, April 1883, page 908, by permission of the Century Company. CHARLES GODFREY LELAND . Etching by Felix Bracquemond, from the proof in the New York Public Library. THE LAST OF THE SCAFFOLDING Etching, 1881, reproduced by the Gill Engraving Company. VENICE Pen drawing, 1881, from the painting by Ds Martin Rico in the Gibson Collection, Philadelphia. BRIDGE AT HARRISBURG ; Etching, 1881, reproduced by the Gill Engraving Company. XII 7O ie 73 75 78 Ye. XIV THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR VIEW IN WASHINGTON Pen drawing, 1881. CALLOWHILL STREET BRIDGE. Etching, 1881, loaned by the American Art Association, reproduced by the Gill Es graving Company. CHRISTMAS DAY Pen drawing, 1881. SKETCHES IN COURT Pencil drawing, 1881. SKETCH FROM THE TRAIN Pen drawing, 1921. A DECK HAND é Wash drawing, 1882, engraved on 1 wood, unsigned, ‘The Voyage of the Mark Twain,” Tur Century, February 1883, page 800, by permission of the Century Company. OLD NEW ORLEANS Wash drawing, 1882, engraved on iad by J. F. Jungling, Cable’s Creole articles, Tar Century, 1883, page 397, by permission of the Century Company. G. W.CABLE . Monochrome by Abbott H. Thayer, NVA. aa the American Academy of Arts and Letters, by permission of the Board of Directors. FACSIMILE OF A LETTER FROM CABLE By permission of the late G. W. Cable. A FULL RIVER Pencil drawing, 1882, engraved on n wood by W.R. Powell, Cable’s Creole articles, Tay Century, July 1883, page 425, by permission of the Century Company. W.D. HOWELLS AND MISS MILDRED HOWELLS From the relief by Augustus St.Gaudens owned by the Howells family, by permission of Mrs. St. Gaudens. THE PONTE VECCHIO, FLORENCE Etching, 1883, from the trial proof in the collection of Mr. John F. Braun, reproduced by the Gill Engraving Company. ON THE ARNO Etching, 1883, from the proof in the New York Public Library, reproduced by the Gill Engraving Company. THE SWING OF THE ARNO, PISA Etching, 1883, engraved on wood by R.G, Collins, Howells’ article, THE Cunraaa October 1885, page 894, by permission of the Century Company. TIMOTHY COLE Portrait by his son, diploma work in the National ‘Academy of Desi; gn, by permission of the Council. W.D. HOWELLS Chalk drawing byMiss Wilfrid M. Evans in the American Academy of Arts and Letters, ; by permission of the Board of Directors. SKYSCRAPERS, FLORENCE ° - 5 Etching, 1883, engraved on wood by R. C. Collins, Howells’ *“Tuscan Cities,’ THe Century, April 1885, page 805, by permission of the Century Company. 83 85 86 87 go gt 93 95 ei I0O IOI 103 108 109 IIz 115 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS HARBOR, LEGHORN ° “ Etching, 1883, engraved on wood by R.C. Collins, Howells’ ‘Tuscan Cities,’’ Toe Century, 1885, page 893, by permission of the Century Company. PISA FROM THE LUCCA ROAD . Pen drawing, 1900, Maurice Hewlett’s Tux Roan’ In Tuscany, Macmillan and Com- pany, 1904. From the drawing in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. UP AND DOWN IN SIENA Etching, 1883, engraved on wood, unsigned, Howells’ article, THE Cmvruny, August 1885, page 545, by permission of the Century Company. THE PIAZZA, PISTOIA Etching, 1883. SKETCH FROM MEMORY Pen and ink, 1883, froma letter to Miss Robins. DUCAL URBINO Etching, oe THE DEVIL S BRIDGE Charcoal drawing, 1901, THE Roap IN TUSCANY. From the drawing in aie Uffizi Cee BARGA - Charcoal drawing, 1901, THE Roap IN TUSCANY. From the drawing in the Uffizi Gallery. VOLTERRA Pen sketch, 1900. SAN GIMIGNANO Pen sketch, 1900. GATEWAY, SAN GIMIGNANO . Etching, 1883, reproduced by the Gill Engraving Company. SAN GIMIGNANO FROM THE FIELDS . S Etching, 1883, engraved on wood by J. F. Jungling, Howells’ ‘Tuscan Cities,’’ by per- mission of the Century Company. CANAL, VENICE Pen drawing, 1882, copy from D. Martin Rico. REBUILDING THE CAMPANILE, VENICE Lithograph, 1911, published as a poster by the City of Venice. FRANK DUVENECK From the diploma portrait by Julius Rolshoven in the National Academy of Design, by permission of the Council. W.GEDNEY BUNCE From the pen drawing by Walter Shirlaw, loaned by Signor Paone. MORNING ON THE RIVA SCHIAVONI Pen sketch, 1883, from a letter to Miss Robins. SIR EDMUND GOSSE From the portrait by J. S. Sargent, Nae AR aA by] permission of Sir Edmund Gosse. LONDON IN 1883 Wash drawing, engraved on ood by Cestate, Fenty James’ article on London, Tee Century, by permission of the Century Company. ANDREW LANG From the portrait by Sir W. B. Richmond, K.C.B. ,R.A., by permission of the Exec- utors of Andrew Lang. XV IIg 1ipH) I21 XVI THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR OLD EDINBURGH Wash drawing, 1883, engraved « on wood, uasigned, THE Conroe January, 1884, page 325, by permission of the Century Company. CYCLING IN FRANCE Pen drawing, 1885, Our Smyrmaarrat JOURNEY, Longmans, Green and Company, 1886. ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL . Pen drawing, 1885. ANCIENT MEDIZVAL AND MODERN ROME Pen drawing, 1894, Mrs. Oliphant’s Taz Makers or Rome, from the original in the National Gallery, Melbourne, Australia. ELIHU VEDDER From the colored chalk deawine by Frank peice owned by the Come Club, = York, by permission of the Club. THE WEST GATE ‘ Pen drawing,1884,A CANTERBURY PILGRIMAGE, Seeley and Company, from the drawin g. IN BLOOMSBURY - Pen drawing, 1885, Our SmwrimenTat JOURNEY, from the drawing. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW e Photographed by himself, and reproduced by his permission. BEDFORD PLACE, BLOOMSBURY Etching, 1890, from the collection of Mr. John F. Brann, THE TEA TOWER Mezzotint, 1902. WILLIAM HEINEMANN From a photograph. J: BERTRAM LIPPINCOTT ; From the painting by Julian Story, by permission ‘of Mr. Lippincott. T. FISHER UNWIN From the portrait by J. McLure Hamilton, by permission of Mr. Unwin. SIR FREDERICK MACMILLAN . From a photograph loaned by The Macmillan Company. GEORGE MOORE From the pen drawing by Walter Sickert, A.R. re PHIL MAY . From the portrait by Sir J. J. Shannon, R.A., by permission of Tony Shannon. WALTER CRANE From the portrait by G. F. Watts, O.M., R.A., by permission of Mrs. Watts W.E. HENLEY From the bust by A. Rodin in the Crypt of St. Paal’ s Cathedral, by permission of the Dean and Chapter. GLOUCESTER CATHEDRAL Wash drawing, 1887, engraved on wood, uasigned, Enarins Caraemnars by Mrs. Van Rensselaer, by permission of The Century Company. MRS. SCHUYLER VAN RENSSELAER From the relief by Augustus St. Gaudens owned by Mrs. Van Rensselaer now in the Metropolitan Museum New York, by permission of Mrs. St. Gaudens. 15 153 154 155 P7 168 170 bo LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS LINCOLN i Wash drawing, 1886, engraved on n wood by Henry Wolf, ENGLIsH Cees by per- mission of The Century Company. ST. PAUL’S Charcoal drawing, 1905, ENouee Hours by Henry James, William Peinemang: ELY Pen drawing, 1885 , ENGLISH Cayetonars by permission of The Century Company. ST. PAUL’S WHARF Pen drawing, 1884, THE Dartyoito: THE BOUSSEMROUM Pen drawing, 1886, Tue Saénz, A SUMMER vores Seeley and Company. PHILIP GILBERT HAMERTON From the portrait by Robert J. Wickenden one by the artist. THE RIVER DURGEON Pen drawing, 1886, published in "Tue Sadnt. A HOUSE AT ORMOY Pen drawing, 1886, THE Sabnn, STATIONERS’ HALL, LONDON . Pen drawing, 1900, By permission of The American Type Founders Company. CLOTH FAIR Charcoal drawing, 1904, Lonnon by Sidney Dark, ‘Macmillan and Company. STREET DOOR, BREWERS’ HALL Pen drawing, 1888. GIRDLERS’ HALL Pen drawing, 1887. BREWERS HALL Pen drawing, 1888. SIR WILLIAM TRELOAR From the painting by Tennyson Cole, by permission of the Corporation of the City of London, and B. Kettle, Esq., Librarian of the Guild Hall. ROUEN FROM BON SECOURS Etching, 1900. LE PUY Etching, 1890, from the collection of Mrs. W. H. Fox E. AND HELEN AT LAON Pen drawing, 1893. MONT ST. MICHEL Pen drawing, 1900, in the icembour 2 Gallery, FRencn Cirandes The Century Company. DOORWAY, ST. TROPHIME,. ARLES Pen drawing, 1890, in the Luxembourg Gallery, Heenee Cee TRANSEPT AT ROUEN : Lithograph, 1895, Highways AnD Byways oF Normanpy, by the Rey. Percy Derr man, Macmillan and Company. A CHIMERA OF NOTRE DAME . Pen drawing, 1893, THe Paty Mati GazettE. XVII 201 203 205 207 208 209 2 pd 92, XVIII THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR REGENT'S QUADRANT Pen drawing, 1895, published in the first number of Tae Savoy. THE DEVIL OF NOTRE DAME . Etching, 1893, from the proof in the collection of Mrs. W. H. Fox. A DEVIL OF NOTRE DAME : Caricature of Joseph Pennell by Aubrey Beardsley, pen drayite: Tue Pay Mace Bupcet, 1893, by permission of the late John Lane. AUBREY BEARDSLEY From the painting by Jacques Blanche in the National Portrait Gallery, London, by permission of the Trustees. STREET IN BRODY Pen drawing, 1891, THE JEw AT e Flee: W. Heinemann. A GENTLEMAN OF BRODY ° Pen drawing, 1891, Taz Jew at Home, owned by Mr. Poultney Bi gelow. MARKET AT BRODY Pen drawing, 1891, THE Jew aT Home, IN THE PARK, BRODY Pen drawing, 1891, THE JEw aT Home. EVENING SERVICE IN A SYNAGOGUE, BERDITCHEV Pen drawing, 1891, owned by Mr. D. S. MacColl, THE JEw AT Hom. THE MARKET, KIEV, JEWS AND RUSSIANS BARGAINING Pen drawing, 1891, THE Jew aT Home. THE RUSSIAN SCHUBE Lithograph by J. McN. Whistler, Pennell Collection, Library of Gonpress: JOSEPH PENNELL Lithograph by J. McN. Whistler, Pennell Collection, Library of Congress. J. McN. WHISTLER From the portrait by Jean Boldini i in the Brooklyn Museum of Science and Art, by per- mission of the Trustees. FIRELIGHT NO. 2 Lithograph by J. McN. Whistler, Pennell Collection, Library of Congress. FIRELIGHT NO. I Lithograph by J. McN. Whistler, National Academy of Design, by: permission of the Council. WHISTLER’S APARTMENT, IIO RUE DU BAC Charcoal sketch, 1923. TURNER'S HOUSE ON THE THAMES Pen drawing, 1884, in the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, Dr. B.E. Martin’: s Oxp Cuexsga, T. Fisher Unwin. OLD CHEYNE WALK, CHELSEA . Wash drawing, 1884, OLp CuHELsEa. THE UNREFORMED LODGING HOUSE Pen drawing by A. S. Hartrick, R.W.S., Tue Darty CHRONICLE, rB95 LONDON EAST END GROCERY. Pen sketch by Phil May, 1895. 213 218 219 Noli. 2-43 245 747 248 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS THE BALLET COSTUME Pen drawing by Aubrey Beardsley, among the destroyed drawings in ihe Pennell Col lection, Taz Dairy Curonictz, 1895. THE ART EDITOR AT WORK, JOSEPH PENNELL Portrait painted by J. McLure Hamilton, 1909. THE STONE BREAKER Pen drawing by E. J. Sullivan, R.W. S., THE Darzy CHRONICLE, r89s, GAILLARD CUT Lithograph, 1912, Toe New Yorx Times. BUILDING HELL GATE BRIDGE Chalk drawing, 1912, THe New York Times. CHOIR OF SAN JUAN DE LOS REYES Charcoal drawing, 1903, John Hay’s Cast1L1AN Days, W. Heinemann. THE TAGUS AT TOLEDO Charcoal drawing, Castit1an Days. CIVITA VECCHIA Pen drawing, 1905, Henry James: Irat1an Days, W. Heinemann. HENRY JAMES. From the portrait by J. S. Sargent, N.A., R.A., in the National Portrait Gallery, London, by permission of the Trustees. THE FOUNTAIN AT NIMES Wash drawing, 1900, James’ Lirrte Tour in FRANCE, W. Heinemann. CHARING CROSS STATION Wash drawing, 1888, engraved on wood, unsigned, James’ article on London, Tae Century Macazinz, by permission of the Century Company. THE BRIDGE AT LUDLOW Charcoal drawing, 1905, Encuisn Hours. MENDING NETS AT MARTIGUES Pen drawing, 1890. THE ROAD FROM THE ALPS TO ITALY Charcoal drawing, 1901. SIR FREDERICK MACMILLAN . From the painting by Sir Hubert Von Herkomer, R.A. , by permission of Sir Frederick and Lady Macmillan. FLORENCE Charcoal drawing, 1901, THE ives IN TUSCANY, Macmillan and Company, 1904, now in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. MAURICE HEWLETT From the painting by the Hon. John Collier, by permission of the family of the late Maurice Hewlett. CASTIGLIONE DEL LAGO 5 Charcoal drawing, 1901, Tue Roap 1n Tuscany, now in the Uffizi Gallery. THE HALL OF THE GLOBES, DOGE *S PALACE, VENICE Charcoal drawing, 1901, Greaninas FROM VENETIAN History by F. Marion Crawford, Macmillan and Company. F. MARION CRAWFORD Pastel by C. M. Ross, by permission of Macmillan and Company. XIX 249 251 252 sae) 755 256 27 258 oy 262 2.63 266 267 268 270 273 277 a) 280 281 XX THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR CAMPIELLO DELLE ANCORE Pen drawing, 1901, GLEANINGS FROM VENETIAN Fisroxy, THE BUSY LITTLE CANAL Pen drawing, 1902. THE HARBOR, GENOA Lithograph, 1gor. BUILDING THE WOOLWORTH . Lithograph, 1902. BUCKINGHAM PALACE THE NIGHT EDWARD VII DIED Charcoal drawing, 1910, THe InLustrateED Lonpon News, May 1910. EDWARD VII . From the painting by Bastien Lepage, by permission of Ad Braun aad Company. PREPARING WESTMINSTER HALL FOR THE LYING IN STATE OF EDWARD VII Charcoal drawing, 1910, Tue ILLustraTED Lonpon News. THE KING S COFFIN IN WESTMINSTER HALL Lithograph, 1910, THe Darty CHRONICLE. WHITEHALL, PARLIAMENT STREET UP WHICH THE FUNERAL PASSED Etching, 1911. THE FUNERAL PROCESSION Pen drawing, 1910, THe Times. GEORGE V IN HIS CORONATION ROBES From the painting by C. R. Sims, R.A., by permission Of FLAS Judd Company. CORONATION OF GEORGE V Lithograph, 1911, Tue Dairy CHRONICLE. WHITEHALL, PARLIAMENT STREET PREPARED FOR THE CORONATION Lithograph, 1911, THe Datty CHRONICLE. JOSEPH PENNELL A caricature by Wyncie King, pen and wash drawing, Tue New Your Times, from the original drawing owned by Mr. F. S. Bigelow. GUN DIPPING SHOP, BETHLEHEM Lithograph, 1917, JosEpH PENNELL’s PicTUREs OF Wan Work IN Aseatca, J.B. Lippin- cott Company. CAMBRIA STEEL WORKS, JOHNSTOWN Chalk drawing, 1917. STORM IN THE GRAND CANYON Lithograph, 1912. NIGHT IN THE YOSEMITE Lithograph, 1912. TEMPLE OF JUPITER, EVENING, ATHENS Lithograph, 1913, JosEPH PENNELL’ SIN THE Lanp oF Temp tgs, W. Heinemann. GOING HOME TO THE BAA LAAM Lithograph, 1913. THE VOSSISCHE ZEITUNG Extra issued in Berlin June 28, 1914, announcing the murders at Serajevo. NEW RAILROAD BRIDGE, COLOGNE Pencil sketch, June 1914. 283 287 288 289 291 a7) 1) 297 298 ie ee) 301 Bid? 310 411 Bit. 318 320 321 320, 328 324 34%) LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS JOSEPH PENNELL PRINTING AT THE PAN PRESS, BERLIN JULY 1914 Dry point by Professor Paul Von Hermann, owned by Mr. W. H. Fox. GRAIN ELEVATOR, HAMBURG HARBOR Lithograph, 1914, also used as a poster by the Leicester Galleries at an Exhibition of German War Work, London, 1917. ZEPPELIN SHED, LEIPZIG Lithograph, 1914. SEARCHLIGHTS BEHIND ST. PAUL'S, LONDON . Lithograph, 1914, drawn from Adelphi Terrace House. TWO PAGES FROM JOSEPH PENNELL 'S IDENTITY BOOK ISSUED BY THE METRO- POLITAN (LONDON) POLICE, 1916 SEARCHLIGHTS OVER CHARING CROSS Lithograph, 1914, drawn from Adelphi Terrace Horse. AT THE FOOT OF THE FURNACE Lithograph, 1916, War Museum, London, Joszpx ieee quae s Prerunes or War Work IN ENGLAND, W. Heinemann. TURNING THE BIG GUN Lithograph, 1916, Print Room, British Museum, Josten PENNELL’S Digvenees OF War Work IN ENGLAND. H. G. WELLS Chalk drawing by Professor W. Rothenstein, by permission of the artist. PRESSING SHELLS, MUNITION FACTORY, LEEDS Pencil sketch, 1916. THE IRON GATE, CHARLEROI . Lithograph, 1907. THE LAKE OF FIRE, CHARLEROI Lithograph, 1907. SOISSONS IN 1922 Water color owned by The Brooklyn Museum of Science and Art, by permission of tie Trustees. FRENCH GOVERNMENT PERMIT TO VISIT VERDUN Letter from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. DAILY PERMIT ISSUED AT VERDUN SCHNEIDER'S GUN FACTORY, CREUSOT Etching, 1911. PERMIT TO SKETCH IN THE CATHEDRAL, VERDUN THE SINEWS OF WAR Lithograph, 1917, used as Liberey Loan poster. JOSEPH PENNELL From the painting by Wayman Adams i in the Chicago Art Tnsticuce, by permission of the artist. THE PROW A Lithograph, 1917. THE GARDEN OF THE GENERALIFE Pen drawing, 1895. XXI 326 ee 328 329 330 331 333 354 335 357 Si ope 343 344 545 346 349 353 Boa ahs 356 357 XXII THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR HAIL AMERICA , ‘ : 358 Mezzotint, 1908. JOSEPH PENNELL : 3 359 Drawing by W. Oberhardt, by permission of the a artist, 1917. J. AND E. R. PENNELL AT THEIR BROOKLYN WINDOW : : 361 From the painting by Wayman Adams, by permission of the artist, 1923. FINISHED. : : 362 Pen drawing, 1896, from a letter to Mr. David Keppel. THE BRIDGE AT MOSTAR : : : : 3,63 Pen drawing. (Books Illustrated.) UNDER THE BRIDGES, CHICAGO : ‘ : 364 Charcoal drawing, 1908. (Books Llustrated.) GYPSIES 365 Pen drawing, 1891, To GyrsrLann, drawing in the British Museum, Cindex.)) LOXA : ; 372. Oil Monochrome, 1894, THE AraaMond: (index. _ BUILDING THE BISMARCK » HAMBURG HARBOR ° JULY 1914 * LITHOGRAPH PRINTED IN BERLIN CHAPTER ONE THE BEGINNING IOSEPH PENNELL IS BORN - LEARNS TO READ - COMMENCES TO DRAW - REMEMBERS THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG - THE FALL OF RICHMOND AND SEES THE FUNERAL OF LINCOLN JOSEPH PENNELL » AGED ABOUT THREE: FROM A DAGUERREOTYPE TAKEN IN PHILADELPHIA was born in Philadelphia, I have been told, Seventh Month, which the world’s people call July, and the Friends Seventh Month, Fourth. Ido not knowtheyear, formymemory doesnot go back, like the Provengal’s, to the mo- ment when the nurse said, “‘Madame, it is a boy!’’ And I have never tried to find out, and I do not know if there is any way of finding out. The date may have been in the books of Orange Street Friends’ Meet- ing, to which we belonged, Ia birthright member; but the Meeting House is gone; I have no idea where the records are, and the family Bible, with the date written in, went in the War. Anyway, the date does not matter, so I have always put it down as 1860. I am not sure even that my birthday was the Fourth of July; but I like to think so, for it makes me feel I am a real American, one of the last of my race, a race that is passing away. fee nothing of my ancestors, good ot bad; but they must have been God- fearing, law-abiding people or I should have heard of them. All I know is, that my Aunt Mary, on my father’s side, hada pedigree which started with a Sir Robert Pennell who, the document said, came to Philadelphia with William Penn on his second voyage, in 1685. But I never could discover the date of Penn’s second visit, and I might have forgotten the 1685 if I had not illuminated a copy; but that is gone, too; went in the War. And I cannot imagine how a Sir Robert found himself cle ven uu JOSEPH PENNELL: AGED ABOUT THREE » FROM ANOTHER PORTRAIT TAKEN AT THE SAME TIME { 1860 } 2 CHAPTER I- THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR among Friends. There was on the docu- ment, at the top, an eagle or some other heraldic fowl, and a shield below, both of which I colored to suit myself, and at the bottom a scroll to hold the family motto, but the motto was missing, and I rather think the whole was manufac- tured by one of those traveling genealo- gists who went round the country telling likely people that titles and fortunes awaited the families to whom they were shown, in Europe, and that these titles and fortunes could easily be obtained if the heirs would only advance enough money to the genealogist to take him back and wrest from the wrongful appro- priators the family fortune, name and fame, but especially the fortune. sHOULD always believe this family coat ee arms to be a myth—I could easily, during my years in London, have cleared it up bya visit to the Herald’s College— if it were not that the name of Pennell, so Lam told, appears in the earliest Phila- delphia title deeds and surveys of the future city; that we were among the cave dwellers, the early settlers or diggers, under Front or Water Street hill; and that the deeds show the family owned a whole square of land as late as 1840—for I have seen the plan at the Philadelphia Free Library—almost all the square be- tween Spruce and Pine and Eleventh and Twelfth, the most respectable in the city, now given over, one side to McCalls and McMurtries and Wisters—and from r110 Spruce, owned by the Robins, I was married—and the other side and the alleys, now the prey of niggers and boarding houses. I often get letters, and once in a while visits, from people of the same name—there is none, I believe, but mine in the Philadelphia Blue Book—and they always want something. One day a man appeared in London and he said, “I knew your father; he was a Philadelphian and worked on THE Lepcer;’’ and I answered, “T never had a father. I never heard of Philadelphia. What’s Tuer LrepcEer?” And I used to get invitations to family reunions with Evanses and Larkins and Pennells and Smedleys, and then requests to subscribe to family histories; but as I did not accept them, I have been dropped, or the gatherings have ceased, or the books are out of print. I might, in this way, have learned all about my people, but I did not. Only the other day a book- seller offered me some of the volumes, with the genealogy and crests of the Pen- nells in them. While we were in England, my father made inquiries in Lincoln, where we spent one summer, and in Corn- wall, where we passed another. In the cathedral town there were many Pennells, but instead of being knights, they were grocers and florists. And I do not know what he found in Cornwall, save the legend current in that country: ‘*By Pol, Tre and Pen Ye may know the Cornish men.” I do not know the names of my grand- parents. My father’s mother, whom I alone remember, was only “‘Grandma.” But I had her photograph, which also went in the wicked War. How she, a real Friend, allowed it to be made, I have always wondered. I do remember her well, best that I saw her, long after she was dead, through the open door, sitting quietly in the bedroom, where she slept when she came to stay with us, and as I ran in to talk to her, she faded away. The first things I remember happened at her home, three miles from Marcus Hook, or Linwood Station, in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, where some of the Pennells emigrated, buying land and selling their Philadelphia property probably for less than pottage. There she lived with my [1863 } ARTS PATRONIZED BY FRIENDS MY AUNT MARTHA BARTON S SILHOUETTE AND HER SAMPLER + Kee 4 CHAPTER I - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Uncle Nathan, her son, and his family, in a double, stone, rough-cast farmhouse, with great trees in front, near the road, and acres in every direction as far as the hills—only one farmhand’s house, and further off, the Meeting House, where we went, at the crossroads, in sight, and the big wooden barn and the cool spring house, and the cold ice house near by. REMEMBER one day I had been put out it in the shade, all alone, to play with little turtles that wandered in the grass— and it was fun to turn them on their backs or tap them on their shells and watch them draw in their heads and legs instead of running away—and as I played, from be- hind the hills, down the road, came boom, boom, boom; and the next thing I remem- ber I was looking from the train we fled to Philadelphia in, at men high on the banks on each side the tracks near Gray's Ferry, piling up earthworks and digging rifle pits—I see them still, figures work- ing, dark against the sky. The next morn- ing some one opened our front door—and I was there—and the white marble steps were red with blood. And these are all - the memories I have of rebel raiders, the blowing up of Dupont’s powder mills and the battle of Gettysburg. Then there was a day when my father came home and said that he had not been drafted because he was just over age, but that, asa Friend, he would not have gone to the war, nor would any other Friend. Friends are not conscript cowards but real resisters of useless wars, and if the world’s people only had their courage, there would be no warts. And I have been told of earlier things, but they are all mixed up vaguely with later ones: with meeting rebel prisoners, filthy and horrible, who fright- ened me, and regiments of Union soldiers marching to the South, and a white hos- pital downtown, and the Sanitary Fair in Logan Square. And so my first memories were of war, and my last will be of war and the wreck of the world I loved. re told I was born in a little house down Ninth Street. My father, after hay- ing been a teacher at Westtown, Friends’ Boarding School—he was born on my grandfather's farm—had come back to Philadelphia and gone into Cope Brothers’ office. And my mother’s family, the Bar- tons, aunts and cousins, had moved toa house on Fourth Street near Pine, from the farm in Jersey. This, [have heard, was turned into a vineyard, and I know their cupboards held good sherry and port and brandy, a little of which they drank ‘for their stomachs’ sake’, as the Bible bid them. The other aunts and uncles and cousins—Woods and Evanses, all correct —lived on Front and Second and Union and Pine and Arch Streets. They had come in again to the city from Moorestown and Mount Holly and Haddonfield and Cooper's Point, all correct, too. But the ridiculous Philadelphia snobbishness among the world’s people was already beginning, and even Friends gave in to it, and they were leaving their beautiful old Colonial houses for the suburbs. When my father was married, instead of staying downtown, where at least he could have made some money had he bought a house, he took one on South Ninth Street near Shippen, opposite to Rollinson’s Ceme- tery, one in a row of two-story houses with attics, I learnt when I went there not long ago to look for it. But I do not know which house it was, for they do not usually put plaques on houses in Phila- delphia—they pull them down, if they are beautiful and old, or let them to the mongrels who have overrun the city; or the up-to-date architects ruin them, as they have all our Philadelphia. And one day, when I was regretting all this, a { 1863 | THE BEGINNING - HIS FAMILY AND HIS FRIENDS 5 Friend, whose house was decorated with the pillars that held up Orange Street Meeting House gallery before it was des- troyed, said: ‘‘Joseph, thee dont realize thee belongs to the oldest and most ex- clusive club in the world—Philadelphia - Friends’ Meeting—and that thees a birth- right member.’’ But another day, when I was drawing Twelfth Street Meeting House, another Friend said to me, “‘Joseph, dont thee think it would be a good thing to pull down the Meeting House and builda store like Wanamaker’s?’’—which looms behind it. ‘‘Robert,’’ said I to him, “T think thee is an awful vandal.” Th np was a neighbor, Annie Wallace, next door on Ninth Street, who used to read Grimm and Hawthorne to me, and my two aunts, Mary and Beulah Barton, lived on Tenth Street. They sat, in their white muslin caps, and handkerchiefs over their gray dresses, in the back par- lor all the afternoon, knitting mittens and making caps, and later we would go downstairs to the basement dining room and, after we had kept silence, they would give me the only tea I ever liked, and muffins, and little pieces of ginger out of a blue and white jar with straw handles, and I could look up and see the big back yard with a wood fence round it, and a railing on top of which cats walked, and roses in the grass plots on each side the brick walks. In the evenings the aunts sat at the front parlor windows, one at each, to see neighbor this or neighbor that go by. And the upstairs rooms were filled with beautiful Chippendale and wonderful Sheraton, which their people had brought from England long before. What I liked most was to see the little tables opened out, one within the other, and to explore the mysteries of the great wardrobe. Sometimes they shut me up in it, and it smelled so good when I hid among the clothes. There were secret drawers of desks I tried to find; and I never tired of lifting the brass handles of bureaus and letting them fall with a de- lightful ring. All told against the white walls of the rooms, though some had pictured paper. In the front parlor were horsehair chairs and sofas, and at the sale of Aunt Mary’s things, when she died, my father bought them—they were, I suppose, the fashton—and the Chippen- dale went probably for nothing. Still, I liked to slide on the curved sofas and pick long hairs out of the seats of the chairs, which were put in our parlor. y LovE for the Rollo books, which M filled my head with a longing for travel and made a restless rover of me, I owe to my cousins, the Evanses, Hannah and Elizabeth. Like Aunt Mary and Aunt Beulah, they seemed to me to sit all day long with their mother against white walls and white marble mantel-pieces, knitting or sewing or reading, in plain dress, white caps, white handkerchiefs over their shoulders and crossed on their breasts, gray gowns, and sometimes black aprons: perfect compositions, never painted, all-sone. Later, I tried to get © Howells to write of them, Whistler to paint them. One said he could not write the plain language, the other said he would like to come home and paint them, but never did. And so, plain Friends, with other beautiful things in Philadelphia, have gone, mostly leaving no record save with those of us who knew and saw. When my Aunt Martha Barton, who had been a teacher at Westtown, spent a sum- mer with us in London, I ought to have had Whistler paint her, for she was a per- fect type of Philadelphia woman Friend, in face, figure and dress, and when she would come back from some excursion in the city, she would say, ‘‘Really, Ido not { 1863 | 6 CHAPTER I: THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR know why people look at me so!"" But she wore the plain dress, plainer than English Friends’ clothes. aly uz Evanses’ house was onUnion Street and the back looked out on a garden which ran to Pine Street, and the gar- den looked to the spire of old St. Peter's, and through the stillness came, with the hours, morning and afternoon, the sound of bells and chimes brought from Eng- land or Holland before the Revolution, so sweet that now I can scarce bear to hear them in a Flemish town or an _ English village. There is a bell in Brook- lyn that brings it all sweetly and sadly back. And these chimes had much to do with making me, the little Quaker, draw churches, ‘steeple houses’, in which so much of my life, the best of my life, has been passed. I drew St. Peter's before I went to England. Somehow, I was born with a love of beauty, a love that most people know nothing of, care nothing for, especially if they can make money by destroying it, or restoring it. y father,as another investment—I do M not know if he madeanything out of selling the first—bought a house on Lom- bard Street near Ninth, and John Wana- maker lived next door and I used to play with Tommy and Rodman. And there was friend Levion the other side, and out of our back building dining-room win- dows, over the fence between, we could see him having tea with his hat on. Of course, my father ought to have realized that Lombard Street was altogether out of, if next to, Philadelphia. I suppose he thought it would be taken in and im- proved; but it ran down. Still, he should not have forgotten that Philadelphia in his day was bounded by “Chestnut, Wal- nut, Spruce and Pine’’, and that Lombard was and always will be outside, though now any new Philadelphian rich enough to buy or advertise his way in, is “‘one of us.’ It was a big, three-story house my father bought, with a side and back yard and a verandah on the second story. It looked between the Marises’ and the Eisenburys’ houses on Pine Street, which had side yards, over the alley, right on to the statue of William Penn in front of the Hospital on Pine Street. Every evening at six the Hospital bell rang for dinner, and, then, if we were only in the right spot, at the right moment, we would see William Penn, when he heard it, come down off his pedestal and go in to dinner with the Hospital doctors who passed the open door. I tried over and over for the right spot and the right time, and I am sure there was not one other small boy or girl who lived in that neighborhood who did not too, and we never gave up hope of seeing him come down and go in. This was a good Philadelphia tradition, believed in by good Philadelphians. And it is something to be able to say I was born in the city, ifonly toadd it is a good place to get away from later. nE Marises’ father had a big ware- house filled with cinnamonand ginger and liquorice and John the Baptist beans, and everything that smelt good and tasted good; and once in a while we boys would go down to the store on Market Street and steal all the good-eating and sweet- smelling things we could—and howsmells and tastes come back! Every once in a while I get the real American smell. You only get it among Eastern Americans and it has never been noticed; but in all old houses, in old woods in the fall, when the leaves on the ground are burnt, it fills me with a longing—a longing for that life and those times, gone forever. The Ameri- can smell is as strong as the London smell, the French smell, or the smell of Italy. But the stink and the filth of the low [1864 | sngegena PHILADELPHIA WATER WORKS + MOST BEAUTIFUL ARCHITECTURAL COMPOSITION IN AMERICA DESTROYED TO BUILD AN ART GALLERY + WHERE MY FATHER TOOK ME : LITHOGRAPH I giz ip —_ Ss eT | ye THE BEGINNING - HIS SCHOOL AND HIS DRAWINGS 9 mongrels who have driven the Americans out of the country have driven out the American smell with all else American. 7, Saas was another wonderful place, the Dispensary opposite Independence Square on Fifth Street. Doctor Morris’ son and J were at the Boys’ Select School together, the only boy I remember there. In the Dispensary, too, were smells of drugs downstairs, and upstairsa collection of coins which we were allowed to look at and which I always wanted to steal. I once stole a counterfeit dollar out of my father’s drawer and spent it on fireworks. What a lot we got with it. And there was a big yard behind the Dispensary, with dirt walks, or dirt in it, and water. There was a hydrant, and we built mud towns and dug oceans and all sorts of wonderful things. The Philadelphia hy- drant was wonderful, too. You drank out of the spout, but you waited first for the mud to clear and then to see if a fish or water snake came next. And that is why Philadelphians of my generation are so healthy. If you could stand Schuylkill water, you could stand anything. I was told one day not so long ago a report on the water was to be made. The engineer stated first, that all Philadelphians drank their ancestors buried on Laurel Hill, which was drained into the Schuylkill, and that at a point farther up there was “an excellent outcrop of sewage.’ The last bit of Philadelphia vandalism is the destruction of the Dispensary, and I alone protested or called attention to the crime. MosTLy played with girls. Boys did not I amuse me, for I was not strong. I had every sort of ailment and got stunned by lightning in the back yard and could not bear thunder for years without my nerves going to pieces; and nearly hung myself on ropes run through swinging rings on the verandah, and broke my right arm— that is why lam ambidextrous—and went half blind, and the boys called me‘ ‘Skinny Pennell’, and once, in winter, the girls in their Select School on Sixth Street madea slide with a bump in the middle and we boys went down there, and as I slid I fell and broke my nose; and that is why it has a hump on it till this day. And I would jump when from the alley I heard a yell “The hominy man’s about today’’, or a statement you could hear all over the square that ‘‘prunes were good for the in- sides’’; but the most awful of old Phila- delphia cries was that of the nigger mammy sitting at night ina black corner who shricked as we passed ‘‘Crabs!’’ A tu the while I had something of my own, for I made drawings and they and my toys were real. [loved my drawing and my toys better than anything or any- body. Iwasa solitary little Quaker but I was not lonely. I was less lonely when alone. I was always drawing. A year or so ago I turned out from an old port- folio bound in figured paper that lace was kept in, dozens and dozens of sheets of illustrations of the lives and adventures of a soldier. There was a story connect- ed with them which I have forgotten, and the designs, mostly in water colors and colored chalk, had not the slightest merit, save a curious composition and some character. I was not even a Cubist; so I destroyed all I could find. The story was never written—I told it to myself. I-used to draw it. Only the story got mixed in my dreams with a great brazen figure that stood in our cellar, and I had to go down there at midnight alone, and then it would begin slowly to rock—fur- ther and further, back and forth—and as I knew ina minute the figure must fall on me, I would wake screaming. But I have never told any one of it until now. I was too afraid of the statue to tell and, night [1864 ] IO CHAPTER I - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR after night, it tottered and tottered above me and as it fell I woke; and my mother and father always wondered what fright- ened me; but I was too afraid of the statue to tell them anything about it. +uer illustrations of those old days— for I was an illustrator from the be- ginning—were made in a large, yellow, oblong, blank cheque book of the Bank of Pennsylvania. There were three cheques on a page, and the paper was Chinese and the back of it was stunning for water colors, but most were in pencil. There were also water colors by my father in it —copies of beasts made from shects of colored lithographs we had. He showed me how to grind the colors in the tiny saucers and put them on, though these copies, so far as I know, were his only works of art. But in this, as in so many other things, he was my first teacher, although I cannot say how or where he learned enough to teach me—perhaps at Westtown. Nor can I say when I had my lessons. It was most likely in the early evening before tea—that Philadelphia tea with hot soda biscuits and oysters and preserves my mother put up or my grand- mother sent us. There was seldom time in the morning, for my father went to mar- ket once or twice a week, carrying his big basket, as was then the Philadelphia fashion; or we used to exercise with hang- ing rings on the verandah, covered with wistaria in the spring and in the fall with grapes. Sometimes he took me with him to market. We would go down to Second Street Market in the Lombard Street horse car, and there, in the dark tunnel of the market house, was my Uncle Nathan ina plain, broad-brim top hat—he was an Elder or Overseer of Meeting—and a white apron, selling over his stall butter and eggs and chickens, which he had brought into town from his farm. And Friends Joseph and Thomas Elkington would come over to talk to him from their soap works across the street, where they made their ‘White Familys’ Soap.’’ Iwas some- times taken to play with the Elkington boys who went to Select School. And there were Evanses, who came from their paint shop up the street and gossiped with my uncle; and when my father had filled his basket and bought other baskets of peaches or kettles of oysters to be sent home, he carried his basket full of good things and I followed, to the South or Pine Street car. And this all good Phila- delphians did every week and were not ashamed. And my father would take me walking on First Day afternoons to Penn Square, or on Seventh Day to Fairmount, in the horse cars to the water works, the most beautiful, the most romantic spot in America, all destroyed by villainous van- dals, to make an Art Gallery by killing art, and against this abomination I only could get Agnes Repplier to protest. The up-to-date Philadelphian is not only a vulgarian but a coward, or most are. I + wasmy father who, with my mother, taught me to read. I do not remember what I read, save that ‘‘Little Ann and her mother went walking one day’’, and Soncs For INNocENTS AT Home, and we had an illustrated Aesop, and the rare New England Primer. It was then I be- came almost blind over what I read and drew, and I had to be kept ina dark room for months; and I cannot stand strong light now. Aftermy eyes got well enough, I was sent to Friends’ Select Boys’ School in Cherry Street above Eighth. Teacher Susannah House, who taught the Primary School, would come to get me in the morning—she lived somewhere near us— and take me with her and bring me back home after school was over. On Fifth Day morning, Isaac Morgan, the Princi- [1864 } THE BEGINNING - GOING TO SCHOOL AND TO MEETING pal, used to march us all down to Arch Street Meeting House, two by two, in our coats with the collars cut off behind, and II cousin Elizabeth Evans among the women ministers. A man I took to the Meeting House a little while ago said he had never : ae i * . >, a ie OE 6 60 7 eee AMBIDEXTROUS how are thee?’’ We spent an awful hour and a half on the hard wooden benches, and our legs went to sleep because our feet did not reach the floor; but if we went to sleep, Isaac Morgan, who sat on a side bench, leaned over and shook us, and the boys who sat behind stuck pins in the toes of their shoes and jabbed us. Even then I loved the big beautiful room, and the ministers, men and women, who sat on the top benches, facing the meet- ing, the men on one side, the women on the other—so peacefully, so quietly—my Aisa ILLUSTRATION MADE ABOUT FOUR OR FIVE FOR AN UNWRITTEN STORY : been so near to God on earth before. SIE i a sacaeascanine tg Se ab ; I WAS ALREADY SEE LETTERING OF SIGNS ON THE BUILDINGS READING BOTH WAYS HEN we went to school on Seventh \¢ Day, we would put our books under our coats and button them up to hide them from the boys who did not have to go and who laughed at us more than ever and shied bricks, too. At Christmas, a Committeeman would come and tell us we must be at school on the Twenty-fifth of Twelfth Month, just as we would any other day, and not to keep the world’s people’s holiday called Christmas at home. But very few of us did come to school on that day. We were told, too, {1865 | 12 that we should give thanks every day and not on one day in the year only; that we were Friends and not as the world’s peo- ple, who believe in times and seasons and other worldly customs. I REMEMBER nothing of this first school so well as the day when there came something over the whole city and all the teachers and the boys left the classes, the littlest and the biggest, and ran down into the brick-paved school yard, and then all rushed through the front gate, save me, for I was grabbed by Teacher Susannah. The firemen were out with hose catriages on which were burning brooms, and the streets were filled with people yelling and running to the State House, and I wanted to run too; but J was carried off home, though I tried hard to get away. And a few days after my father CHAPTER I - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR came back from market and brought with him the paper all in black; and soon after that I was taken to the house of Captain Julius, of Copes’ Packets, on South Broad Street, next door to the house where the Robins lived later on, and the house had a balcony, not a verandah, on the second story front; and we sat out there; and away up and down Broad Street was a waving line of shining steel in the sun- light, and afterwards a great black hearse stopped under the trees in front of the house, and everybody cried. us is all I remember of Gettysburg, of the fall of Richmond, of the assas- sination of Lincoln, of the war; but noth- ing of it all can I forget. What I saw and heard then, I remember. I was an artist from the beginning, for I looked at and remembered things as an illustrator. Mog FRIENDS MEETING HOUSE FOURTH AND ARCH WHERE THE SCHOOL WENT TO FIFTH DAY MORNING MEETING «+ LITHOGRAPH 1908 OUR PHILADELPHIA [1865 } CHAPTER II: AT THE COPES OFFICE - DRAWING AND PLAYING IN THE OLD SHIPPING OFFICE - MEETING THE COPE CHILDREN - THE END OF THE AMERICAN PASSENGER THE ORIGINAL COPE BROTHERS - FROM A PAINTING BY S.B.WAUGH WHICH HUNG IN THEIR AND MERCHANDISE SAILING SHIPS AND OF THE OFFICE OFFICE - REPRODUCED FROM A COPY IN THE PENNSYLVANIA ACADEMY OF THE FINE ARTS T WALNUT Street Wharf was Copes’ office—the firm of Cope Brothers who owned the four great packet ships that sailed to Liverpool from Philadelphia. And here was my father, and here I was taken to play by my father. The office was in the second story. On the ground floor were ship stores, and you went through an iron door on the street, upa narrow stair with a rope banister, to the second story, where there were four rooms. In the first was my father with clerks under him. Then there was an inner room where it seemed to me, little boy, the Copes never were. When they did come, and I was there, I was scared. Either Thomas P. in plain clothes would walk in solemnly, or Fran- cis R. in world dress would rush in reck- lessly. They never came together; and they never seemed to do anything when they got there, but when they were there I was frightened; why, I do not know. Theirs was a corner room looking down { 1865 | 14 CHAPTER II - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Delaware Avenue and across the river, and both ways were wharves, and their ships were tied up to the wharf oppo- site Copes’ Wharf. Another front room, rarely used, had in it a double high desk, with drawers instead of legs; and one drawer, like that in my father’s desk, always had pretzels or crackers in it, and I used to pull it open and help myself. KS the desks were high stools which could be pushed to the windows, from the top of one I could look out on the ships and Camden Ferry and Smith's Island, and perched on the stool at the window, I drew the ships—the Tusca- rora, Tonawanda, Saranac, Wyoming— and the ship Captains would come in and look at my drawings. But neither they, nor the Copes, nor any one else, did more than look; no anxious patron for my future encouraged or refreshed me with cash or with praise, or even wanted the drawings asa gift. I dont think even my father said anything, but he gave me pencils and paper. Art was not upon the town; the American collector was not in- vented; the West-Peale tradition was for- gotten in Philadelphia, Abbey was forced from his home, and, besides, Friends did not approve of drawings. These drawings —illustrations—were made because I wanted to make them. I could not help it. And, mostly, the people who saw them did not like them, mostly did not understand them. Only my father must have cared or he would have stopped me. All these went in the War. From the win- dow of the corner office Icould look down Delaware Avenue on the Camdenand Am- boy Railroad Depot, and the Hotel with menalways tilted back on chairs in a row in front of it; and the attempt to draw the street and the buildings and the people, as Isaw them from above, gave me the man- nerism, which I encourage, of looking down on subjects I draw to-day. I didnot get it from the Japanese, for [never sawa Jap print until about 1880, when I bought Hokusai’s Hundred Views at Wanama- ker’s for a quarter, in the original edi- tion—that went in the War—because Drake of Tue Century told me to get it, and found our view point the same. But my liking for elevated view points came from looking out of Copes’ office windows years before. Some of the Captains, who had made trips to China and Japan, may have had prints, as they had lacquer and cabinets in their houses, but they never showed any to me, for I never saw any of these things unless they were away—going to or coming from Liverpool—though I went to Captain Baker’s and Captain Dunlevey’s to play with their children, for they lived in our square. F I tired of drawing or staring out of the windows, I could do a still more wonderful thing—look into a camera lucida which was in the desk, at the life of the streets, and from this I learned a great deal—maybe too much—or from a kaleidoscope—what a treasure for the ists and the artless—or from a stereoscope at home, which had foreign views. Some- times I was allowed,asa great favor, to go out through glass doors in the front of the office, on to a grated, iron-railed balcony. On each floor, one above the other, the balconies ran up to the gable-ended roof, a trap door in each, through which goods could be hauled to the upper lofts by a crane at the top. The gable end of the building, as in Holland, was on Delaware Avenue, and it was built, as so many Philadelphia houses were, of Dutch red and black bricks. In the big room with the desks was a great safe—another won- der—with wondrous locks, and my father had the key, and over this, on the plain white wall, was an oil painting—one of { 1866 | ee | ; £4 .* *) i ms s He : i i \ i 2 2 ils MY FATHER LARKIN PENNELL 1819-1 890 - FROM A DAGUERREOTYPE BY MCCLEES AND GERMON TAKEN WHILE HE WAS IN COPES OFFICE AT WALNUT STREET WHARF - IT IS INTER- ESTING TO CONTRAST THESE REAL AMERICAN TYPES WITH PORTRAITS OF AMERICANS OF THE SAME CLASS TO-DAY - BOTH ARE CLEAN SHAVEN BUT THE MEN OF THE PAST HAD CHARACTER WHICH SHOWED IN THEIR FACES » THOSE OF THE PRESENT DAY ARE STANDARDIZED AS CAN BE SEEN IN THE SUNDAY NEWSPAPERS FROM THE PAGES OF WHICH THEY GRIN AND SMIRK 16 CHAPTER II - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR the first I ever saw—of the three original CopeBrothers. Howtheseworthy Friends allowed themselves to be painted by Waugh and engraved by Sartain in mezzo- tint I do not know. Silhouettes and sam- plers were the only forms of art, with wax fruit and flowers and real shells, and sometimes daguerreotypes in their black cases, to be seen in Friends’ houses. We had at home a painting of Fort Snelling and some water colors of ships, kept out of sight, and a lot of illustrated books— Captain Cook’s Voyages and a History of the Pirates and one of the Ameri- can Navy among them, in a big box in the attic. One day I tore the engrav- ings from the books and painted them. Luckily, my father caught me and proved to me so painfully and clearly that I should leave the works of my predeces- sors alone, that I have mostly done so to this day, no matter what I think of them. Not so long ago, I had another attack, and it too had disastrous results. Even to-day it is hard to restrain myself from destroying the new art and the new liter- ature—the admiration of the new Ameri- cans; but to do that would be to turn Bolshevik—as they are. Something else that comes back to me as I write is the smell of these books—not the smell of good paper and good ink, which is good, but a smell of the sea and of spices and of strange lands, for they must have be- longed to one of the Captains before my father got them. Nn the top of the big safe, one on each O corner, stood two models of full- rigged sailing ships, and never have I been happier than when they were taken down and set on the floor, and I could lie down by them and look at them and tell stories of their voyages to myself. They were on little stands and I could sail them to distant lands behind the big desk, through storms and calms. How I would have loved to take them home and launch them in the bathtub, with the Noah’s Ark that upset when it got wet and the people and the beasts that fell out of it in the water, and their paint came off, and the tin steamboat, to run on the floor, that wound up with a key and ran down even before it went to the bottom of the tub, and the glass ships and wooden ones—a whole fleet of them, and flocks and shoals of tin ducks and glass fishes that all spread over the face of the waters, when I put them in the bath. But if it was not possible to carry off these wonderful ships, they made me draw ships, horribly difficult things to get right. This was long before people began to collect ship models or wooden Indians which stood before every cigar store; and Revolutionary cannon that were planted upright on every corner to keep drivers off the brick pavements. OMETIMEs, but not often, the Marises S and the Morrises would come down with me to the office, and we would hunt in the dim back room and the dark lofts upstairs for English postage stamps on old letters, and find them; they must have been rare ones, for the firm was old. But we knew nothing about rarities, and though I started a stamp album, I soon tired of that. The collection of postage stamps even then bored me, for I knew there was nothing save money in it, but that is why most collectors collect. Little Cope boys and girls in crowds used to come too, but more rarely, from Awbury, their place near Germantown. There were endless brothers and sisters and cousins. But we did not chum up, though they too would pull old English stamps, some black pen- nies, off old letters; there must have been a fortune in these alone. Little did I { 1868 | “poloary Gaang mop qinog ‘eiuppng aogrng 08 P artuig Ronorg $9 aeyaudorg am x03 pousiand ps pow Bey a e Hieeess hee . Oe bese LES BIAL LL : tag : pot FPS: é b&b we LRRD DAPI PE HAO PO teeter owes NAMOUE & DRAWING MADE AT AGE OF SIX IN COPES’ OFFICE - THE DATE OF THE DRAWIN G IS ON THE POST MARK + MESSRS. BROWN SHIPLEY & COMPANY WERE COPES’ LIVERPOOL CORRESPON- DENTS AND AGENTS AND THIS DRAWING WAS MADE ON THE FOLDED SHEET IN WHICH AT THAT TIME LETTERS WERE ENCLOSED THE GENERAL USE OF ENVELOPES COMING IN LATER 18 CHAPTER II - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR think that in a few years we would all be at school together—the younger ones —and grow up together, yet apart, and that three of us would go into art though we were Friends—John, who was in my class, becoming a very good landscape architect, and Walter, a year or more younger, also an architect, turning all American colleges into a lifeless copy of a dead English model, when he had the most beautiful living tradition, our Colo- nial art, our Philadelphia art, about him. He built part of the new University in this fashion when he had the old Univer- sityat Ninth and Chestnut—perfect Colo- nial, that never should have been touched —to inspire him. But that was despised by the vandals who destroyed it and who are themselves succeeded in Philadelphia by worse architectural vulgarians, full of French notions and ignorant of American art—teally of all art, for to be a French- man does not mean one necessarily must be an artist. And now these two sleep in the quiet burying ground with their family and my family, only their names and dates on the little gravestones in Friends’ Graveyard at Germantown. And I want to lie there too. ie the evenings my father and I would walk home from the office, up Walnut Street, the sun glaring in our faces till we could not see the red brick houses, by Friends’ Alms Houses and the State House and Orange Street Meeting and the Hos- pital, along perfect streets of these houses with white marble steps and white doors and white window shutters on the first and second stories, and green above, all gone now, and the green trees too, all the beauty of Penn’s sylvan city, my city—my home—that I foolishly thought to help to preserve, wrecked by vandals and uplifters, foreigners and fools. FRIENDS’ ALMS HOUSES ON WALNUT STREET BY WHICH MY FATHER AND I WOULD PASS ON OUR WAY HOME FROM THE OFFICE + PEN DRAWING MADE FOR HARPER'S WEEKLY 1882 | 1869 | CHAPTER III: FRIENDS SCHOOL IN GERMANTOWN WE MOVE TO GERMANTOWN : SENT TO SCHOOL : TAUGHT DRAWING BY LAMBDIN - WIN A PRIZE - THE CENTENNIAL I GRADUATE : THE THE CLASS OF SEVENTY-SIX AT FRIENDS’ SCHOOL - JOSEPH PENNELL IN CENTER: JOHN S. COPE FIRST AND ONLY BOY TO DO SO ee SEATED RIGHT » MARY WEST HUSTON DESCENDANT OF BENJAMIN WEST EXTREME RIGHT HEN I was ten years old, in 1870, we moved to Fisher’s Lane, Germantown, into a new, jerry -built, jig-saw decorated house, my father having sold the place on Lombard Street for just what he paid for it. I was sent to German- town Friends’ Select School. It was a school for Friends only, then. Iam glad I refused to go to Westtown Boarding School, to which it was planned to send me. Beautiful and quict as Westtown is, or was, it would have ruined me, for boarding schools and boy scouts and all other herding make for the ruin of a child, and so the ruin of a country. At the Germantown School I stayed for six aw- ful years, the worst of my life, for there is caste and precedence and all other things of that sort among Friends as well as among the world’s people. Because my family had not made money, and so made good as other Friends with less to start with, both socially and financially, we were scarce in it or of it. But all that is another story; it is all over and this is the story of my beginnings as an illustrator. The move to Germantown gave me new ideas. Again there was war, the French- German War, but that was far away and we boys had battles of our own with In- dians in Wister’s Woods which were far [1870 ] 20 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR more important to fight. I grew up with the boys and girls in and around the Lane, the Bailys and the Henrys and the Browns and the Snowdens, all Friends, or relations of Friends, but the Henrys, —most respectable, all of them, they thought themselves. We used to see art- ists at work in the Wingohocking Valley behind Stenton. There was a painter man who sat on a stool, under an umbrella, in the meadow by the creek, even then a stinking sewer, oil-stained after it had passed Fisher’s Cotton Mills. He painted cows in the landscape and it was fun to shy stones at the crank, for he was a fat Dutchman and he could not, we knew, run fast enough up the hill to catch us. Two of us now are artists, and a third is a collector of art. But later on, in the long summer, I grew quite interested in the painter. He was doing the same sub- ject, again and again, as all American painters do when it pays, and I sneaked up behind him to see how he did it. But he had a good memory and, turning sud- denly on the little snooper, he gave me some good instruction in the art of both- ering artists and what comes of it, of which, in my time, I have made much use more than once since. vEN then I wanted to study art, but E there was no one to teach me, though most people who gape at artists, as I was doing, merely gape as they do at a dead horse or a panned motor. There was an- other artist who painted in Wister’s Woods but we had great respect for him and left him alone. A third made photo- graphs and concocted things from them. His work we never saw, we only heard of it, though he was my cousin. These two artists were Friends and went to Meeting. They were William T. Rich- ards and George B. Wood, and I think they were the last artist members of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, now, as when founded, ‘‘a company of gentle- men,’’ the charter says—gentlemen ac- cording to Philadelphia notions. But to be a gentleman does not mean that one need know anything of art, anyway in Philadelphia, where most do not. t+ Germantown School, as at the A school in Philadelphia, every Fifth Day we went to Meeting, walking over— the old Meeting House was in the school grounds—two by two from the school- house, the boys and the girls apart, though we sat together in school; or if not, we boys were punished by being made to sit between two girls in the classrooms. I can add nothing to the sub- ject of co-education because I thought nothing about it. We, boys and girls, just grew up together, and that was all. We saw much of each other out of the class, at parties in winter and on picnics in sum- mer we were together, but there was one thing I never could understand —why sometimes, when after school we would chase the girls among the shrubbery in the old school yard they would run round and round the lilac bushes, till they were tired, but never into the school house, and then we kissed the prettiest—and they were pretty. Somehow it did not amount to much, but in all the years we were to- gether in school or out of it, there never was the slightest breath of scandal of any sort about us, and it was because we had no chaperon, we were not spied upon— we boys were on our honor, and it was our duty to protect the girls and that was all there was to it—and so every one grew up decently because we were Friends. Even after, but one boy and girl who had been in the class together married. I made no intimate school friendships either— my chum was John Henry who lived in the Lane, the only boy friend I ever had {1871 | oe.) eT eo © —and when he went to college and I went to work I lost him. And I have never had a real friend since. Do they exist? Every morning each of us had to recite verses of the Bible as school opened, and every Second Day morning the whole chapter e & we had learned the week before, and we were kept in, if we made a mistake, until we got it perfect. That is the way Whist- ler and I learned English —not from teachers who couldnt talk it, as they cant now, but from King James’ version of the Bible. We did not always understand what we learned, and sometimes indis- creet questions would be asked. One day one of the girls inquired: ‘‘Teacher, what is a concubine?”’ ““Thee stay in at recess, Sally Jane, and I'll tell thee,’’ said the GERMANTOWN FRIENDS’ MEETING » DRAWN AT THE SCHOOL UNDER LAMBDIN ABOUT 1873 AT GERMANTOWN - AT SCHOOL AND IN MEETING 21 teacher. To the Fifth Day Meeting, Wil- liam Kite and Samuel Emlen and Samuel Morris and the other men ministers and elders came, leaving their business; and the women ministers came too. And what character, what refinement the men had! How beautiful, how calm the women were—the whole like a Franz Hals! And no one, save Smedley in one attempt, painted or drew the character and the beauty. And yet Smedley, Howard Pyle, Mary Hallock Foote knew it all, for they were Friends, though Pyle was a Hicks- ite. And we children, for that hour and a half, tried to be good, the boys sitting on one side with the men Friends, the girls with the women. But it was long, though peaceful, that hour and a half. { 87x | ; 22 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR E came on First Day mornings, too, \4 sitting there under the gold bars of light falling down through the Venetian blinds, listening to the sounds of flies in- side and horses outside stamping in the sheds in summer, or to the roar of the winds round the house in winter, and the crackle of logs in the big stoves in the old Meeting House. And once in a while there was a marriage and the world’s people came to hear the groom say that “with Divine permission and Friends’ approbation,’ he would take the bride to be his ‘‘loving wife, till death should separate’ them. Sometimes it was a silent Meeting; but oftener the spirit moved some minister to speak—and they could speak, and meant what they said— before the heads of the Meeting shook hands and broke it up. Every month there was a Monthly Meeting and the caretaker would let down the wooden division shutters, like window sashes, between the men’s and the women’s side. Each had a separate business meeting and sat on separate sides of the partition. The business would be gone through, and how tired we were of the reports and queries; but how we waked up when some Friends Passed Meeting before they were married, and in the concerns Friends had to visit, or send epistles to other Meetings. For we of Germantown Preparative, Frankford Monthly, Abing- ton Quarterly, and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, regarded ourselves, down to the smallest and tiniest Friendlet, as far superior to any other Friends, and we listened to the preparation of minutes or the concern of friends to visit New York and even London Yearly Meeting, considering them to be in need of coun- sel from Philadelphia, where Orthodox Friends knew they were more Friendly than other Friends, whom they warned to keep to the straight and narrow way. It was a good way, and if only I could have kept to it myself, I should have been a different person. The love of the Friends’ doctrine has never left me,though I have fallen by the wayside. Still, I wish I could live up to it—the simplest and most perfect doctrine in the world, the doctrine of Christ practised by real Friends, real Christians. I po not remember that I learned any- thing in Germantown School that I have not forgotten or have not had to unlearn, save the Bible, drawing and his- tory—and the names of State Capitals that haunt me which we chanted—our nearest approach to singing. *‘Pennsylva- nia, Harrisburg onthe Susquehanna River; New York, Albany on the Hudson River; Massachusetts, Boston’’—we never were sureifit hadariver. Imight have learned the classics if the teacher had had any notions of anything but Latin and Greek grammar. Their beauty was hidden from him. I dont believe he knew anything but what he got out of books. The things I translated for myself, ‘‘When the cloud shadows chase each other over the sides of the mountains,’’ are all I remember, and I do not owe that to the teacher, who did not understand what it meant. I could see the pictures in Virgil and Horace the others never saw, and one day I got hold of a crib, or a translation and I studied it by heart—the day’s les- son—and when I was called on, I stood up and spouted it forth, and there was a sensation. Then the teacher, the awful headmaster, called on me to parse a sen- tence and to give the meaning of certain words. I could not, and, well, I dont believe he could have done so either. Who ever heard of a teacher of English, Latin or Art who would be teaching, if he or she could do anything in art or [ 1872 | AT GERMANTOWN - THE TEACHERS AND THE STUDENTS 23 literature. I teach now, but not that way. If I had—which I am thankful I have not—a child—a man child—he should never go to school and be stand- ardized. My left hand brought meall sorts of trouble from the teachers, who tried to make me copy the abominable Spen- cerian standardized writing of the copy books, so full of stupid moral tritenesses, with my right hand when I could do it better with my left. If these instructors of youth had had any sense, they would have encouraged me to use both hands; but these people and their pupils use one hand, one-half their brains, and, there- fore, have one-half of one sense. I may say, however, they did not succeed, and to this day my right hand, save in a few things, knows not what my left hand doeth. How the teachers made us hate them for their stupidity, for we small boys were far more intelligent than they; it was only as we grew up that we became standardized and hypnotized by their stupidity, which is what our education means and is. Now these things are in- grained in Americans who, therefore, mostly do not grow up but are mental and moral runts and feeble-minded; aged about fourteen. This is the result of gym- nastics, kindergartens, boy scouts, sports —all hypnotizing and standardizing machinery for killing character. Now we only cultivate children’s arms and legs; their bellies are weak and their heads are empty. It is not fashionable to read, only to play. We are become a race of cocksure imbeciles. There are exceptions. East Side Jews are encouraged, despite the fact that in all the world there has never been a great Jewish artist; I mean worker in the graphic or plastic arts. It does not pay well enough, quick enough, so they dont stick at it long enough. And all chil- dren are carted to galleries they hate, and encouraged and boosted for a moment in- to a notoriety that it takes real creative artists, and how few there are, a whole lifetime to attain; but this is education, so-called, sandwiched between ball games and flag-worshipping patriotism, the refuge of cowards. Not long ago, a class was taken to the Metropolitan to see the Primitives and when they were through the teacher asked what they liked best. “T dont like any cause dey aint like Mutt and Jeff,’’ answered a young American, standing up for the art he knew and loved. Another day I saw a citizen with his lit- tle daughter before Saint Gaudens’ Lin- coln. ““Vots dot ugly ole man, popper?” - “I dunno,’’ said the parent. Lincoln’s name was on the base—I heard that. UT sometimes we would retaliate. I loys the boy who filled a rose with pepper and left it on the teacher’s desk, and I remember that she smelt it; but I dont remember if the little imp was ever found out. I knew who did it, but I did not tell. Friends can keep secrets. DID care for a few of the teachers— presence Sue, who taught me history and who, also, when I had made a draw- ing on my slate, would come round and either sponge it out or write under it, “Satan always finds something for idle hands to do.”’ Naturally, at the moment, I hated her. We had terrific tussles. She meant well and so did I; but I think she liked me—I hope so. The headmaster never reasoned with me, never advised me pri- vately. I never saw him out of school, nor was I ever asked to the homes of any of the other teachers. There was no intimacy, no companionship out of school, and in it they were only teachers—or rather, they never taught, they only heard us recite and put down marks. The life was utterly different from that of any other school boy who has ever written his adventures. [1873 ] Peis CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Then there was ‘‘Madame’’; we little Friends called her that. The Meeting never knew that we called Madam, ‘‘Madame.”’ She had no other name for us. I liked her too. She taught French. She succeeded a solemn person who, we were told, was the only Frenchman who escaped from Mexico after the execution of Maximilian. My father wanted me to learn French and, well, I learned it in the American fashion of those days, much more practically, I am sure, than it is learned now. And it helped me later into and out of scrapes in France. My father saw somehow into the future. It was an extra and I was at the tail of all the other classes; but he made me take French. I dont remember if there was a teport of that, but there was a monthly book full of my want of marks in all other classes save drawing. For there was a drawing master—an innovation in Friends’ School—one of those magnif- icent Philadelphians who walked Chest- nut Street,where he had his studio; splen- did, six-feet, gray-bearded like Whitman and Leland—James R. Lambdin. Of course we were made from the beginning to draw, or trace from drawing copy books or on glass slates, which I could never do decently—and I cant trace decently now. We also drew maps, and mine were amazing: all illustrated—all destroyed, I hope. So were my school books :—Virgil, a complete translation of the first book, prigged, as I said, from a crib, Milton and Goldsmith. Luckily, all have gone. Once, a professor of art came, and for a dollar, to be paid in advance, guaranteed to make each of us an artist in one lesson. Ialone rushed home to get the dollar, but failed, and so became an illustrator. And, although I did not then know it, all art is illustration. Later a Lecturer was intro- duced, learned in the history of art and artlessness, with charts and diagrams, and I joined. And Bay Smith, the future Mrs. Berenson, was in it, too. But I was bored. The Lecturer became later a Direc- tor, and an expounder of architectural refinements or the accidents of time. Al- though he died the other day in the full- ness of years and of honors, I yet fail to grasp whether his theories or his knowl- edge or his honors were worth anything. I know his photographs were good, and I also know he was always getting in my way when he was photographing and plumb-lining, and I was drawing in French cathedrals. But peace to him, which is more than he would, I fear, say of me, even though once he introduced me on a lecture platform, to his great dis- comfort. His name was W. H. Goodyear. HE new master was a different sort. As I have said, he had a studio on Chestnut Street, though he lived in Ger- mantown. I do not know if he had stud- ied abroad; I know that he was a member of the Pennsylvania Academy; but as with all other native Philadelphia artists, I fear Philadelphia had no use for him— and so it has been from Benjamin West to myself. He taught me one thing—and he tried to teach the class, too—to use my eyes, my brains, my memory—all that American educators are ignorant of— above all, drawing from memory; that is most valuable, though even then you must have something to say for yourself. Education leads to standardized stupidity. And long, long beforeI heardof Whistler's practice, of the Japanese system, of De Boisbaudran’s method, I tried to carry out what Lambdin told me, told the blind, dumb class—to use my mind and my memory. And I have tried to follow his teaching to this day. Lambdin’s method was to make you draw some ob- ject before you; then, not looking at it, to draw what you remembered of it. This [1873 | JAMES R. LAMBDIN + PORTRAIT BY HIMSELF IN THE PENNSYLVANIA ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS JOSEPH PENNELL’S FIRST DRAWING TEACHER AT FRIENDS’ SELECT SCHOOL GERMANTOWN 26 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR class alone I led. I was far below the tail in all the others, save history. Everything else Lambdin taught in the ordinary way, though he was always telling us to make drawings from nature, if we wanted to learn to draw. Two or three did, and so encouraged was he that before vacation he offered a prize for the best drawing made out of doors during the summer, to be awarded when the school reopened in the fall. I drew the house across the street, in the holidays. How I worked over it! But I tried to do it inmy own way. The school opened again; the students brought the drawings they had made. I believe there were a lot, for there was the prize, and prizes are the source and curse of most American art. I saw at once that only one other drawing counted. Bob Shoemaker had made it—the Falls of the Yosemite or the Yellowstone—his rich father having taken him to that far-away land during the vacation. There it was, a most remark- able thing in pencil; we all worked in pencil. Wonderful, I thought it. I was sure I had no chance for the prize. But Lambdin looked at the two and handed the prize, a silver crayon holder in a leather case, tome. Like the entire class, I was stunned. I sat at my desk staring at it. It was just before the recess of half an hour. I sat there for fifteen minutes of the recess; then I put the case in my desk, and then I loafed out into the playground. All together, the boys were waiting for me— the girls never came in our yard—Bob Shoemaker in the midst. But we did not fight. Little Friends never fought with their fists; but they did make remarks that I, the unpopular, the outsider, with a mere drawing of a commonGermantown house, should be preferred to the popular, the rich boy who had seen and done things, was not fair, and it was only in a draw- ing class run by some one who wasnt a Friend and had no business in Friends’ School that such a thing could have hap- pened. Everybody in the school, from the principal down, seemed against me, and though I did not like it, it was good train- ing, and I have found since a not unusual experience in prize winning, which 1s mostly productive of heartburning and jealousy, and is mostly only graft in this land of grafters, which we are to-day. It is all right when you are in the gang, for then you get the prizes when your turn comes to get them. Bz I am glad Lambdin gave me that prize. I have never had a money prize and would not take one. I have never fought to get a prize, so I take them when they come to me, and I have a number. Still, I wonder, as Lambdin did, whether Bob Shoemaker made that drawing from nature, at the age of twelve or fourteen. If he really did, he might have been a great artist instead of a mere millionaire, as I believe he now is, if he is still alive, though I do not know what has become of him. The prize sent me for a time to na- ture and life. I never told Lambdin what I did, though once, I remember, I let him see some horses I was proud of and he liked them. Then my father bought some volumes of Dickens with illustrations by Cruikshank, Phiz and the rest of those British bunglers, and in one volume was a tree with skeleton branches; and there for some time I found or lost myself and came near out-Rackhaming Rackham, and the branches of my trees for a time became skeletons. It took me more time to get over that trick. In winter, the skeletons were everywhere, but in spring another boy who drew—though he did not attend Friends’ School—Latimer Brown, and I would go out together sketching, and as he saw no skeletons in the trees, I forgot them and I began to try to draw what I [1873 ] THE DRAWING WHICH WON THE PRIZE AT GERMANTOWN SCHOOL + A HOUSE ON FISHER’S LANE OPPOSITE THE PENNELLS’ HOME + DRAWN IN PENCIL FROM NATURE °* JULY 17 1873 28 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR saw, wotking on brown paper with black and white chalks. Where we got the money to buy these, I do not know. When I was afraid to ask my father, I may have run upa bill at school; but I think it most likely that my father, as usual, gave me the money or the materials, for he never refused ; I was only afraid to ask. I remem- ber one drawing of trees we did. Do boys of twelve spend their holidays drawing now? After that, I found Germantown devoid of skeletons and full of interest —Wakefield Mills, Wister’s Mills, Har- per’s Dam. It must have been that winter the dam broke, and with the thermometer down to zero, I made a pencil drawing of it—not for anybody, not for anything, but just because I had to;—I was an illus- trator. And maybe it was that winter, too, as I was learning to do grapevines on the ice, Fanny Kemble came and stood on a rock which jutted into the dam and said sweetly, in a voice of thunder, ‘‘Is Owen Wister here2’’ She was his aunt. That was the only time I saw her, but he and I now face each other in Academic golden- labeled chairs on great official occasions. iN then I went in for woodcutting with a boy next door, and when we had made our blocks, we tried to print them with shoeblacking on a wringing machine, but he tore his nails off in the cog wheels and blamed me for his carelessness; and that ended my wood-block printing. Of course, we did other things. We went to pigeon matches and cricket matches, all done away with now—for decayed golf, aim- less bridge. The next year Lambdin left the school—I dont know why—and was suc- ceeded by Joseph Ropes as drawing master, avery different man, ‘small, shy, modest, ”’ even Tuckerman says of him. Artists were not many in America forty-five years ago and the few made history. Ropes took to me, as very few do—or is it I who keep people off? In the spring he used to let me go out with him sketching, afternoon after afternoon, and in his way taught me. But his way was not my way. Everything was to be seen not as I saw it but as he saw it, just as I had seen skeletons, but according to his system and his perspec- tive, upon which he had written a book, and he gavemeacopy. He took me to his studio on Main Street and there, in a bare top room, showed me his oil paintings and water colors and gave me one of Tivoli, where, he told me, he had found an Italian wife and lost her and never got over it. And there he tried to teach me to work in water color in his way; but again his way was not my way and he gave it up, though my father was paying him a dollar a lesson. Luckily, from the begin- ning, I was stubborn and did as I wanted. He tried, and so did I, and he came near conquering me, but when he proudly sent me to show my work to Peter Moran, who taught in Philadelphia, and I walked fourteen miles there and back on Seventh Day afternoon after school, Moran would not waste time over me, or even see me, sending down word—and it was the truth —that mine were “‘the most mannered things he ever saw from one so young.”’ Moran was right. Ropes and I were wrong. Ropes also made etchings on glass and | tried too, drawing with a point through a glass negative which had been exposed to a white screen, and then printing it like a photograph. There were some of these around in Germantown for a long while, treasured, I believe, as my early work. Ropes liked me still, and when things began to happen, wrote mea proud letter, which I stupidly never answered, and I never heard from or of him again. It took time to get out of these manner- isms, and then I fell into others—and still do—and so have misled millions. And the [1874] AT GERMANTOWN - THE DRAWING MASTERS OF THE SCHOOL 29 rest of my life has been spent in trying to get out of them and finding myself. I also went to William T. Richards, who, in another way, was as mannered in his maturity as 1 in my youth, and he told me to take my sketches away and burn them, and then draw something, if I could. So I drew a geranium plant, and really it wasnt bad, as I saw it before the War. And when he saw it Richards said I might learn to draw, though, from my other sketches, henever would have thought it possible. He did not waste time encourag- ing me, but he started me working seri- ously, which is not the fashion nowadays. y drawing went on, in and out of M school, till the spring of 1876. I never played much at football, cricket or base- ball, though, being left-handed, I liked to upset the whole cricket field when I did bow]; and I did some fearful smashing of wickets with left-hand grounders. As I did not have to, I rarely played; but I could skate better than any one in the school, and also managed to ride the bone- shaker bicycle owned by one of the boys— that I adored. All the while I was trying to learn drawing for myself, but did not know good from bad, and Ropes had gone and there was no one to tell me or show me. In Friends’ Library there were hardly any illustrated magazines—there were none that had any novels in them—only Har- PER’s and ScrIBNER’S, anyway, were pub- lished—and to see them and Goop Worps and Tue Art Journat and Tue Grapuic and Harper’s Weekty and Frank Lezs- Liz's, | had to walk seven miles down Germantown Avenue to Broad Street and down Broad toChestnut,and down Chest- nut to Tenth, to the Mercantile Library. Twelve cents could be better spent than on horse-car fare, but six cents were spent coming back, if I was too tired to walk. So I learned to tramp; but how long those tramps were sometimes. I vowed I would go, and I knew I should get back some- how, and that determination, Quaker grit, and nothing else, has carried me through many a long tramp, many a worse mess. So far, I have always got back somehow. Sometimes, when I had seen what I wanted and had ten cents, I would buy a railroad ticket from Ninth and Green to Wayne Station and not get off; then Kite, the conductor, who knew us all, would stop the train between there and Fisher’s Lane, bythe Young America cricket ground, and I, and possibly other boys, would be thrown off; and Kite would share in the glory, and we would finish the afternoon playing cricket, for all of us could play cricket; all Germantown did. It was cor- rect. Other people had fun with the cars. There was Miss X’s mother who took the horse cars—they lived in Doctor Y's house —because they were four cents cheaper than the steam cars, and she could also give tracts to people; and one morning some one had handed the conductor a bad five-cent piece, and he swore when he found it;and she said, ‘John Jones, istheesaved?”’ And he answered, ‘‘Missus X, it’s none of your damn business!’’ After that, and other happenings, they left Germantown and America for England, and the father lived in a tree, and did more quaint weird things as long as he was on earth. y father, really for my sake, I am M sure, bought old volumes of THE Grapuic and Tue Art Journat, L’Art, and Tue Portro.io, far better than any illustrated journals we have to-day, and subscribed for ScR1BNER’s, which then every one saw; and I began to copy things in them, and I got from the library Ruskin’s ELEMENTs OF Drawinc and Penley’s WATER Cotor ParntInG, and mixed them all up with Harding’s trees and George Reid’s landscapes, so it is not very wonderful if [1875 | 30 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR my ideas and my style got mixed too. I had not the brains to discriminate. I won- der if any one left alone has in the begin- ning; and there was no one toask. Besides, I was getting known as a sort of prodigy, and that is fatal to progress, for I have had to unlearn everything I picked up at that time. Had I been properly taught my craft, I would have been able to do far more and far better, for I have more brains than most people, but I had to unlearn every- thing and try to learn again in the right way later. [had told Ropes, though no one else, that I was going to be an illustrator, and the School bought a number of casts, mostly hands and feet, and some angels’ heads I had never seen before and never have since, and I drew them with stump, which he showed me how to work. I hated it then as I do now. Well can I re- member the principal coming into the ‘“‘Museum’’—a room with cases—where I was at work, sent to draw by myself, and where there was an anatomical man and shells and a microscope and books anda skeleton ina glass case. The princi- pal, when he saw me, sneered, *‘So thee’s got to drawing the human form divine, has thee?’’ And then he grinned at me. I could have killed him, Friend though Iwas. Little do talkative teachers know what their silent pupils think of them. I often wonder what my pupils think of me, but I hope I dont talk that way to them. I HAD determined to get into the school of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, which was to open in the new building on Broad Street in the fall of 1876. The Academy exhibition in the spring of that year was notable, for then it was that Chase, Shirlaw, Duveneck, Dielman, Twachtman, Muhrman, Cour- ier, Carl Marr, McLure Hamilton, had returned from Munich or Antwerp, and all sent to the Academy. Had they only been as clever commercially as they were artistically equal to the boys of Glasgow, an American School would have burst that year upon the world. The exhibition dazzled me so much that I went again and again, once taking with me one of the girl students. I was arrayed in a new Wanamaker imitation tweed suit to my own satisfaction, only marred by running into some other members of the class who had come to town too, and they laughed at me. I never had to struggle for want of money. I lived at home, and never at any time paid for anything; and, ina fit of business ability, I bought, as a bar- gain, a dozen Cochin China eggs for fifty cents. These all hatched—we kept chick- ens in the back yard—and I found myself possessed of twelve naked monsters, male and female after their kind, which finally clothed themselves with golden feathers and became the admiration of German- town. They took to laying and as the eggs—in fact, any eggs I had—now brought a dollar a dozen, I felt myself a financier. I could not tell Cochin eggs from other eggs, for we had other chick- ens. I regret to say that sometimes these eggs hatched Bantams instead of Cochin Chinas, and sometimes common fowls. Such things will happen when one has mixed chickens. So I was a flourishing enough little prig, soon able to ride to town, to go to picture shows, and to buy books—Ruskin’s Mopern Parnters and Hamerton’s INTELLECTUAL Lirz, and never finished either, and Gilchrist’s Biaxg, if you please—and to subscribe to magazines; or rather to get others to subscribe and to have a free copy myself by acting as agent for them. This state of things went on for months, till the grass in our front and back yards was all torn up by the beasts of Cochin China, and till they began to be stolen. And they would fly up on my { 1876 | ig ae oS t 4 MAIN STREET GERMANTOWN FROM A LITHOGRAPH MADE 1908 FOR OUR PHILADELPHIA IN THE SEVENTIES 'THE GERMANTOWN ROAD WAS LINED FOR MILES WITH BEAUTIFUL COLONIAL HOMES BEGINNING WITH THE LOGAN MANSION - AMONG OTHERS WERE THE JOHNSON HOUSES AND THIS ONE UPSALA FACED THE CHEWS’ THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OF ALL AT GERMANTOWN - DECORATING THE MEETING HOUSE 33 Aunt Martha’s shoulders and scare the life out of her, as well as nearly knocking her down. Then I sold them for a fabu- lous sum to one of the Copes, and lived for months in a riot of shows I rode to, at Earle’s and Haseltine’s, and of books I purchased and picked up in second- hand shops; and so began my collecting. I also thought to make a fortune out of peanuts and bought a pint of unroasted ones and planted them in the spring and they came up and blossomed and bloomed —all the chickens did not eat—but no nuts. And the summer and fall passed and the leaves fell and winter came; then one day I grabbed those barren stalks and pulled and pulled; the whole earth came up—not earth but peanuts. But I did not go into the business. EFORE the school closed in 1876, I ey ie to graduate with three girls— the first boy to do so; I had been through a course of natural history or geology or something of the sort. I forget it all, save that in the Museum were some trilo- bites and that I drew them and a ship at sea in pen and ink, a subject I had imag- ined, for I had never made any sketches on my brief trips to Boston or down the bay in Copes’ ships or to Atlantic City. My father used to take me on the out- going ships, and we would stay on board till the pilot left at the Capes. And I re- member the sailors singing, “‘We're off to Philadelphia in the morning,’’ though they, blind drunk, had been carried aboard thenight before. Mysketcheswereframed, I dont know why, and hung in the big schoolroom. I wonder what became of them or my seascape invention; all lost, I suppose, like the plain language which has fled from the school. Only Walter Cope, of my contemporaries, 1s remem- bered. Though one of my Liberty Loan War posters hangs in it now. B uT before I graduated, several things happened. John Cope, who did not graduate, and I really distinguished our- selves. The new Meeting House in the School yard was being painted outside, and one day, during the long recess, we climbed on to the top of the porch, watched by all the pupils, including the to-be Mrs. Berenson, and in broad day- light, took the painters’ pots and brushes and executed, in real fresco, a full-length portrait of an eminent Friend, in “‘broad brim and shad-belly’’, a symphony in brown, the only paint the painters had— an overseer of the Meeting and member of the School Committee whom we hated. We also wrote up the names of the streets on which the Meeting House faced on the walls of the building. Now this Friend, without our noticing it, happened to be taking the air in his back garden across Coulter Street and seeing what was being done, came over, and we found him waiting for us at the foot of the ladder when the bell rang for us to go back to work, and we were greeted by him as well as by the as- sembled pupils and teachers and painters when we climbed down. Suffice it to say that, after an emergency meeting of the School Committee and the Overseers of the Meeting, it was decided that as John Cope and I would be leaving in a few wecks, and as John Cope—son of a Committeeman and the son of an Elder and a Cope—was hopelessly involved, it would not do to expel him, and they could not therefore expel me. So, save for a lecture before the whole school and a bill for removing the work of art, it was thought best to ignore my first and last attempt at mural painting and Church or Meeting House decoration. But for years the ghost of a portrait still remained on the walls and was pointed out, I under- stand, as my work; and that is all I left | 876 | 34 CHAPTER III - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR almost as tradition, in the school. I had one other experience with a committee- man. We were playing foot ball our way, just kicking it about, in the big school grounds one day after Meeting—for we played everywhere save in the graveyards. He joined in,‘‘broad brim and shad-belly,”’ and I gave the ball a fearsome kick, I usu- ally missed it, and it took him square in his face, which was covered by it—it even went behind his ears as his hat flew off. He just looked at me as he emerged from the ball; he said nothing, but I wonder what he thought—and what he thought when one day I saw him again in his back yard smoking a big cigar, for cigars and plain clothes dont seem to belong together. I never saw another plain Friend smoke. GRADUATION essay had to be pre- A pared and I suggested that I should write mine on the paintings at the Cen- tennial—my first incursion into art criti- cism. This necessitated a number of visits to the Exhibition, beginning with the opening ceremonies. I was delighted, for I saw Abbey and Reinhart and I do not know how many other illustrators, over a big doorway, sketching President Grant. There were no snap-shotters then, and I turned my back on the President to watch the illustrators sketch. Then, too, I made the acquaintance of the Eng- lishman who was running the London Grapuic show, in which were a number of original sketches and drawings, and they interested me far more than the tele- phone and the Emperor of Brazil, both novelties. And I also had my first fall off a tall bicycle, which I saw for the first time and tried. Still, despite these attractions, the essay was written, it 1s lost, but I remember it was about three pictures— Wagner's Chariot Race in the Circus Maximus; one of a martyr having his feet roasted by inquisitors; and the subject of the third I have forgotten, as well as what I said of all of them, and the names of the two other painters. I do, however, remember Holman Hunt’s portrait of himself, now in the Uffizi, and a Slinger, by Leighton, and that is all, although I believe there were things by Whistler, of whom I had never heard. Soon the ‘‘Mother’’ was to hang in the Pennsylvania Academy, and though the directors could have had it for five hun- dred dollars, they had not the brains to get it, or anything else by him, and they bought a ridiculous Greaves “‘portrait’’ instead. While one of the directors, John- son, had a fake Whistler, and his real one, ‘The Lange Leizen,’’ has been ruined, and of Widener’s,another director's, ‘River Scene,’’ I have my doubts too. On the other hand, there are two superb Whis- tlers in Philadelphia almost unknown, ‘The Yellow Buskin’’ and‘‘Mrs.Cassatt.”’ Mr. John Braun has a third, a “‘ White Girl.’’ The lost portrait of “‘ Lady Archi- bald Campbell as Orlando,’ turned up one rainy night in the city and I was able to identify it, but it has disappeared again. And there was a set of the “Thames Etch- ings’ given by Whistler to Dr. James Dar- rach with whom Dr. Whistler studied medicine in Philadelphia, but they were ‘destroyed, while Mr. Claghorn’s Whis- tlers were sold and scattered, instead of going to the Print Collection of the Academy of Fine Arts. But many strange things happen in the Quaker City. lees essay was read in the Committee Room, or Preparative Meeting Room of the Meeting House, the first time such a thing happened, and I was compli- mented and presented with a diploma, and a bouquet by the girls who did not graduate, and covered with confusion. And so ended my school life, the unhap- piest six years of all my life. [1876 } BraPiBR IV, AT THE INDUSTRIAL ART. SCHOOL BEGINNING TO STUDY SERIOUSLY: BECOME A CLERK: ENTER SCHOOL OF ART :- STUDY A YEAR : EXPELLED FROM SCHOOL f COAL WHARF AT KENSINGTON +: DRAWING MADE APRIL 27 1879 WHILE AT THE SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ART - uT of a little of the proceeds of the saleofthechickensto Alfred Cope—for every one was sick of the brutes—I bought some casts of hands and feet and had a big sum left, and during the Centennial summer, boiling hot days in the little upstairs back sitting room, I pegged away at what I was sure were masterpieces, to be sub- mitted for my admission to the Academy School, which was to open in the fall in the new building on Broad Street. Or I would wander with the boys, also loafing, AN EARLY WONDER OF WORK IN WHICH I WAS EVEN THEN INTERESTED from the source to the mouth of the creeks near by, the Wingohocking, Perkiomen, Wissahickon, playing all sorts of pranks by the way, from stealing apples to chas- ing cats or having stone fights with other boys; or in the back lots at home wallop- ing the ‘‘Satan”’ kids—they sell my prints now—or knocking the front teeth out of the Maguire gang with stones. These wicked, naughty boys were not, most of them, good little Friends. We alwayswon, or thought we did, these battles; we al- ways tan when anything happened, usu- [1876 ] 36 CHAPTER IV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR ally pursued by the other gang’s parents who threatened our parents.On Hallow- e’en we scared people stiff by setting up spooks in the graveyard or tying door- bells together, or going around with Jack- o’lanterns when we did not bob for apples ina tub at‘home. HE Old Logan house, Stenton, then lie was a favorite haunt. It was owned by the head of the family, a sort of Borgia it was said, who used to tramp round with a gun and threaten to shoot us. It was near the Browns’ big house and we would break in through the cellar windows and go upstairs and try to pry the Dutch tiles out of the chimney pieces, crawl behind the paneling of the walls, and hunt in the cellars for the entrance to the secret tunnel that led under the great avenue of trees beyond the box- hedged garden, to the graveyard. There was an open vault by the graves which we knew was the entrance to the tunnel, but we never dared go in and we never could find the exit in the house. But that tunnel was real to us—teal as the persim- mons in the garden. As I grew older I would wander by myself as far as the Wissahickon by the McGargie and Rit- tenhouse paper mills, where we had shied stones and mud in the pulp troughs by the roadside. Maybe that is why some of the paper is so bad when I try to print my etchings on it. Once I went away up Germantown Avenue to Cresheim Creek, winding then through open fields till it came to the glen and then the gorge which carries it to the Wissahickon. It was so beautiful that I sat down, all alone, and cried for the beauty of it. And then I tried to draw it. That beauty is gone and my drawing is gone, in the War, and now there are great sham Ital- ian palaces, big pictorial French chateaux and ladies’ swell studios, and winding paths, and school picnics and newspapers and the filth the new American breeds wherever he goes. And the difficulty of getting there is all that remains, if you have not gota car, and I have not. I SENT my drawings in to the Academy Schools and after months of waiting I was told I had not been admitted and asked to remove them. So sure was I of admission still, that I produced a number more imaginative marines in pen and ink, the result of our annual trip to Atlantic City; my father had them framed, and I sent them in to the first exhibition in the new building of the Academy. I got them back, too. This should have fin- ished me as an illustrator, but it only convinced me that I was right and the Academy was wrong, and that some day I would be an illustrator and prove it, and then they would receive me—and— well—not so long ago, they gave us, Mrs. Pennell and myself, a reception, with all Philadelphia on “‘the receiving line’’—and that was worse than being rejected, but even now they refuse to | hang my portrait, by John McLure Ham- ilton, though lam the only student in the last quarter of a century who has made a reputation. Some of the past students are more notorious locally and win more prizes annually, but that is their business. At that time the Academy entrance ex- amination was stiff and the tuition was free. And I believe, now that Ihave taught in both Europe and America, that such a system is better than the present one in most art schools where the entrance examination is a farce for those who can pay the school fees and then loaf their days away. po not believe in the modernart school. I If any one will study art, let him go to a master who can teach, and work with him, and learn the trade and the craft. [1876 } THE INDUSTRIAL ART SCHOOL - MY THEORIES OF STUDY Sy) If the student comes through, he becomes an artist. All other art schools should be abolished and art-school masters be allowed to starve or made to work, in- stead of fooling fools for the fees they get, if they make their classes pay. A master may run a school, but it should be a shop where the pupils from the be- ginning learn to do something. It is the only way to learn, the way of the past, when there were many trained crafts- men, and because of their training a few became artists. I know, for I have proved it—in my own classes. But to-day the average student only wants to learn enough to teach and to preach what he cannot practise, and so make a living and be called an artist. Most of the men only want to flirt with the girls in the lunch rooms and work enough to win the easily won prizes that have to be awarded, and the girls do the same— only they try to marry the men. They squander about ten thousand dollars a year now on prizes in the Pennsylvania Academy.Then not a cent was wasted that way. John Alexander told me that a woman once came to him and asked to be taken as a pupil. He said, ‘Madam, I do not take pupils.’’ “‘Oh, Mr. Alex- ander, I would only come one hour one day each week.”’ ‘‘Madam,”’ said he, “‘I have been working every hour every day every year of my life and I dont know enough yet.’ ‘‘Oh,”’ said she, ‘‘I dont want to do that: I only want to learn enough to teach.”’ M y chicken profits had not even been used up by a visit to Downingtown, where some of the family lived. On that trip I made endless drawings in the man- ner of Ropes—I could not get out of it— in pencil and white chalk on gray paper. And I mdde my first sale, one dollar paid me by Friend Jane E. Mason, the mother of some of the pupils at Germantown School, for a drawing of rocks on a hill- side near Downingtown. I also remem- ber I did a cider mill, an early Wonder of Work. I went on copying casts and drawings in the house, and making sketches out of doors—and my father kept me and my mother never said any- thing. I even tried to make comics for Harper’s WEEKLY and to force my way on to THE Dairy Grapuic of New York— the first American daily illustrated news- paper and still the only American daily in which large original drawings have been used to any extent—as a special correspondent capable of running to fires in Philadelphia. Once I went to some celebration at Valley Forge, and got up with the ‘‘special artists’ in their box— there were no ‘‘photo artists’, none of the tribe of “‘commercial artists’’, then— and I worked giddily until I was asked by some inquisitive fool what I was working for—then I was nearly thrown out and quite disgraced as an impostor by the real artists, who pointed to Frank H. Taylor, the official correspondent of Tue Grapuic. But he was decent to me then and afterwards, for he knew that I wanted to be an illustrator. VENTUALLY most of my chicken E money was spent and I was ashamed of loafing, and it was suggested that I should go into a furniture factory, whose owner, luckily, did not see why; then that I work in an architect’s office for nothing; but the architect wanted a pre- mium as well and my father did not see the reason for that. In this case, how- ever, America lost, for architects now are glad to welcome me as an Honorary Associate here and in Europe. Then Mr. J. B., the original Lippincott, thought I might come and stick stamps on his letters. This I refused—and now they [1877] 38 want my books. And then I tried to make designs for Dobson's carpet mills. All I had to do was, I was told, to draw flowers, and if I could have done that, I could have done more than most design- ers. But when I showed them the gera- nium, my flower that Richards liked, and some dock leaves and golden rod and dog- wood and skunk cabbages I drew because I liked them, they refused absolutely to have me. Finally, when I was quite con- vinced there was before me nothing but making drawings no one wanted, I was offered a post in the Philadelphia and Reading Coal and Iron Company’s office in Germantown, at a salary of seven dol- lars a week, to sell coal. I had, I admit, even then a contempt for business, but more for the American business man, who is always shoving his way into art by doing good to it and advertising himself. I commenced to prove my belief, other- wise I should have been a railroad presi- dent, which more than one of my contem- poraries, without half my brains, have become. It killed them, or else they have had to retire. As to retiring, I remember once, John Sargent, who was properly taught and had the brains to take advan- tage of it, is said to have told Miss Mary Cassatt, ‘I think I shall retire:’ ““Retire!”’ said Miss Cassatt, ‘‘I have heard of house painters retiring, but I never heard of an artist who wanted to.”’ Bout the same time that I started in A business, the Pennsylvania School of Industrial Art announced its opening ina. ramshackle building on Broad Street near Race. Isent in my rejected pen drawings and unappreciated flower sketches and neg- lected angel feet, and was accepted at once as a free scholar. Then my life began. I had to be at the coal office at seven in the morn- ing and calm Irish carters and coax expa- triated British cotton or woolen spinners CHAPTER IV : THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR | to buy coal, and steal their custom from our rivals. It was so easy for any but business men. And I had to stay in and around the office till six in the evening. At seven- thirty, I had to be at the school on North Broad Street, and I stayed there till it shut up at ten, and then I had to loaf in the streets orat the Ninthand Green Street De- pot till the eleven forty-five train took me back to Germantown. Under these condi- tions, I had not much energy to devote to coaland its distribution. But it seems that I increased the profits of the Company at our office. And when, after a year, my chief, Mr. Alkins, became ill, I ran the yard. But the final burst of glory came when, single-handed, I went through the railroad strike of 1877. During this strike there was in the Germantown Depot of the Reading Railroad a telegraph opera- tor we all knew as Billy Van Horne. Was he the picture collector, amateur painter, railroad magnate, and expatriated Amer- ican I afterwards used to hear of ? If so, I am responsible for his interest in art. But he too is dead of too much business. t the end of the strike I was promoted A to an office of my own at Chestnut Hill. As before my promotion, I had al- ready all the responsibility for the larger office and about as much as I wanted to do, I considered it a promotion down- ward, and in six days, despite the en- treaties of the Company and the staff, I re- signed and left. There was consternation in the main office, contemptuous surprise outside of it, and regret in the family. My father never said one word against it, never charged me one cent for my ex- penses, though I lived at home; but my aunts were horrified. So great was the commotion that the matter was discussed in Germantown Friends’ Meeting, I was told. I was also told that as Benjamin West, a Friend, had started ina log hut in [1878 ] a oS eevee ee a Pe ee ae ee ee Chester County and ended as President of the Royal Academy and by being buried in St. Paul’s Cathedral in London—though for this I do not know if he was not turned out of Meeting—if I really believed I ought to devote myself to illustration, _ THE INDUSTRIAL ART SCHOOL - IN BUSINESS 39 Bryn Mawr College, caught me in the train and warned me that no one who had neither strength nor courage could ever do anything, even in art. He never knew how near I came to telling him what I thought of him and the people like him, S THE BRIDGE NEAR DOWNINGTOWN : MY FIRST LITHOGRAPH TO BE DRAWN ON ZINC WITH PEN AND LITHOGRAPHIC INK - PRINTED ON A PRESS IN GERMANTOWN AUGUST 21 1877 the Meeting would not put any objections in my way. I scarcely see how they could, for, before this, Howard Pyle, Mary Hal- lock Foote and W. T. Smedley, all Friends, the last a member of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, had made their reputa- tions as illustrators and were making a living too. So why should I not try and see what I could do? This was the Meet- ing’s decision; but I shall never forget the _afternoon that Doctor James Rhoads, afterwards President of the Trustees of and of his running a college, even though he was an Overseer of Meeting. How little do such men, armed with health, strength, money, place and above all, ig- norance and conceit, understand those who have made up their minds, their real minds, to get something and get some- where, despite their physical and social drawbacks! That poor man, far as he was from imagining it, only increased my de- termination to succeed; and I have had to fight that sort of person all my life. But {1878 | 40 CHAPTER IV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR even as he talked to me, I remembered Poe and Stevenson and Homer and Mil- ton, and all the rest of the diseased who had courage if they had not the strength, though this is nothing to-day, when we only cultivate our arms and legs and starve our brains, and keep our bellies going on predigested food out of cold storage and soft drinks. HILE I was in business, many things ve happened. There were adventures in the office which never got outside of it. We had a wonderful yard foreman, an Irishman, the twin of Lincoln in face and figure. Carncross and Dixie brought out a turn with Lincoln in it, and our foreman was found and tried. The first night he was so scared that he made his exit through the scenery when the curtain went up; but after that he was a success, so much so that one day a most elegant gentleman appeared at the box office and bought the whole front row, saying, “‘I hope there will be nothing offensive to- night, for this row is engaged for the Gardners of Boston.”’ “‘Oh, no, sir,’’ said the box-office man. And when the cur- tain went up, there the Gardners were. All went well till Mr. Bones said to Mr. Jones, ‘I done hear such a funny story to- day.’ ‘‘Did yer, Mr. Bones?’’ “Yes, Mr. Jones. Well, it was like this, ha, ha—ha, ha, ha!’’ “‘Hol’ on,’’ Mr. Bones said to Mr. Jones, ‘‘am dat story all right?’’ “Why, Mr. Jones, yer done ast me such a thing?’’ ‘‘Why, Mr. Bones, dont yer, dont yer know de Gardners of Boston is here ?’’ The Gardners’ exit was superb.: uT the best of all was my break. I was Bae being complimented by the management, and one day as I was tiredly hearing the compliments of the manager, the postman shied a big package from the head office on the desk. The manager tore it open. ‘‘Hum, caught thee at last!’’ And after looking it over, he said, ““Thee has, I see, left a date out of thy report and so they have sent the papers back’’—those big, senseless, business sheets that any real business man would dispense with. ‘‘What’s thee got to say to that?”’ ““Well’; said I, ‘‘I’ve got to say that if the fool on Fourth Street had had the sense to add the date himself and initial it, when all the others were properly filled out, he would not have stopped making up the accounts for two days and cost the com- pany six cents for postage.’’ “‘Hum,’’ said the manager again. I learned afterward that ‘‘the smart Aleck’’, as the manager called him, was Harrison S. Morris, later novelist, millionaire, poet; but we did not know at that time how we should de- velop, or I should. They promoted me; I do not know if they turned him out. I did not know him then, a clerk too. THER adventures had nothing to do with work, for even in a railroad office, as in all offices, hours come when there is nothing to do; at any rate, they came to my office. I used them for draw- ing. I bought a paint box and tubes of ivory black and flake white, and every- thing about the place was put down on brown paper in black and white. At . night, when I stayed home, I practised on the family. I made one drawing of my Aunt Beulah, in Friends’ dress, her char- acter in it, and it proved very interesting. It disappeared, destroyed in the senseless War. Then I would get days off. And my etching began, or it had begun before that. When Ropes showed me a plate he had made on glass at Tivoli, | went to Hinkle’s, the photographer on Main Street, and had one prepared, and on it I drew and Hinkle printed a view of Stenton, as I have told. This, I believe, is my first etching, cer- tainly the first exhibited, for it was put in Hinkle’s window. So far as I know, [1878 | COAL BREAKER AT WILKES-BARRE PENNSYLVANIA + LITHOGRAPH MADE FOR THE UNITED STATES FUEL DEPARTMENT DURING THE WAR I9I17 + THE ORIGINAL IS IN THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS AT WASHINGTON +: SHOWING DEVELOPMENT OF THE WONDER OF WORK _—- THE INDUSTRIAL ART SCHOOL - CHARLES M. BURNS 43 not a copy was sold, though the photog- rapher published it, and I really believe he was an honest publisher. But it did have one good result. It introduced me, through its exhibition, to Colin Camp- bell Cooper, who became a painter. He and his brother Sam, who became a prig, were issuing a paper devoted to German- town affairs—THE GERMANTOWN SOCIAL. He gave me a commission, for the pure glory of seeing myself in print, to makea drawing with lithographic ink on a zinc plate. Ifit came out in the magazine, this was my first published appearance. The lithographer had a place in a back yard on Queen Street, Germantown, almost op- posite to where Alexander and Birge and Butler Harrison lived, though I did not know them then. Still, I had not much time for work and experiment except in the evenings at the School of Industrial Art, where there was a great deal too much mechanical and too little industrial art for my taste, and there were consider- able differences of opinion between the mathematical professor and myself. ee was one professor, Charles M. Burns, who taught everything save decoration and geometry. He taught us how to use our eyes and how to use our tools, and he made us do work outside and criticized not only our work but the way we did it. Most of the students could not stand his criticisms, and he could not stand them, and so the class dwindled. A few of the students were not discouraged when they brought in a drawing which they thought fine, and said, “‘I did that standing up,’’ and ‘Oh, well,’’ said the professor, ‘there is nothing wonderful in that! Why didnt you do it standing on your head?”’ Or when one had elaborately blocked in a whole figure and was very proud of it, he was told, ‘“‘I know a man who dont block in anything—just be- gins with the head and goes right down to the feet, and draws miles better than you.’ A few of us did like, or submitted to, his criticisms and spent all the time we could in his class. I even managed to get days off from the office, though I wonder now that I was not sacked for it. And we would go to Burns’ office on Wal- nut Street. He was an architect, the only real modern architect Philadelphia has had, utterly unknown to the city, but his Convent at Cornwalls lives. He would show us things about etching. Once he drew a design ona grounded brass plaque, filled it with acid and went home. In the morning not only was the plaque etched through, but the floor and the ceiling of the room beneath. Wee formed a little group within the class and sketched allover the town, from the Museum of Industrial Art to Cramp’s Shipyard and the coal wharves in Kensington, and etchings were made of them ; mine were all destroyed in the War. Long beforethis, my father, whoreally had aninterest inthe Wonder of Work,had been out to the oil regions of Pennsylvania and had taken me to the coal regions up around Tamaqua and Mahanoy City, and Mauch Chunk, and I had made drawings of breakers and mines, all gone in the War. S o the love of drawing work, for work's sake, was born in me, not “‘borne in upon me’’, as Friends say. And in my first article, ‘‘In the Mash’’, in THz Century, there is an oil refinery, and in the Beth- lehem article, the second, are the steel works. Schwab and I must have debutted about the same time. Once I showed him an etching of the Edgar Thompson Works at Bessemer, and he said, “‘One day I looked down on those works, from the same point, and I determined to get in— I started as a water boy but in five—was it?—years I was general manager.’ But [1878 } 44 CHAPTER IV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR he never thanked me for the proof of the etching I sent him, and as for his picture gallery! In fact, Schwab is just lucky. He is never tired of telling you so—‘ ‘Happy,’ he calls it. But he simply hung on to Car- negie as that canny man hung on to any- thing handy, and they could not help get- ting rich, their only aim, the aim of all great Americans of their sort. Schwab has a few good stories which he tells over and over. I dont know how often he got them off during the War. There was one of the time he and Carnegie were going to the Pennsylvania State College to get degrees —there was a reason—and he came into their sleeping car to dress as the train got near, and he found their valet wedged un- der a bureau. ‘“What’s the matter, John?” said Schwab. The valet wriggled out. “‘I am leaving,’ ’said he.‘’Why?’’ said Schwab. ‘Because I aint going to slave for two millionaires what's only got one collar button between ‘em, and they lost that!’’ The coal mines then were run by English and Welsh miners and they would tell me in the coal office, that if I was sent up there, to go to the house of the English boss, for he would feed me on chicken and champagne in a clean parlor, and not to the American hotel, where I should have bacon rinds and whisky in a dirty dining room. Now the mines are mismanaged by golfing presidents and run by strik- ing mongtels from ‘‘mittel Europa’, and when I was there the other day I saw minarets and domes and spires of all the religious sects—save the Jews, who dont work with their hands—all over the land- scape, and I found signs in three languages, none of which I could read, and when I asked a real American if he knew Ger- man, French, Italian—‘‘Nope, none of them jaw rattles; but I do know Polack, Slovac, Roosac—them goes here.’’ He had almost forgotten his American. Nn our sketching expeditions from the school, a fellowstudent,G.D.Gideon, who was in a publisher’s office, usually went, and he drew much better than I. Harry McCarter was in the class, but he never prowled about, even then his feeling _for decoration and his compositions were the admiration and amazement of us all. So was his modesty; but he quickly forgot that and now is looked up to by the elect of Philadelphia, instead of downon,as he then was by the select. Every time there was a fire, after the school closed, Gideon and I, forgetting offices to-morrow, ran to it and made sketches. Why only fires appealed to us as subjects for illustration, Idonot know. When the sketches were made, they were posted at once to editors. So far as I re- member, not one was ever printed; but in those days editors did more editing and not infrequently a note of encourage- ment accompanied the returned drawing. One night, as we came out of school, we saw a splendid blaze downtown and we ran down Arch Street to find it oppo- site Friends’ Meeting House. Here was a chance. I was a Friend, the hose was going in the big gate, and we could go too and work from the wall. “‘John Jones,’ said I to the caretaker who was keeping the gate, ‘‘Thee knows me. Please let me in. Thee knows I am a Friend!’’ And he answered, ‘‘No, I dont and I wont, and I dont care a damn if thee is.’ Gideon laughed. No sketch was made from the Meeting House Yard that night. D URING the first year of my evening class at the Art School, two things happened. I bought a bicycle, which in many ways helped me, and, in more, hin- dered me. And I made my first etching on copper. How I found the money or the time to do either, Ido not know. But the head of the office was most kind, perhaps because he knew that little Friends of that {1878 } CHARLES M. BURNS ARCHITECT - PROFESSOR OF DRAWING AND DESIGN AT THE PENNSYL- VANIA SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ART UNDER WHOM I STUDIED 1877-1879 - BY WAYMAN ADAMS PAINTING MADE ABOUT I9I7 - IN THE MEANTIME BURNS DID MUCH GOOD ARCHITECTURAL WORK IN AND AROUND PHILADELPHIA - A NOTABLE EXAMPLE IS THE CONVENT AT CORNWALLS 46 CHAPTER IV - THE ADVENTURES OR AN TELUSTRATOER period were without vice, on the surface. I never smoked, drank, or saw the inside of a theater till I was twenty. Of course, I had smoked corn husks and reeds—and drunk hard cider. There is no priggish- ness or vittue in this; it is merely a fact. Whether Gerome Ferris or Fred Waugh went to the Industrial Art School, I do not remember. I think Ferris did, for dur- ing the year he took me to his father’s studio on Chestnut Street and I came into another new world. Ferris, his son, and his two nephews, the Morans, Percy and Leon, were soaked in modern Spanish art. Ferris, the father, owned Fortuny’s etch- ings and photogravures after Rico; he had copied Fabres and Casanova; he talked of the Fortunys and Ricos in the Gibson and Johnson collections, and we went to see them, and I think he knew Madame For- tuny. Not only had the illustrators and engravers of Europe acknowledged this groupof Spaniards as masters, butthrough the help of Ferris, who was always ready to show his things, Blum, Brennan and Lungren, the most brilliant, the most skilled craftsmen and illustrators America has produced, were enabled to form their style. They studied for a while in Phila- delphia. They came from Cincinnati—and stopped in Philadelphia to work with Eakins—why Blum and Lungren left the Middle-West I do not know, but I heard that Brennan, who was on a paper, was sent down the Ohio to draw a steamboat explosion, but he stopped on the way and when he got there only the smokestack was sticking out above the water—he did that, but he left the paper and came East. TEPHEN Ferris had more to do with Sie founding of the best period of Amer- ican illustration and engraving and print- ing than he himself had any idea of. Be- sides showing me all this Spanish work, an inspiration for what I was soon to do —I somehow had the brains to take ad- vantage of it—he showed me the tech- nique of etching, and little in etching that he taught me have I since had to unlearn. I never saw him etch but once or twice, and then he did a whole plate before me and explained, by practice, everything. I started to makea plate. My first subject on copper was an old mill near Wister’s Dam, and on my big flat desk in the office, amid reports, schedules and forms of the Philadelphia and Reading Coal and Iron Company, the plate was bitten. The desk was burned, my clothes were ruined—and I was not sacked but got a day off and rushed down to the printers in Dock Street and stood by while a proof was pulled. One day I dropped some acid on my stock- ing and never knew it until I founda hole in my foot and my shoe full of blood. S UMMER came and I went to Dingman’s Ferry and encountered a relic of the Hudson River School at work there, and under his influence made, Iam certain, the worst water color ever seen. I also made, away from his influence, an etching or two. They are destroyed and, luckily, so is the water color. But I found my- self the hero of a story. One morning I was sketching a frame house beyond a field, a woman came out of the house and looked over the fence, and a man joined her. Then, picking up a pitchfork and keeping the fence between us, and follow- ing round the field until he got behind me, he looked at the drawing and re- marked, so it could be heard all over the ten-acre lot, ‘‘Nope, M’riar, he aint mad; he’s only makin’ maps!’ As it was impor- tant that I should finish my water color, I stayed about a week over my vacation time—and yet was not sacked; stayed while the trees turned, and at last came back in the early morning stage, thick frost on the trees and ground, to the [1879 } ait ¢ PbS INDUSIRIAL ART SCHOOL - EXPELLED A] Bs. STUDIES AT THE INDUSTRIAL ART SCHOOL Water Gap, stopping for a breakfast of buckwheat cakes and coffee in the dawn. How it warmed me; how good it was. Now one could not get breakfast, or would shiver on cereals and force—"‘pre- digested food’’ Maxfield Parrish called it —the best thing he ever said or did. All the while I was sadly thinking of the pretty girls I had left behind me at the Ferry; though I was deadly afraid of girls when I grew up, they were always nice to look at and to think about. HE Art School opened again in the fall T and we allturned up, the little set who worked with Professor Burns, and they, before long, under my leadership, refused to have anything to do with the mechan- ical master, or as little as possible. We were undoubtedly working to get the most we could out of the school, accord- ing to our lights, but we were undoubt- edly in open mutiny. The first thing I knew I was called up one night by Pro- fessor Burns and told either that I must leave the place or that the mechanical end of the school must, and he thought it easier to get rid of me; but if I liked, he had arranged it, having shown my work, I could enter the Antique Class at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts the next evening. I had escaped; peace was with honor; I still had the Professor as a friend, and had till he died. I had triumphed over the Academy and the Professor of Mechanical Drawing. I al- ways trample on such people. I do not suppose a more conceited prig could be found, even in Philadelphia, than I was. Tue Pennsytvania Mustum anp Scnoor or Inpusraiat Akt, MeMoxIAL Hart, FAImMOUNT Paxk, Philadelphia, Dror 2 AATF? Ae Le. A cote ash eoferrece eines ee oe PIII feck Pit fececelecl oA feng ree Ke. Fo Ae AP eee fy ferme pase “¢ Cater or gree Facet « ae pe PBS oe ee Agius : A forere > atts Decent) fecconee ogee! Cesta Mrcoriece FERC Cee ren-th eZ, Zz 0 Cee ee eae a ANS ’ elk va . ee cS Chr e es Ae NOTICE OF MY EXPULSION FROM THE SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL ART - NOVEMBER 27 1879 [1879 | 48 CHAPTER JV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILUUSTRATOR ut the results were disastrous for the B Industrial Art School. Nearly all the best pupils left for the Academy. How they got in, I do not know; but before long there we all were, and for another és : : a vy year the little group held together. Now my name appears in the Industrial Art School catalogue as an alumnus of that antiquated state supported institution. AT CARNCROSS AND DIXIE’S WHEN THE GARDNERS CAME TO THE SHOW DRAWN DURING BUSINESS HOURS AT THE COAL YARD OFFICE IN 1878 CHAPTER V: IN THE ACADEMY SCHOOL: STUDYING WITH EAKINS - HIS TEACHING AND LECTURING -: MY EXPE RIENCES IN SCHOOL - MY FIRST COMMISSION - I WORK FOR THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY - MAKE DRAWINGS FOR HARPERS Ee ee vi OLD MILL AT GERMANTOWN : ONE OF MY FIRST ETCHINGS 1880 * PRINTED IN THE PENNSYL- VANIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY ’S JOURNAL - ANOTHER EARLY WONDER OF WORK IN PHILADELPHIA HERE were some weeks between my leaving the Industrial Art School for the Academy Schools and my resigning from the coal office; besides, at the Industrial School, I broke down but went on working—differ- ent from my students nowadays! We did not know what “‘nervous breakdowns’’ were. At first in the Academy I worked only at night. I suppose I had to sign papers before Corliss, the Secretary, and Whipple, the Curator, introduced me. And I am also sure Henry, the colored janitor, did something else. But there was no hazing. I just sat down beside a man named Wimbush, an Englishman; he was the swell draughtsman. Years later he had a studio under Whistler's in Fitzroy Street, London, and there I met him again, and that is all I know of him. Wimbush was drawing from the cast, and I went at one, too. I could not say whose head then, nor can I now, but it was one of those old Romans who look exactly like the average American, just as brutal and puffy and stupid and shaven. Howells pointed this out to me in the Uffizi when I was working with him in Italy. And there is a whole row of Roman senators or American toughs in a corridor of the British Museum; under them Rome fell and we are going the same way. After a night or so, the Professor was brought into the classroom by his daughter or { 1880 | 50 CHAPTER V - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Whipple. Whipple, the Curator, was little and black and hairy and lame. The Pro- fessor was little and white and bald, made like that, the students said, by eating the ends of tubes of white lead as a steady diet. What Whipple had done I do not know, or what had been done to him. By the time the Professor had ceased compli- menting Wimbush and been helped to his feet, I was thoroughly scared. He just glanced at my work. Of course, it was vile, the first head I had ever attempted from the antique at night. He said, ‘Vy you dry do improve on der gast!’’ and was helped on. That criticism, which I have no doubt the old man had got off hundreds of times before, would have done most students good; it did me harm. Had he taken the same trouble to tell me where my work was bad, even if all over, as he did to praise the self-evident, slick, superficial correctness of the prize stu- dent, it might have been of some use to both of us, certainly to Wimbush. How- ever, the Professor and Wimbush have disappeared ; I still rest. I knew the Pro- fessor’s name, but not his work. After that I had no respect for him personally, no admiration for his pictures when I saw them later, though they were better than those of some of his better known con- temporaries. His criticism was not criti- cism, for I was trying, though all wrongly. What was he there for? What did he do? He offended me, he did not teach me, and after that Wimbush patronized me. But before the Professor had tottered to the next easel, I had made up my mind that I would never be treated like that by him again, and he never got the chance. I went out when he came in to criticize. So far as I can remember, I never saw the Professor again. At that time there could not have been twenty-five students in the night Antique, and if we had enough abil- ity, or, as in my case, pull, if you choose, to gain admission, it was his duty to en- courage, or discourage, not to insult us. I have never forgotten the shame of that night, for the school snickered. That old man did me a wrong. Criticism may be brutal, but it should never be insolent. I try not to insult my students, though they tell me sometimes they expect I will. One of them whom I fired told me I had. oon I joined the day Antique where S there was another and different sort of Professor—Thomas Eakins. On his advice to paint, I sailed in, in black and white oils on the Ilysus. Somehow that went better, and something in the painting or drawing, for I was merely drawing in monochrome with paint blindly, ap- pealed to the Professor and he sent me to the Life Class, which he also directed. The others, Fred Stokes, Gerome Ferris and Fred Waugh, were left alone to learn to draw. I, in those days, was far too clever to have to do this. Poor me. 4p HERE was no initiation to the Life Class, either. One just went in at the beginning of the pose, drew a number, sat down and began to work. Everybody painted, but I started in with pen and ink. The class stared. In it at that time was Philip Hahs, whom every one thought a genius and continued to think so until he died, very soon after; how many geniuses go that way; A. B. Frost, an old student; T. Anshutz, who became Eakins’ succes- sor; Charles Fromuth; J. J. Boyle; and half a hundred, probably more, some of whose names I never knew, and of few, I fear,even the small world of Philadelphia ever heard. Everything was free once the examination was passed—Life, Antique, Modeling, Composition Classes, and Lec- tures. There were no prizes, no paid or free scholarships, no traveling purses. If a student got hard up, and lots did, he { 1880 } C THOMAS EAKINS PROFESSOR AT THE PENNSYLVANIA ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS PHILADELPHIA DIPLOMA PORTRAIT BY HIMSELF IN THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN NEW YORK CITY 52 CHAPTER V - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR disappeared or he posed to us; we thought nothing of that. Quaint things happened, but they concern nobody save those who lived and learned in the school. There were Doctor Keen’s anatomy lectures, when a skeleton, a stiff and a model, and the darky Henry, all jerked and jumped together when a battery was turned on. Henry yelled. Eakins gave comparative lectures at which all the Trustees turned up. They would have been thought lurid in Paris schools, but not by us in Phila- delphia. I once a few years ago talked to the students of the Academy, but I was not asked again by the Directors. I often am asked by the Fellowship. It is a queer feeling to talk in the old lecture room where I heard Seymour Haden and Keen. I Gort it soon. Never had a big pen draw- ing been set before the astonished eyes of the Professor, back from the Beaux Arts, Gérdme, and the Hospitals. He did go for it, and there was reason. But so mad was I, that ever after, during the year or so I was supposed to belong to the class, when he came in the room or just before, I went out. This was weak and silly on my part, but Iam not one of those who can work in a crowd of students or study in a crowd, or be criticized in a crowd, or criticize a crowd of my stu- dents. Naturally, Eakins, as he had done everything to shove me forward, resented my conduct. I wonder he did not expel me. But when, a little later, an article was prepared for Scrrpner’s, on the school, illustrated by the students, I, the predes- tined illustrator, was kept carefully out of it, as I am often kept out of things now by his little nagging successors in other places. The Professor did not for- give me until almost the end, when, a few years ago, we met after I had helped to get him a first-class medal for his won- derful Gross portrait at an International Exhibition; and he knew it. He was old and broken, scarce able to talk, but he put his hand on my shoulder and said, ‘‘T made a mistake.’’ ‘“No, I did,”’ said I; and he smiled, and it was over, and that was the last time I saw him; but we were friends till he died. The Academy has a set of my Panama Pictures, hidden away some- where, but the Institution did not make this fortunate investment; it was some friends of mine who presented the litho- graphs. Our only expenses at the school were lunch and dinner and our materials to work with, and, for me, railroad tickets. When we did not bring something to eat from home, we just ran across the street to the ‘‘pie foundry’’ and bought, for five cents, the pie of the day that had the name we preferred, for they all tasted alike. Another meal, and a most substan- tial one, for the same price, consisted of three cents’ worth of bananas and two cents’ worth of crackers. Once a restau- rant started close by where we could get clam chowder for five cents, but it soon failed; it was too popular. The older men tackled the free lunch at the “‘beer foun- dry’’, but we younger students did not dare to. When we were hungry and had no money, we didnt eat till we got home. It is easy enough not to; if you have a strong will, the strong stomach comes; but I am afraid the process tries it. As our London charwoman used to say, ‘Vy, ve ‘as to git used not to h’eatin’.’’ Some- times when we were not hard up, or not hungry, we gave hunks—not slices—of pie to those who were, and when we were all very flush, we shied the stuff all over the place. I was not in the school by any means long enough to use up my money my father had saved for me while I was in the office. He and I found that one can buy railroad season tickets and bicycles and artists’ materials and work { 1880 | THE ACADEMY SCHOOL - THE COMING OF THE NIGGER 53 eighteen hours a day, and save money, even when one is paid only one dollar a day for staying eleven hours in an office. I have no idea how I did it, or howhe did, but he saved my money. There was enough to live on at home, attend the art school and ride my bicycle, and Isoon began to make a little more. I F there was no hazing at the Academy, there was plenty of noise. We sang, they smoked, we had processions, all made a fearful row when the weekly pose was changed and pushed over rows of canvasses ‘‘butter side’’ down, and the many did all those things they ought not to have done and the few tried to do just what they should have done, when they were left alone. Songs, composed by no one knew who, relating to every- one in the school, were sung in and out of tune by a chorus of everybody, and a new verse frequently caused a riot be- tween the subject and the singers. As there was no monitor, this was easily quelled by the rest of the class, who always sided against the subject and beat him with mahlsticks. If this did not settle him, he was strait-jacketed in his own canvas. I remember only one verse of one song: ‘““Now there is George Thomson Hobbs, He used to be one of the nobs, But since he’s got married No longer he’s tarried, That poor George Thomson Hobbs.”’ For some unknown reason it always drove Hobbs to fury, so we sang it only when we wanted a real good row. And we got the row always. ut the great excitement, apart from Bine wrath of Whipple, the Curator, the fainting of the female models, which happened every day, owing to masks and heat and smoke—some one, however, al- ways grabbed the lady as she fell—the descent of the Secretary with threats of expulsion, the dissections of the stiff that was kept in a little room on the stairs and smelt horribly of chemicals, and the endless inventions in his lectures of the Professor, was the advent of The Nigger. There was every kind of man and boy, from sixty to twenty, in that class, ex- cept black men, and one day the Chair- man of the School Committee appeared after a solemn announcement that he was coming. His usual way was to drop in without warning, often so quietly that we did not know he was in the room un- til some one would trample on him in the dark behind the screen. It usually hap- pened when there was a female model. But this time the Chairman came in state, accompanied by the Secretary, other mem- bers of the Committee, and the Profes- sor. And he said something like this. A drawing has been sent in and passed. The person who made it has been notified that he is admitted to the school. He has come and the Secretary has seen him. He is a colored man. Now there is no rule in the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts ex- cluding people of color from the schools. But, knowing the feeling on the subject, I have placed the matter before the An- tique Class; and I wish the Life Class to meet and decide whether he should be admitted. We met, and we decided that we had no objection. Ido not remember a dissenting voice. He came, he was young, an octoroon, very well dressed, far better than most of us. His wool, if he had any, was cropped so short you could not see it, and’ he. had Was nice wmustache mac worked at night in the Antique, and, last of all, he drew very well. I do not think he stopped long in the Antique—the faintest glimmer of any artistic sense in a student, and he was run right into the Life. He was quiet and modest, and he { 188x } 54 CHAPTER V - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR ‘‘painted too,’’ it seemed, “‘among his other accomplishments.’’ We were inter- ested at first, but he soon passed almost unnoticed, though the room was hot. Little by little, however, we were con- scious of a change. I can hardly explain, . but he seemed to want things; we seemed in the way, and the feeling grew. One night we were walking down Broad Street, he with us, when from a crowd of people of his color who were walking up thestreet,camea grecting, ‘Hullo,George Washington, howse yer gettin’ on wid yer white fren’s?’’ Then he began to assert himself and, to cut a long story short, one night his easel was carried out into the middle of Broad Street and, though not painfully crucified, he was firmly tied to it and left there. And this is my only experience of my colored brothers in a white school; but it was enough. Curiously, there never has been a great Negro or a great Jew artist in the history of the world. The only “‘black man’’—and he called himself a Moor— was Del Mazo. Rembrandt and Turner were accused of being Jews but they never admitted it during their lives, if both apparently did some funny tricks in their dealings and created dealers. HAD not been out of the office a week, nor was I yet in the Life Class, when I got my first commission, given me by Charles Wister of Germantown, Owen Wister’s uncle. It was for two pen draw- ings at ten dollars each. One was made in his garden; the other was of the front of his house, which I have often drawn since. I never knew how, in the seclu- sion of his beautiful home on Main Street, he ever heard of me. The import- ant thing was that he liked the draw- ings, though, from contemporary exam- ples I have unearthed, I should say they were vile. I have since seen them in his house, and they were vile; but his name, not mine, was signed on each. The rest of Germantown was amazed, as I intended it should be, on learning that in my first weck of illustrating existence, I had made in two days as much as I could in two weeks at the office. This is not a financial record of my profits and losses, or of the income to be gained by illustration, facts useful only to tax collectors and commer- cial artists, though endlessly quoted in the lives and doings of the prosperous and preposterous as incentives for correspond- ence school incompetents, and newspaper paragraphs. I went into illustration be- cause I wanted to; that my work was wanted from the beginning was a curse to me. But there was, evidently, no escape. I did not try for commissions, but they came to me, and they still come, I am glad and proud to say. D. STONE, the Librarian of the Penn- . sylvania Historical Society, moved out to Fisher’s Lane, our street, to live and through his son, even before I was in the office, I got to know him. He had what seemed to me an enormous collec- tion of prints in scrapbooks, and he showed them to me. His son and Mantle Fielding, who became an architect and cared for the Colonial—I believe he found it too difficult and fell to criti- cism—would come in night after night, and we would go over them together. I later brought my drawings and etch- ings to Stone, and he introduced me to a historian named Townsend, the suc- cessor of Watson the annalist, who was preparing a series of articles on German- town Road for the Historical Society’s Journal, and through Stone I was com- missioned by the Society to make draw- ings and etchings to illustrate them. These began to appear in the Journal and with their appearance I began my {188x } a THE PLOW INN YARD SECOND STREET PHILADELPHIA - ONE OF MANY OLD INNS LIKE THOSE IN ENGLAND WHICH EXISTED TILL THE COUNTRY WENT DRY AND LIFE BECAME DREARY ETCHING MADE IN 1881 AND PUBLISHED LATER IN THE MAGAZINE AMERICAN ETCHINGS THE ACADEMY SCHOOL - THE ILLUSTRATION OF THE PAST 57 career as an illustrator. They ran for sev- eral months, and in the middle of it all I was invited to an anniversary dinner of the Society at the Academy of Music and I assisted at my first banquet. Now I am not asked to their functions and my drawings are not wanted in the His- torical Society Collection; and when I offered them some from Our PuitaDEL- puta, the answer was, ‘Did I think they had nothing better to spend their money on?’ I wonder if they kept the early ones I made for them. Ix my drawings it can be seen how much, even then, I had studied and tried to imitate the technique of Rico and Fortuny. Vierge’s work, curiously, I did not know till long after—and to think that I should edit and arrange his PasLo DE Secovia. But I thank Heaven I had such good and sound technical masters of the art of pen drawing for reproduction. The pen drawings by these men and Casanova, Fabres and Vierge, reproduced by Gillot in Paris and his partner, or assistant, Chefdeville, from 1870 to 1880, have never been surpassed and are not approached now. The reasons are simple. The draughtsmen, engravers, printers of this group were brilliant art- ists who loved their work, taking a pride in it; they worked together, the draughtsmen with the engravers and printers at the press; and they were not plagued by ignorant cheap shopkeepers —I mean art editors and ad. men, and publishers from whom are recruited most of the officers of the companies and syn- dicates which run publications to-day— who know just what the publicwants | and dump the cheapest and nastiest that can be had on a long-suffering world, Still, I must be just. I believe many edi- tors and art editors are as honest as they are ignorant. More, however, are sweat- ers and ruled by their lust for advertise- ments. A few, a very few, try to get good work. But to-day American illustration is the most contemptible and artless in the world, and most American engrav- ing and printing a joke; the graphic arts, like the country, are dry, flat, degenerate. and the overlord is the trade union, all bow to that. Little of my time, during the day, was after this spent in the schools. I still went at night and endured the envy of the less fortunate. Ilustrating, de- spised by the Professor, held in contempt by painters, looked down upon by the students, was not then the favorite path along which the incompetent could struggle or promenade, yet the painters were only making colored illustrations, mostly rotten. But when I began to get going, I found that the painters were willing enough to come to me, to whom they had scarce spoken before, for tips about work. I believed, as I do now, that illustration is a most serious, a most important form of art—a form of art in which we Americans have made a greater international reputation than in any other. Really, though, all art is illus- tration and always has been from the beginning of time until now, when it has become the prey of incompetent com- mercial artists, cubists, expressionists who have nothing to express or illustrate and so fall back on cheap tricks and cheap blither and cheap critics to sell their worth- less wares—and call them new art, know- ing nothing of art. T this time Abbey and Reinhart, in- A telligent Americans in Europe, and Howard Pyle, a struggling, self-made, misguided medizevalist in America—but his Colonial drawings are fine—had won international reputations for themselves and done work they never surpassed. Brennan, the finest technician of America, {| 188x } 58 CHAPTER V - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Blum and Lungren were carrying on the Spanish tradition, and now that I have looked her up again, I find that Mary Hallock Foote was one of our best illus- trators. Frost was combining humor with drawing, the comics not having yet set the degraded fashion the Ameri- can loves. Jungling, Wolf, Cole, Kings- ley and Whitney were proving that wood engraving in the hands of artists is an art. La Farge, the only decorator then in the United States, was illustrating, and St. Gaudens was not above carving illustrations, nor Stanford White above lettering and layouts. It was the paint- ers who could not paint and the business man who could not understand—and never can—who held illustration in con- tempt, probably never having heard of Mantegna, Botticelli, Diirer, Rembrandt, Blake, Menzel, the Men of the Sixties; or, if they had a faint glimmer of an idea that there had been such artists, know- ing nothing of them as great illustrators, illustration then, as now, including all forms of engraving. But it was certainly more ambitious, more intelligent, more vital, not merely financial. And, as I have said, all art is illustration, only the methods and mediums change; only most painting is not art to-day and most peo- ple who know everything do not know this elementary fact, overlooked in their rush and hustle to do good to art—and advertise themselves. HERE were only twoillustrated month- is in those days, ScripNER’s and Harper's, and two weeklies, Lestiz’s and Harper’s. The one daily was Tue Dairy Grapuic, the first illustrated daily, illus- trated with large photo-engravings and lithographs, that ran for any time, in this or any other country. But there is not one illustrated monthly, weekly or daily to compare with them to-day. The wecklies and the daily I bombarded with sketches of all sorts, from catastrophes to comics, and the curious will find the results in the numbers of Harprr’s WEEKLY, sometimes on the funny page. I was even asked to join Lire by its founder, J. A. Mitchell. Had I done so, where would Gibson have come in? But at that time Americans looked for art in ScriBNER’s and Harper’s as they think they have found it to-day in the movies and the comics. Literature and music they imbibe from the radio. S o far as I remember, it was in April, 1881, that I received my first commis- sion from Harper's to attend the Annual Meet of the League of American Wheel- men in Boston, and sketch it. [had helped to found the League at Newport the year before and I sent in some drawings of that. The year after I went to Boston for Harper's, and I took a header off my tall bicycle painted white, and called “The Baby Hearse,’’ the pedal broke, before the Governor of Massachusetts and the May- or of Boston reviewing the parade, and I cannot forget the withering scorn of Kirk Monroe, the magnificent Marshal, editor of Harper’s YouNG Propie and President of the League, and his cut- ting comment, “I thought you could ride!’’ I could and I did, for I rode round the rest of the route with one foot, arrayed in a polo cap and skin-tight knee breeches and a jacket much too short, as Captain at the head of the Germantown Bicycle Club. I must have been amazing. But what sketches I made I have forgotten, though I remember I missed the official dinner because I was at work on the drawings. I seem dimly to recall that something went wrong and the drawings were never printed. If they were, they can be found in Har- pER’s WEEKLY, April or May, 1881. I also {188x | — THE ACADEMY SCHOOL : FIRST PUBLISHED WRITINGS 59 rode to Dedham and made a drawing of a colonial house for ScripnER’s that was printed in the magazine. HIs was at the beginning of bicycling, fl. and in it I was a much greater person than in art. It was to cycling too, about this year or earlier, that I owe my first appearance as an author. Three of us Ger- mantowners made a trip on tall wheels from Philadelphia to Albany; none of us got back on them; and we were met and interviewed and paragraphed as cranks, and I described the first two days’ ride in a tourists’ paper printed at the Dela- ware Water Gap, where we arrived after struggles. But I received neither my promised honorarium from the editor nor even a copy of the paper. The article may have been rejected. On this trip I also met the Bentleys on high wheels— the backers of the Bell telephone—and had I invested in their shares, I should, like them, never have been heard of, even as a millionaire, as I have been told they became soon after. 9 Dp was also printed in Tue Bicy- CLING WorLD an account of a ride I took at Atlantic City in winter, on the hard beach, which contains as many lies to the line—I remember some of them— as I could work in. But when one cycles, or motors or fishes, or flies, one always lies; otherwise, one would not be watched and judged and checked before being be- lieved even by a gullible world. In those days the world that I lived in was gay. JOSEPH PENNELL CAPTAIN OF THE GERMANTOWN BICYCLE CLUB AT THE MEET OF THE LEAGUE OF AMERICAN WHEELMEN HELD AT BOSTON IN 1881 FROM A SKETCH IN A LETTER WRITTEN MY FATHER {188 | CHAPTER VI: THE FIRST COMMISSION FOR THE CENTURY : A DAY IN THE MASH - STUDIO TAKEN - STUDIO BIZ AN OIL REFINERY FROM ‘‘A DAY IN THE MASH’’ N the summer of 1880 I went to Rich- field Springs to stay with T.R. Manly, a student with me at the Academy, whose drawings and etchings ought to be much better known than they are. On the way I stopped at Cooperstown, for I had a scheme to illustrate the scenes ' of Cooper’s novels with etchings; but it never came off. Nor did another, for an edition of Poe that Major Putnam was to ‘‘bring into print.’’ I did one plate and that was enough for him. But this EXPERIENCES: NIGHTS AT THE PHILADELPHIA SKETCH CLUB » MY FIRST ARTICLE IN SCRIBNER’S - 1881 WASH DRAWING ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY J. F. JUNGLING A GREAT AMERICAN ENGRAVER summer was of immense importance to me. An article had appeared in ScriB- NER’s on Shanty Town in New York, illustrated by Blum, Muhrman and the rest of the group, and it was this article that set me to work for myself. AGUELY I had heard of a place near Vga Island, Philadelphia, where people shot reed birds and the natives raised truck. So I went down there and I found, hidden away, a mass of old canal boats, huts, causeways, barns and oil { 1880 | THE FIRST COMMISSION GIVEN ME -: I MEET A. W. DRAKE 61 works that made me mad to draw them— a better subject than the men of New York had found, and my own. There was system in the way I set about things. I made two or three drawings. I looked up my cousin, George B. Wood, the painter, for I knew he could give me a letter to A.W. Drake, the Art Editor of ScrIBNER’s, and he did. I already had the intelligence of the illustrator in me. I did not take over to New York the hodge-podge of sketches with which the would-be illustrator usually bores the att editor without proving to him that he has any ability to illustrate anything. I took only the drawings I had made for “A Day inthe Mash.”’ But these were the drawings I wanted Drake to see, and that was the title I wanted for the article to go with them. I had chosen an author. Everything was all arranged beforehand. The trip to New York was an adventure. I always went over on the Reading, get- ting on at Wayne Junction. How fast the train was forty years ago — how we dreaded the curve at Bound Brook; as a matter of fact, it is no faster to-day. This shows our progress. I always take the best and the fastest, even though it costs a little more, though I did not know the Florentine merchant’s advice to his son, “Never stint thyself in thy work.”’ From the front of the ferry boat from Jersey City to New York there is the most wonderful view in the world. No one now scarcely looks at it—or they come under the river by the Pennsyl- vania and dont see it, we hate beauty and loathe grandeur, unless some for- eigner tells us to admire it—then we call it cute. In those days the highest build- ing in lower New York was Babbitt’s Soap Works. I made a drawing of that. It is gone. Now you look down to find it, or did till it was pulled down. But New York to me then was, and still is, the Unbelievable City, as I wrote of it. “The City that has been built since I grew up; the City Beautiful, built by men I know, for people I know; the City that inspires me, that I love.’’ Once over in New York, I went to Scribner’s store, 743 Broadway. I was told, when I asked for the office of the magazine, that it was up- stairs. There was noelevator,andIclimbed first to the Editorial Rooms, and then was directed up another flight and through a swinging door. Why do I remember that? In a room beyond, I saw the back of a domed bald head bent over a drawing. I think I was shown in right away, and the man with the bald head had a pleasant smile and he was so interested in my work that I forgot entirely to give him the let- ter of introduction in my pocket. He was A.W.Drake, the Art Editor of ScrisNER’s, later of THe Century, which ScriBNER’s soon became, a man who invented more illustrators and engravers than any one in the world. Not only did Drake en- thuse over the sketches, but he took me downstairs with him and introduced me to Mr.R.U. Johnson, then the Associate Editor, and in five minutes it was ar- ranged that I should complete the set of drawings in the Mash, that I should get an author—I had done so—and that if everything went all right, the article would appear. It is extraordinary how much sense I had; but then I was born an illustrator. And I think R. U. Johnson might, in his REMEMBERED YesTERDAYS, have said as much of me. Upstairs Drake took me again and to prove his belief in me, gave me a com- mission to draw Henry Calhoun’s office, from. some one else's sketch, for the magazine. It was my first drawing, re- produced by process, page 893, April 1, 1881. Then he carried me off to lunch. {1880 | 62 CHAPTER VI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR It was always lunch time, or some sort of time, with Drake in those days. We went to Dorlan’s on Broadway and had fried scallops, the first I ever tasted— you never got them in Philadelphia. Nor could you get Finelli’s fried oysters in New York; or scarcely anything decent to eat in America to-day, save in a few real homes of real Americans. Then the wildly elated boy started back to Ger- mantown. All these trips and my work at the Academy, and my bicycles came out of the year and a half on seven dol- lars, rising to ten, a week at the coal office and the chickens, and the commis- sions I received later. I never spent any- thing save on work, books, bicycles, and clothes. And my father always looked after my money, and invested it, and the few hundred dollars were not used up, but increased and multiplied. lee next day I went to work on the sketch Drake gave me and finished it, and the day after I got my author and we went down to the Mash. I do not remember much about my work there, only talks with fishermen in the boats where they lived, misty mornings, and an oil refinery that I drew. My first sub- jects are still my subjects—the Wonder of Work. I did them all from nature. Really, in a way, the drawings were ‘good, I think, now that I have looked them up again, or the engravings from them. I took my time, and the author took his, so much so that a letter came from the Art Department of THE Crn- TuRY, asking what had become of the article and of me. But at last it was ready, and one morning, with the draw-_ ings under my arm and the article in my pocket, I went again to New York, and this time there was a little round man in the outer office, and he scared the life out of me, by patronizing my work, and I learned that he was W. Lewis Fraser, the Assistant Art Editor, whom I got to know before long, without being afraid of him; and I quickly made friends too with Miss Gleason, the Secretary. When Drake came in that morning, he praised the drawings, and they were submitted to the Editors downstairs and accepted, and the end of it was that I was pre- sented with a voucher and received a fabulous sum of money which made a tight wad in my pocket. The lunch on this occasion was in the Vienna Café or at the Hotel St. Denis by Grace Church, and afterwards we went across the street and Drake introduced me to J. F. Murphy in his studio, and I showed him the draw- ings which had not been taken—of course among the best—and he asked for them to exhibit in the Salmagundi Club. I never saw Murphy again, nor have I exhibited in the Salmagundi since. Broad- way could hardly contain me. I got home somehow and I shall never forget ending my mother’s anxiety by pulling out note after note from my pocket and throwing it on her bed. I was accepted, and my drawings were to be printed, and I was paid before publication. The author did not fare so well. He was rejected or, rather, his article was rewritten by a journalist of Philadelphia who became an Ambassador, and it was published. I am sure that through this chance I made him an Ambassador, though he thought he made me an illustrator—and always told me so. Now we are both Academicians and his name was Maurice Egan, and he was always very nice to me ever after, even saying we—E. and J— had invented a new style. I never met Egan till he was Ambassador to Denmark when he used to come to London and Fisher Unwin brought us together. And we stayed together till the end of his { 1880 | THE EDITORS OF THE CENTURY + FROM THE PAINTING BY ORLANDO ROULAND IN THE POSSESSION OF THE ARTIST AT THE RIGHT R. W. GILDER THEN C. C. BUEL: A. W. DRAKE R. U. JOHNSON - THEY MADE THE CENTURY OUR BEST ARTISTIC AND LITERARY MAGAZINE THE BACKGROUND IN THIS PAINTING SHOWS THE EDITORIAL ROOMS OF THE CENTURY AT THIRTY-THREE EAST SEVENTEENTH STREET NEW YORK—THE NORTH SIDE OF UNION SQUARE THEY WERE ON THE TOP FLOOR AND THE VIEW FROM THEM WAS AS FINE AS THE INTERIOR 64 CHAPTER VI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR life. My authors are nearly all gone now. EANWHILE, Calhoun’s Office ap- M peared in ScripNEr’s. There the curi- ousmay findit,signed with a moon and six stars, imitating Brennan. I| signed in this" fashion every draw- ing Icopied, for some reason I have com- pletely forgotten. As yet, I knew nothing about methods of drawing for engrav- ing and printing. But, save Drake and Brennan, no one had experimented. Soon it became an age of experiment, and we learned as we went on. Every one worth anything began to experiment, not im- itate, as they do to- day. All this was due to Drake. There was no standard, no sys- tem; the illustrator workedashewished, the photographer copied his drawing on the block, and the wood - engraver reproduced it, and the photographic engraver, just begin- ning, experimented too. Imade some of the first drawings for the Ives Screen process— known commercially as the Levy Screen, and for Ben Day. Now the artist and the engraver join a union and again do not ex- periment.The “‘process men”’ strike if you want to experiment. The artist does not either, but does as little as he cannes badly as he can, and gets as much out of the Art Editor as he possibly can; and the proprietor, company or publisher does R. W. GILDER - EDITOR OF THE CENTURY FROM THE BUST BY THE COMTE DE ROSALES AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS not know enough to stop him—or dare to. The printer of ScrrBNER’s, De Vinne, endeavored to print what the illustrator and the engraver gave him. Each tried to do his best; often it was bad, but all were striving togeth- er to do something better than had been done. William Morris and the British, with their rattling of dead bones, had not been heard of in illus- tration and print- ing. The illustrations made all over the world between 1860 and 1890 are living, vital works of art. Morrisapplied social- ism to art and every one worked down to the printer, and the office boy was as good as theartist, and one, to prove it, married Morris’ daughter. Here,theprinter tried to work with, or up to, the engraver, but thedraughtsman was theinspirationofall. As usual, English middle-class pretentious cheapness tri- umphed and book illustration was standardized. But during those years, illustration in Europe and here far sur- passed anything that has ever been done; now, for the moment, it is ignored, for- gotten, unknown. Owing to the vile paper the books and magazines were printed on, much of it has disappeared. Drake, before his death, feared all his work would be lost—it and he will live. Now the illustrations are vile or photo- { 1880 } THE FIRST COMMISSION GIVEN ME -: AT EPHRATA as graphs, but that is what the people want. HEresult of my first article, intowhich T Eakins was glad enough to get, with some others, was that I rented a studio with H.R. Poore, also an Academy stu- dent, in the Presby- terian Board of Pub- lication on Chestnut Street, near Broad. Poore’s father was connected with the Publication Society, and Poore himself, though determined to be a painter, had a sneaking liking for illustration and for a University de- gree. Curiously, we chummed up. Our joint studio was any- thing but a success and ended after two years, and long be- fore the end one of us was sure to stay away when he knew the other wanted to work there. During thesetwo yearsmuch happened. Hardly were we settled in the building when A.W. DRAKE BY JOHN C. JOHANSON + GREAT- I not submitted as I did, it would have been better for them and for me, as it was for Abbey, who cut loose. But I was always to draw buildings. We started . off to the place near Reading. I had the manuscript. The author—no matter about hisname—was a funny Philadel- phia newspaper man who got off cheap jokes about Dunk- ers and Drunkards, though better than the junk the “‘col- umnists’’ grind out now. They would not have been allowed then, the best\ of them, to write for Tue Dansury News or THe Detroit FREE Press — the _ birth- places of those bores, the American funny men. With this au- thor I began the co- lossalblunderswhich I have made, more or less, all my life. I ex- posed him to the edi- tors, but not until EST OF ART EDITORS AND A DEAR FRIEND Poore and I had fin- Stephen Parrish and PORTRAIT IN THE POSSESSION OF THE ARTIST ished the drawings. his son Maxfield, who then was making etchings of fish and birds, full of char- acter—far better than the work he does now—came in. Soon Miss Beaux, back from Paris, came too. Then soon a com- mission came from THe CrENTuRY to illustrate an article on the Dunker settle- ment at Ephrata. I lugged Poore in to do the figures. He did some things in the Mash article also. Even then Drake standardized us to certain subjects. Had The manuscript was rejected and of course the author never forgave me. I suppose it was none of my business, but I then took, asIcontinuetotake, illustrationseriously, and even authors seriously, and I hated to see not only the subject, but the editors made ridiculous. But the whole country is run bysuch funny men nowadays, which is one of the reasons why we are the joke of theworld.On the hill at Ephrata stood, and still stand—though one is gone, fall- { 188x } 66 CHAPTER VI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR en down through neglect and decay—the monastic houses, copies of South German buildings with huge high roofs; and within are the cells of the brothers and sisters, the Meeting House and the work- rooms. We went at the drawings with fury, but, to our hor- ror, we found that Howard Pyle had been there, for he had left behind an unfinished drawing which was preserved inthe hotel. We said nothing, but worked harder and faster, fearing that any month Pyle’s article mightappearinHar- PER’s and ours never be printed. I am not sure how long we stayed, and my only memories are of the hotel full of drum- mers, andthe garrets R. U. JOHNSON thanks for it from the Directors of the same Institution. There are times when stealing is the greatest virtue, the best policy. We bought a number of spinning wheels and other things of the kind, and I tried ever after to get rid of them, for a consideration, but they went in the War. My work was finished on the spot, all done from nature. This is the righ way to illustrate. I have always worked this way when pos- sible and not copied sketches. To copy photographsisdeath to an artist, though the chain anchor of incompetents and commercials. Myim- pressions were put down as they struck me, and it is the per- BY WILLIAM M. CHASE sonal note in illus- of the monasteries THE PAINTING IS OWNED BY DR. JOHNSON tration which tells. full of noise, the noise of children play- ing. One day we went upstairs and broke into a pitched battle, and the battle was being fought with books. I looked at them and had enough sense, after my work for the Historical Society, to see that they were early American publications. Some- how, we got the children out of the room, and, thinking that we could make better use of the books, filled our pockets and shirt fronts with as many as had not been torn up in the skirmish, and this is whya certain collection in Philadelphia is so rich in Sauer’s imprints. Only the other day I chanced upon one,among someother things, and wisely deciding to add it to the others, I got a gorgeous note of On the other hand, Poore, save for some very good studies of details, manufactured his drawings, his compositions ; and to my disgust the studio was littered for weeks with costumes, models and agricul- tural implements. Pyle’s drawings only appeared years after, and, though we trembled every month when Harpsr’s was announced, we came out in THE CEN- TurRyY years before he did in Harper's. ow we were launched, for if there N were only two illustrated magazines, there were not enough illustrators to work for them, so commissions came fast. I was sent to Bethlehem, Pennsyl- vania, to do the Moravians with R. B. Birch, long before he made his reputa- { 1880 | HIS EXCELLENCY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN +: BY ERNEST L. IPSEN + IN THE POSSESSION OF THEIR MAJESTIES THE KING AND QUEEN OF DENMARK AND RE- PRODUCED BY THEIR PERMISSION : MR. EGAN WROTE THE FIRST ARTICLE IN SCRIBNER’S ‘‘A DAY IN THE MASH’’ WHICH WAS ILLUSTRATED BY ME IN 1880 68 CHAPTER VI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR tion with Lrrrte Lorp Fauntieroy, and Poore was asked to illustrate an article on some western subject—he had been out west—by Thomas A. Janvier. Janvier was not my author, but, save for the his- torical Townsend, he was the first live writer I had met, and both Poore and I were fearfully impressed when he climbed to the top of the building and appeared in the studio. He told Poore, who never asked me to do a thing, just what he wanted illustrated, and just how it was to be done. Now, sometimes this is de- lightful, and sometimes—usually always —it is the reverse, for the author in his own estimation is the artist, especially if he decorates the illustrator’s art with a few lines of text written to order to fill up space. But Janvier had an “‘artist’s wife’’,and he knew, and though—or per- haps because—I only did one article with him, we were good friends till the end. How delightful and picturesque he was making a salad—or running things at the Century Club, and when I did, years after, the article with him on Eleanor’s Cross- es, he never bothered me at all. It was printed in Harper’s. As I was not asked by Poore or by the Editors to work on Janvier’s article, I made a drawing of Decoration Day and carried it to Charles Parsons at Harper's office for the Weekly, not for the Magazine. I felt myself a most important factor in the success of THE Century, which Scrisner’s had now be- come, and under no circumstances would I have worked for the rival, nor would any other of Tue Century artists. But Harper’s WEEKLY was not a rival, and I took my drawing to New York and at Franklin Square climbed the winding iron stairway to the little dens and pens of the editors and artists right against the elevated, with only the window glass between, a contrast to the luxury of THe Century, which had moved to Union Square. I found Mr. Parsons, the Art Editor, in his particular cell. He looked at my drawing and at me, and his words were, ‘Well, have you got anything else to live on? If you havent, you'd better saw wood.”’ I never hit, at the moment, upon the proper answer to such people, and, perhaps luckily, I forget what the answer was to have been to Parsons when I found it. I was mad and would have finished him, if I had not been a Friend. Providence sometimes is very good to fool editors, and they escape because I cannot get off the proper thing at the right moment. Only many years later did I hear from Abbey in London that this was Parsons’ stereotyped way of greeting the young artist. He could not have discouraged me, nor did I discour- age him altogether, for soon after I went to another Bicycle Meet somewhere down East, by the Fall River Line, which charged but one dollar. The boat was jammed and I made a drawing of the people sleeping all over the place while I sat up, and sent it to HARPER’s WEEKLY. I had to wait some time before it was returned with the printed notice I was beginning to know that expressed ‘‘Messrs. Harpers’ regret that they were unable to use the offered contribution.’ But I have never been able to understand how a drawing containing some of the figures in my sketch appeared almost sim- ultaneously in the Weekly! No doubt it was the beginning of that “‘transference’’ which is the sincerest form of flattery and in my case continues to this day. I think the bicycle drawing came out in Har- PER’s YOUNG Prope. Anyway, this was my first personal encounter with Parsons. ie was not all work in the studio by any means. It was fun too. There were real artists—oil painters—in the build- { 1881 } THE FIRST COMMISSION GIVEN ME :- ing: ‘Old Williams’’, with whom Abbey had studied, and Herbert Welsh, and Liberty Tadd, in addition to the Par- fishes and Cecilia Beaux, and a lot of Germans. Poore and I were only illus- trators, though Poore soon was paint- ing in oil and was elected an Associate of the National Academy for one of his dog pictures. There was wild excitement over that. We hated all the rest, that is, before we ceased to be on terms with each other, but we hated more Cecilia Beaux, and most some arty females who had come in, following her. She was soon to do her most interesting work. We thought women had no _ business there, so we went in for revenge. One night, when we had swept up the studio and put in order the chairs with no cane seats in them, through which not-think- ing people used to sit, if there wasn’t a fresh palette or anacid bath on them—and sometimes they sat there anyway, till they were pulled off, we took a tramp model’s property pants and a coat, and stuffed them with papers, and a mask from some- where, and a hat, and gum shoes, and tied them all together; and as it grew dark, there were no lights on the upper flights of stairs, we carried out the gent and laid him, spread abroad, head down, at the bottom, and then we went home. And no one ever did find out, whether the man was murdered, or why Cecilia Beaux had a faint, or Maxfield Parrish took to mak- ing billboards, or who committed the (time. because, as 1 have said, Poore’s father had something to do with the Association which owned the building, and it would not do for his son to be mixed up in such affairs. Frost was next door to us, and the Sketch Club near by, and it used to give functions every Thurs- day night. I was, as a coming man and Academy Student, made a member. One PEAY INS IHE STUDIO 69 day the British Fleet sailed up the Dela- wate for the second time and some of the officers were asked to the Club, and the Fish House Punch was on the fire, and a giddy young lieutenant saw the innocent apples bobbing about in the boiling ket- tle and asked for one, and they gave it to him, and he ate it all, and then they took him and tied him in an armchair and lifted him in it, on the big table and gave him a churchwarden and told him he might have another apple if he could put the pipe in his mouth; and Arthur Frost, who waited by him till morning, vowed he never did. But Frost always was good and kind beside adding gaiety to what was a gay age. An uplifter came one night to the Club with a scheme for deserving somebodies. And he was offered at once a hundred dollars— we had mil- lionaire members then—the punch was made and was sold for the unfortunates, and one artist member presented ten dol- lars, and another gave five, and still another one dollar. And finally Frost arose and towered, and his red head shone amid the smoke of peace. And he felt in one pocket, and then another, and then in all his pockets, and at last he said, “T was only looking for my latchkey’’, and he sat down, and ‘‘the meeting then adjourned to sketching’’, as the Secretary’s report used to read, and the deserving were forgotten. It was like that in the dear dead days before there were arty women, and she-men. But almost all the distinguished American artists came from or through Philadelphia in those days, and were made members of the Club. And I have been chosen President of the Philadelphia Sketch Club since. HE Sketch Club, which has been in existence for half a century, is now one of the sights of Philadelphia. It stands in the Little Street of Clubs,’ Camac { 1881 } TO CHAPIER VI» THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Street, which also holds the Franklin Inn, a literary club where the Philobiblon too has its meetings, the Plastic and the Coin D'Or, to mention a few. It is a street mainly of little two-story houses, real red-brick, white-shuttered Philadelphia houses, on one side almost perfect, the other ruined, a big tree at one end, a skyscraper at the other, but the Sketch Club untouched, un- spoiled. Once you have passed the easily opened door and crossed the hall, you are in the library and few art clubs in the country have a better one. The books, and many are valuable, were mostly given by a pious member. Above the cases 1s a gal- lery of portraits of members, the work of two others—a historical collection of por- traits of Philadelphia artists for the last half century. Long windows reach from floor to ceiling showing a back yard, the old Philadelphia back yard, with flowers and trees, brick-paved walk and high brick wall, quiet and peaceful still. The base- ment is a huge dining room with a great fire place, and the, alas, mostly unused punch bow], or when used profaned with soft drinks but oftener covered with dust and tears, ate in it. Here, too, the walls are hung with sketches by and of Phila- delphia artists. There are other rooms, other pictures, other properties, and up- stairs a picture gallery over all. The Club, like many other institutions in Philadel- phia, is different from any in the country. = THE BROTHERS’ AND SISTERS’ HOUSES + FROM ‘‘A COLONIAL MONASTERY’’ + SCRIBNER’S 1881 WOOD ENGRAVING UNSIGNED - FROM A PENCIL AND WASH DRAWING ON TINTED PAPER {188x | CHAPTER VII: IN AND OUT OF THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - MEETING LELAND - SEEING WHITMAN - HADEN LECTURES ‘THE ETCHING CLUB: THE GREAT PICTURE BOOK MURALS AT HARRISBURG - REUNION AT LURAY OF NORTH = 5 sy LENG. A SPRING DAY FROM ‘‘VISITING THE GYPSIES” ND then there came a commis- sion to illustrate for THE CENn- TuRY an article by Charles G. Leland on the Art School and Art Club he had started in Philadelphia to develop the Manual Arts, at which all the young lady amateurs, school teachers and infant prodigies were proving how impos- sible were his practices, though his prin- ciples were right: that every one can learn to draw, but when they have—and they can just as they can learn to write—what good is it unless they have something to say by drawing ? But these principles have never yet been carried out or even under- stood in America, where the arts and crafts are all in the hands of amateurs and up- lifters, millionaires and pifflers. I used often to see Leland with George Boker and Walt Whitman walking down Chestnut or up AND SOUTH : DEATH OF GARFIELD: WORK IN WASHINGTON * PEN DRAWING PUBLISHED IN THE CENTURY Walnut Street, clearing the pavement as they advanced, side by side, the only things that could interfere with their triumphal progress being ailanthus trees, measuring worms and squirting bricks, Philadelphia products now gone with other good and bad Philadelphia character. And I used, if I went down Broad Street, where the artless Art Club now looms, to see the top of Leland’s head at a front window, when writing, or his great flowing beard if he looked up, for he wrote at a first- floor window of the house on the street where he lived, and he did this wherever he was, up to the last in Florence. The article was printed, but I made no draw- ings for it; maybe the pupils did. And one of them, or rather one of the man- agers, was Elizabeth Robins, and I was introduced to her; Leland brought her { 1881 | fae CHAPTER VIL THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILEUS tRAtoR up to the studio to see me. But that is another story, or rather the beginning of many other stories, some of which she has told. And then he began to notice me, and I, having in Philadelphia been recognized as the coming genius—a young “‘prince among illustrators’ was a mild term—was taken by him, or was it by Kirk, the editor of Lippincort’s Macazing, to the Triplets, and we drew lots for seats, as was the custom, and I found myself, at my first dinner, between Whitman and Furness. And how dis- gusted they were; and if it had not been that Doctor Brinton, or Max Adeler’s brother, was nice to me, or, more impor- tant, that my father was suddenly taken ill, and I had to leave, I would not still, I am sure, be a member, though I am, I think, the only member of that epoch left, and about the only one who would have been allowed to be a member among all the members to-day, though I think I have been dropped, or the Club is dead. It still, I find, goes on—but I have left Philadelphia. Then Leland put me into the Penn Club—the Triplets were the inner circle of the Club—and I remember that Furness hated me, for the Lippincotts had asked me to illuminate Tur Szven Acrs oF Man, to be made into a gift book; and I did this, in my way, from a copy of the First Folio, and Furness’ comments on my illuminations were ex- cruciating. Only, luckily for me, Lippin- cotts had paid for my decorations and illuminations in advance—a hundred dollars or so—and they every once in a while remind me I owe them that sum in work, and also for a drawing of a pig to go in a school-book, which the editor spurned, though they paid for it, too. NpD then somehow—probably I sug- A gested it—I got Leland to do an arti- cle—"‘ Visiting the Gypsies’’—for THz Century, and everything changed. In- stead of going to Meeting with my father on First Day mornings—we were living all this while in a boarding house in Ger- mantown, the Coulter House—I would go down to South Broad Street, and there would be Miss Robins and Leland, and then we would go sometimes to Camden and maybe call on Whitman, and go on to see Romanies, but most often it was up Broad Street, usually taking the horse cars to Oakdale Park, and there they would be. And we would have beer the Rye, for all Gypsies all over the world knew him by that name, would pay for, out of silver mugs, and each would have a different crest or initial on it. But all this is written. Or to West Philadelphia where, in a wood, there were Lovells, and with them too—or the Rye did— we chummed up. But that is all written in E.’s To GypsyLanp, though no one scarce knows the book. Leland’s article came out, and then he suggested others for Our ContINENT which E. wrote and I illustrated, and they used to come to the studio where I was working on my first series of Philadelphia etchings—and one day I spilled a whole mess of nitric acid on the pants of my blue suit and they turned to gold in spots; and I painted the spots with Prussian blue and started for Atlantic City; but the dust and sand set- tled on the result, and I had to go to bed while a kind friend carried the pants about till he found some of near the same size. Till his death, Leland was mixed up in many ways and places with my life or with E.'s life or ours. The other day the centenary of his birth occurred and the only attention that was paid to it in Phila- delphia was a paper read at the Philobib- lon Club by his nephew, Edward Robins, yet Leland was the greatest Philadelphian of his time. But no Philadelphian knows { 1881 | i | % is ae Ps ae ' t Pa ri ea &. ts 4 bey I Poe 4 i i oo 14 1 4 } i : vee 3 a4 | CHARLES GODFREY LELAND FOUNDER OF THE MANUAL ARTS MOVEMENT -; FROM AN ETCHING MADE IN LONDON :- BUT THE ONLY ONE IN EXISTENCE - ‘““HANS BREITMANN’’ UNCLE OF MRS. PENNELL BY NO MEANS A GOOD PORTRAIT BY MONSIEUR FELIX BRACQUEMOND et eee eee eR ES SATE ea sieicntone SCHOLAR AND TA CHAPTER VII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR this—or anything else. Whitman, though I often saw him sitting on the fruitman’s high chair at MarketStreet Wharf or riding on the front platform of the horse cars, I had little to do with, though, as I say, I used to meet him; and though I remember him perfectly, I have no recollection of any- thing he ever said. He even used to come to Germantown, all the way out in the horse cats, and stay with Francis Howard Williams, a collector of celebrities, and there I remember once meeting him with Cable—this was between 1882 and 1883 when Cable was lecturing—whom Wil- liams had also gathered in for an evening. Somewhere about this time I did a book with a Dr.Buck about Whitman and went to his Long Island birthplace and drew that, and I think other subjects, but all are gone, I dont think thatI ever saw the volume and I forget the title. ap HE year 1881 was full of work. Early in the spring I, as I have said, com- menced my etchings of Philadelphia, for from the beginning it was my aim to show that that is best which nearest lieth, soaked as I was—though I could scarcely draw— with English tradition, which I had ab- sorbed not only at the Historical Society, but by looking round me and going over the prints at Claghorn’s (James L. Clag- horn, President of the Pennsylvania Acad- emy), where, in the corner of his upstairs print room, Sunday after Sunday afternoon was spent studying Whistler and Haden, while evenings were put in reading Ham- erton and Ruskin. I liked Hamerton’s A Patnter’s Camp IN THE H1GHLANDs and Tue UNKNown River. Ruskin’s descrip- tions woke me up and made me see things, but I never got completely through any- thing but the ELements or Drawina. The third great man whom I got hold of— Shakespeare—bored me to death. There is more for me in one line of Virgil, as 1t was hammered into me at school—'’So long as the cloud shadows chase each other over the sides of the mountains’’—more pleasure than I have ever found in all the Shakespeare I have ever attempted; and what little of Shakespeare on the stage I have seen I failed to appreciate, as most people fail, but do not dare to say so. But it was from Horace, I fancy, and in Friends’ School, I got my love of wine and of Italy. Np then Seymour Haden came to the Avnited States in charge of Frederick Keppel, at the time of the Philadelphia Etching Club International Exhibition. We had started an Etching Club and I was made Secretary, and made friends and enemies who exist to this day. I heard Haden talk at the Academy of the Fine Arts where the show was held, and afterwards I think Parrish, Peter Moran, Ferris and I were invited by Claghorn to the Union League and had a real Philadelphia sup- per of snapper, reed birds and champagne, the first I ever drank; but I did not like it and do not like it yet. But there are things I do like, and if the cranks who have overrun and ruined this land had only had one good dinner and one good drink in their lives, they would lynch any one who would try to prevent their having more. Every town then, as now, had an Etching Club, but ours and the New York one were real clubs. We met once a month at some one’s studio, but in the meantime we each etched a plate and pulled enough proofs to exchange with the other members over beer and pretzels, or champagne and chicken salad, at the members’ houses. We exchanged views and prints, and then, with the help of the Acad- emy, we got up an International Exhibi- tion, and somehow I was made Secretary of that. Now the parent clubs are dead, but each Main Street, Middle-West town has one, with one object—to do good to {188x } end @ fa he tare, Jeafsarany Seb rl ae Resa” = senet a Pn eA R AR nr i NMOS BS me STI NC CSMA NNS Api THE LAST OF THE SCAFFOLDING : ERECTION OF THE CITY HALL PHILADELPHIA - ETCHING MADE 1881 - THE PLATE WON ME ELECTION TO THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF PAINTER ETCHERS LONDON THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - THE GREAT BOOK rie etching by making money for its members, especially if very young and very incom- petent. There are more etching clubs than etchers in the land to-day; and more teach- ers than etchers—I even am one, but I do try to teach the craft practically. That I know is the way to teach. ee were English houses and Eng- lish streets in Philadelphia, with Eng- lish names—Chancery Lane and Water Street Stairs, and Plow Inn Yard and Christ Church—and I know now, as I believed then, that these houses and streets and churches were more English and more beautiful and had more char- acter than anything in any one town in England; and one reason why England interests me is that it is so like Phila- delphia as it then was. All my etchings of these subjects were attempted under the influence of Whistler and Haden. I even copied the wall in Haden’s ‘‘Whis- tler’s House,’ which shows how ignorant I was, for it is one of his cheapest hack ma- chines. Then, too, Abbey had done his Herrick, and soon was to bring out his Oxp Sones, and every one waited every month for his English drawings in Har- pER’s, as they look for fashions and photo- graphs now. I tried to learn my trade in every way. Once Thomas Nast lectured at the Academy of Music; he was the best cartoonist we ever had, but not the only artist. He set upa big sketch block on the stage on an easel and he asked the audi- ence what they would like him to draw. After they had stopped demanding local celebrities of whom he had never heard, there came requests for the usual lot— Washington, Tweed, Lincolna—and he tried various sheets of paper and then dashed off Tweed’s portrait, pulled it from the easel, and it flew out of his hands and sailed across the floor right to my feet at the edge of the stage. I was there to learn how to do it. I picked the drawing up to hand it back to him, and saw, as I held it up, the whole por- trait carefully pricked out with pin-holes. He only had to draw over them as fast as he could to get a perfect Nast. But as Phil May used to say, when he did simi- lar stunts, though without pin-holes, “Far be it from me”’ to rival this great man. But I did learn a lot that night, and its a pity some of Nast’s successors havent learned his tricks; they could never learn his mastery of his art. ap HE great event of this spring was the publication of Blank & Blank’s great work, written by Blank on, I have to this day no idea what, or rather what the title was. But I do know that one day we— Poore and I—heard that Peter Moran and Stephen Ferris and the Smillies were mak- ing etchings and drawings of pictures and getting paid a dollar an hour for it too. We had no respect for tradition, or profes- sional etiquette, but a wild desire to get some of the dollars, as we heard there were endless drawings to be made; and we did get some of the work to do and some of the dollars for doing it. I think the ever ~ thoughtful and overworked Ferris got both for us. What we were asked to do was to make pen-and-ink sketches from photo- graphs of well-known pictures by European artists. This we did, and so well that we were given lots more—or I was—and as we virtually could select our own artists, we tried to do our best. I remember I was given two Ricos, a Fortuny and a Casanova to begin with. We were fur- nished with photographs, but how these were turned into brilliant pen drawings is one of the lost arts of illustration, though illustration is a lost art now. The success 1n my case was so terrific that Tue Century asked me to do an article on the pictures in the Corcoran Art Gal- { 1881 | 78 lery at Washington. The publisher’s suc- cess, we heard, was equally great. The drawings were reproduced by line photo- engraving which was just coming in, though thebest workeverdonewasdonein Caner aur ie VENICE FROM THE PUBLIC GARDEN : GIBSON COLLECTION BY D. MARTIN RICO - DRAWN IN 1881 - “4 those early years. When the photoengrav- ings were made of the pictures to be repro- duced, a proof ofeach print was sent toeach painter whose pictures we had copied, with a request that he would say what he thought of the reproduction. In some few cases he was flattered; in others he was fu- rious,and Iam told—mind, Iwas told this story—that in every case when the artist answered, praising or blaming the sketch made from his painting without his per- mission, it was a simple matter—mind, I am told this—to cut off the painter’s signature from his letter, reproduce that, and print it under the reproduction of the painting, so that some people might imagine that all these illustrations were original signed drawings by the greatest living European artists. There was not even an attempt at international artistic copyright in those days. All I do know is that Rico, twenty years after, in Venice one afternoon, wondered when he had made a certain pen drawing of his paint- ing from the Public Garden, and signed it, not only with his name, but with a moon CHAPTER VII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR and six stars too. When he found out [had copied it, he admitted it was so good that he said it ought to be his own. And on this work we prospered. All the while I was working at my Philadelphia etchings and COPY BY ME IN PEN AND INK OF THE PAINTING IN THE PUBLISHED IN THE CENTURY they were sent to the Academy and were hung; and great was my conceit when a few lines about one of them appeared in Tue Lepcrr. And I cut the puff out and framed it, and that—my first notice—is gone too, though I saw it just before the War. But I shall never find it again. ap HIs year was jammed so full of things for me that it is hard to keep count of them. Tue Century people asked me to go, with Drake, to Luray, to make drawings in the newly discovered cavern. I journeyed down alone and stopped over at Harrisburg; no mural paintings there, no new capitol even, but the most won- derful old wooden bridge over the beau- tiful river, the Susquehanna. This I etched ona plate so large that it took two sheets of paper to print it on later, in the old printing office high up in Jayne’s build- ing on Dock Street to which I went to print, because it was there Moran and Ferris printed their etchings. O NE day, years later, I thought it my duty to stop at Harrisburg —I was coming back from the West—and see the { 188x } THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - THE HARRISBURG MURALS 709 new Capitol and the murals. There could be no danger—Abbey was dead and the architect under a cloud—so I stopped. There was one of those dear old American- plan hotels on the main street, with a THE GREAT OLD WOODEN BRIDGE OVER THE SUSQUEHANNA AT HARRISBURG - I was, I could not have told which Capi- tol of any one of twenty other States I was looking at, save that this one had a gtay ice-cream mould of a stalagmite melting on each side of the entrance stairs acetal ane Semmens 2} : 4 FROM AN ETCHING MADE I881I - THE BRIDGE IS NOW DESTROYED AS ALL AMERICA IS BEING DESTROYED row of gents sitting on the back legs of their chairs downstairs, spitting, and a row of colored waiters, drilled better than white soldiers, upstairs waiting, and after dinner I went to look for the old bridge; but that had been the first thing to go; it had American character and was built by American hands. And the proofs of the etching done when I went to Luray Cave are gone too. The old Colo- nial houses still stood; probably they are gone now, I havent been there since, and the whole place, I understand, is turned over to an up-to-date New York architect. It is just as well, possibly, for now that Burns is dead there are scarce any native architects left in the State. Since then, a Governor has told me that if I would come up he would show me wooden bridges still standing and give me good liquor still lying in the cellar of the gubernatorial mansion. Needless to say his ancestors were Friends. I wonder what the present incumbent has done with both. Next morning I approached the Capitol and if [had not rememberedwhere into yawning cracks and crevasses, in the pavement, which I had to be careful not to tumble into. I approached and entered the seat of the lawgivers of my native State. As I gazed transfixed, aloft, Inearly broke my leg over one of Harry Mercer's tiles, about an inch higher than the ad- joining one. Knowing Mr. Mercer's taste for hanging Conestoga wagons in the air, and arranging invisible doors with Rem- brandt’s etchings on them, which open and hit you in the face while you look, and dungeons for dining rooms, and stairs that end nowhere, and sofas that turn into bathtubs if you sit on them, in his pala- tial home, I was not, and am not, sure whether this arrangement was a joke or art. And minding my steps, I advanced and gazed around, and seeing cuspidors twenty feet high illuminated with jewels and lights, I asked an attendant how they were used. ‘““Them aint spittoons, Cap; them’s stands for flags uv conker'd en- emies!’’ I looked beyond and straight be- fore me sprang from the waving floor the grand staircase of the Paris Opera House— { 1881 | 80 CHAPTER VII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR or maybe that is somewhere else, in some other Capitol of the same kind, the cre- ation of some other original American architect from photographs. High above were lunettes, and sailing out of one right Opposite me were the topmasts of Abbey’s decoration—all the rest of the design cut off by the moulding below. ‘Religious Liberty being brought to America.’ I knew this, for I had seen the whole paint- ing in London. And under it, in glitter- ing letters of solid gold on the surface, the legend, “‘My God. What an Example’’ —the words of William Penn—the end and beginning of two sentences jammed together, running completely around the dome and joining upright before thedeco- ration. I left despite the appeals of the spieler that I should accompany him to “see the real hand-painted ile paintings done bya real young lady of Philadelphia.” I have since seen Miss Oakley’s work in her charming studio and on the walls of her interesting exhibitions. I had seen enough. But in about thirty other State Capitols and in the interiors at Wash- ington, you can see and hear the same thing. Go to the nearest and come away ashamed and delighted at the absence of humor and the absence of art, which is typical of most American murals to- day. But American art is rather confusing to foreigners. [remember the adventures of Fritz Thaulow and Sir Alfred East, not in Harrisburg, but in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, when, but separately, they served on the Carnegie jury. Thaulow arrived in the first city and as the train stopped and he got out, right in front of his car was a brazen band which burst into “‘See the Conquering Hero Comes.”’ Thaulow was much impressed and took off his hat, only to find himself violently shoved from behind by the captain of the victorious local ball team, with the re- mark, “‘Hustle yer big shader!’’ Then he began to take notice, and the next morn- ing when he came down to breakfast at the Shenley, and the waiter said, ‘“Amer- ican or European ?”’ he replied, ‘‘None uv yer tam pizness!’’ And in Philadelphia some one gave East a dinner at the Art Club and he was telling how he had just been made a Royal Academician, and what an event that was in London—how city dignitaries were proud to acknow]l- edge it. ‘“Ah, it’s different here,’’ said the host ; ‘“‘the Mayor never even heard of art, to say nothing of the Royal Academy!”’ So sad was the scene that two of the guests went out on the front gallery of the club to console themselves, but ina second they rushed in, yelling, ‘‘Boys, the Mayor’s done it! Come!’’ And there, on the front of the City Hall, traced in letters of fire, was the legend “‘Welcome R. A.’’ And it was not till East proposed to hire a car- riage next morning and go in person to thank the Mayor, that they told him the Royal Arcanums, or some such things, were having a convention in the city and that was why the sign was in the sky. Poor old East, he was such a delight to his enemies and to his friends. A tT Luray, found Drake in arealSouth- ern hotel; and what care we had to take not to tumble through the holes in the floor as we went from the porch to the dining room, when the gong sounded, to get our chicken and pone. Thedrawings were done, but I had experiences alone in the cave with a candle that sometimes went out, when there was a darkness that could be felt, and with guides and with twoengineers who were fitting up the elec- tric light. With these engineers I had lots of fun, and fright too. Tied to a rope, we would crawl through holes or drop into chasms, to see what was on the other side or at the bottom. One of the engineers was {1 88x} THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - FIRST WAR ARTICLE SI as fat as was thin, and I shall never for- get how, after wandering around in a new hall we had found by crawling through a hole way up at the top, as we started back, a stone fell on him and wedged him fast ahead of me. I illustrated the article with monotypes which, to the disgust of the printers, I made in the office, squirting ink and paint over everything. This must have been in July, 1881, just after Garfield was shot. Poore and Par- rish and I, working away in the Phila- delphia studio on the 2d of July, knew somehow that something terrible had happened —and it was the same with everybody all over the country. The country felt the shock and shuddered, just as when Lincoln was killed. We have changed, or Presidents have, since then. Just before I left Luray the first Reunion of the men of the North and the men of the South was held there, and I heard real stories of fighting and how it was done and why it was done, by the men who did it. We cried and laughed and sang, Dont you see de black cloud risin’ over yander,’ ‘“The Star Spangled Banner”’ and “‘Dixie’’, the whole livelong hot day, in the streets of the town and in the courthouse. Among the Southern men was an old unreconstructed rebel chap- lain who got talking to me of slavery. “Tf you had a mule worth one hundred dollars,”’ death? Well, if you wouldnt do that, would you lick to death a slave worth fifteen hundred?’’ Afterwards, seeing me sketching in the street, he came up and said,‘ ‘Suh, I have to tell yuh that yuh will go far, suh!’’ He was a prophet, in some ways. So strongly did the war fever take hold of me that on the way back to Washington, where Garfield was dying, I stopped at Antietam and went over the battlefield and near twenty years after he said, “‘would you lick it to © the fight I dug bullets out of fence rails. [had to stay that night, and after supper I was told there was a man in the hotel I ought to jee and hear, and I was pre- sented to’Colonel Alexander Boteler. Then and there he told me the story of John Brown's Raid, and his part in it after the fight as judge, for he tried John Brown. I was held by the magnificent old man and by one fact in his story: John Brown barricading himself in the engine house and commencing to fire on the crowd outside, when the first person killed or wounded was a darky, and at once the news went round that the Yankees had come down to kill the Niggers; and the Colonel said, “‘That ended slavery round here, for, suh, every nigger tuck to the woods!”’ Part was told and part, later in the night, read from his manuscript. A ND then my genius as an illustratorre- vealed itself, for, after an hour or two of talk, I proved to him that, even if THe Century had not the courage—it was in the era of the bloody shirt—to print his manuscript, it was his duty to send the Editor this valuable historical document. It was sent, and 1t appeared in THE CENn- TuRy, and was I believe the first article on the war, though not the beginning of Tue Century ’sWar Series: the first article about the war written by a man who took part init. I, adventurous illustrator, was responsible, but Mr. R. U. Johnson, in REMEMBERED YESTERDAYS, does not men- tion the article or even the fact that I got it for THe Century; but I did. On my way to Washington I also stopped at Harper’s Ferry and made a drawing of the engine house in which Brown was besieged that I think was printed with Colonel Boteler’s article. I went also, on my own, to Rich- mond and drew Libby Prison, and that was published too. I have always done the things that should be done, and in- { 188x } 82 CHAPTER VII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR vented authors, and some day, this will be recognized, though I have been forced to call the attention of a stupid world to it. There were drawings too, made at York- town. Drake and I went down to Old Point and stayed at the big hotel and there were drills and guard mounting, and my future sister-in-law, though I did not know her, beautiful in an ivory gown and a big Gainsborough hat, sur- rounded by the most gorgeous officers in uniform. After the war one never saw officers in uniform, save on duty and at hops in the evening. Drake fell ill, and I worked up the Luray sketches. I could not make drawings in the cave. And one day we went up the York River on a steamboat and heard the cry of the man, “Now, then, all yous what aint got tickets jest walk up to the cappen’s office and settle.’’ And then we drove to the Nelson mansion, which I drew, and the family—I think they were all Nelson Page's sisters or cousins or aunts—and all charming—told us how the place, in every war from the time of the settle- ment, was always run over by both sides in turn, till there was scarce anything left in the house or on the land. By the time I reached Washington, Garfield had been sent North, and I started my drawings of the White House, the Capitol and the Cor- coran Gallery for THe Century. I also made an etching of the Capitol seen over a wooden shack, one proof of which, I learn, is still in existence. I have no idea who were the authors of the articles I was illustrating. Merely a list of sub- jects, to which I never paid the slightest attention, if possible, was given me by Drake. The White House was delightful; it was before there was any sort of resto- ration about it. Owing to the national grief for Garfield’s misfortune, there were few visitors, though Vice-President Ar- thur was in residence. I presented a letter to the President's young Secretary. He told me he would show me round, if I came before seven the next morning. I was there. We did the downstairs rooms, then we went upstairs, and ““This,’’ said he, “‘is the President’s anteroom; this the President’s dressing room; this the President's bedroom,”’ and throwing open the door, a white-gowned figure, with a yell, sprang out of the far side of the bed. ‘‘And that is the President.’’ After- wards I got on more familiar but less intimate terms with President Arthur. When I come to think of it, this must have been later, after Garfield’s death. My evenings were spent usually with Professor W. H. Holmes and a number of other artists, when I was not with a crowd of cyclers at the rooms of the Capitol Bicycle Club. Professor Holmes was then in Major Powell’s department of the Ethnological Bureau, and so was Thomas Moran, who ought to have been a great artist—he is bigger than the present-day duffers, anyway—and Holmes had assisted at the discovery not only of the Yellowstone Geysers but of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. He gave wonderful descriptions of the way Pow- ell’s party traveled across the desert, knowing nothing of the Canyon; and how for some days they crossed the level plain, at last sighting trees on the far- away horizon with nothing but clouds beyond, strange in that country, aston- ishing these scientists as they slowly approached; of their keeping on until the mules refused to go further; of their own terror as they came to the trees and that awful screen of clouds; and how, when they did reach the edge, there was nothing, and Major Powell, in his ghastly fright, whispered, “‘My God, boys, its true, weve struck the end of { 188r } THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - SUMMER IN WASHINGTON 83 the world!’ In the Yellowstone they sat down for supper one evening by a quiet boiling spring and put things in it to cook, but, suddenly, it went off and spout- ed a hundred feet in the air; ‘‘and,’’ said Holmes, ‘‘some of the crowd didnt stop running till they got to Washington.” ee like these and the offer of a post if I could make satisfactory draw- ings — satisfactory, thatis, froma govern- ment critical stand- point—induced me, for the first and last time, to compete for a post. I was given a sort of profile map which Holmes had of drudgery was beyond me mentally as well as artistically. There were other Washington artists, and the first Ameri- can prize student, and Doctor Burnett, who was, I believe, the first person in Washington to col- lect etchings, whom I used to go to see. Lheymatresallasave Professor Holmes, rather vague in my rather dim memory of forty years ago. UT vivid is my memory of run- ning one afternoon, on Pennsylvania Ave- nue, into Farney, Metcalf, Cushing, and some Zufi Ind- ians, followed by an * admiring crowd, and made in pencil and told to copy it in ink. Holmes said he had made it with the thermometer away below zero, thawing the lead pencil, or himself, over a fire between his legs as he drew. I felt like telling him, as I used to be told,‘ ‘there was no merit in that.’’ The only other thing about it I can re- member is that there was a Mount Pen- nell on the drawing, but where that Mount is or was, I do not know or care. I believe there is an Elizabeth River dis- covered by Landor in South America, but then both he and Teddy said the other never was there. I took the map and improved it, and I did not get on the Survey. But how Holmes, who could make the most stunning direct water- colors, should have preferred this sort FROM A LETTER TO A. W. DRAKE I881 of my joining myself to the party. Metcalf and Farney had come down to illustrate articles on the Zufis —who had journeyed to Washington from the West by way of Plymouth Rock, where they went to get the sacred water of the Atlantic, with Cushing, who had lived among them and studied them and was now writing about them for THE Century. As we were all working for the magazine, we chummed up. If they had been working for Harper’s, we would not have spoken. There were happenings that day. The Indians passed the afternoon, first in the back yard of an oyster saloon, cut- ting the pearls out of oyster shells, for that was money, though the people of Washington did not know it. Then they were taken to a music hall and intro- { 1881 } 84 CHAPTER VII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR duced to the ladies of the company, and I understood that some arrangement was made for them to appear with it. They were to have seen the Great Father, but as he was dying when they arrived in Washington and the coming Great Father was not yet showing himself, they were led instead to the East portico of the Capitol, where they said their prayers and spread their offerings before the statue of a sailor holding up a ball in his hand, and asking Columbus, umpire at the game, the chief figure, how 1s it? And they were given Mat Morgan’s cari- catures and Barnum’s posters for their embroideries and pots. It was pretty quaint and I often wondered if a story in THe Century called “‘Three That Go and Two That Come’’ gave the Indian idea of the whole affair. For those sol- emn Indians were no fools; it is only we thieving Americans who have stolen everything from them, who are fools, saying the only way to improve an Indian is to kill him and steal his home, his land. But the Indians, I am told, do strange things to the Friends, who feed, clothe and educate them at Carlisle, and when they go back, they burn their clothes and forget their education. I have seen one plowing in a top hat and blanket at Gallup, and a squaw, who could not talk English, speaking over the ’phone. And now the uplifters want to stoptheir dances and festivals—but adore jazz and the tan- go and the League of Nations, and want to wipe out our real Americans, as the Spaniards wiped out the Aztecs. We are only imitators. I had also drawings to make in some of the new houses in Wash- ington. Here I followed Brennan, who had shocked the superior owners, people with many “‘things on the mantel shelves that gave the whole show away.’’ One newly- moved-in and moved-up lady told me that Brennan had spattered ink all over her rugs, and that when she objected he told her it was all they were good for. That was the age when the Longworths and Hays and Adamses invaded Washing- ton, and Richardson built their houses. It was the fashion to live in gloomy, iron-barred, rough-hewn castles even if you had to pull down lovely Colonial houses to do so. But no American archi- tect trained in France ever does preserve American buildings; it is so much easier to destroy than carry on or create. I did other drawings in Washington that hot summer, but the most important were of the Corcoran Gallery. I had an invita- tion to attend the hanging of Guiteau, but declined; that, too, was later. Farney accepted and, I believe, fainted. Horrors, from war to trapeze artists and prize fighters, I always avoid; uplifting soul- ful Americans love them. In the fall I made many illustrations for Judge Tour- gee’s Our ConTINENT in Philadelphia. pee then came my first big commis- sion, and I have had big commissions ever since, not only all over America, but all over Europe, where I am, I am told, better known than here, though only the other day Violet Hunt wrote me there is a tribe arising which, like the Jews here, know not Joseph; but here they do know, though they pretend not to, and hate me too, and so do those “‘profits’’ of culture who have ruined art and literature in America as the same class has in England. But I shall stay in my native land—or what was my country—even though it isa dry, dreary desert. And this reminds me how in a fury in London in the White- friars Club or some other awful resort of High Street, middle-class Britons, some typical ones, to whom I had been giving some good advice about England, turned on me and said, ‘‘Well, if you dont like us, { 188x | THE PHILADELPHIA STUDIO - METHOD OF ILLUSTRATION 85 why dont you go home?”’ *‘Because I make you so mad bystaying,’’ I replied. [thought then that I should always stay more or less abroad; but the War settled that, and settled me here ; ended Europe ; ended the world; and for a time ended me. I had taken thought for the morrow, for the future; but it is over, my future is in the past. But it is good to remember and record the things that I know. The big Commission was to go to New Orleans with Cable. I MUST say a few words about the way in which my early drawings and etch- ings were engraved. When I began, most illustrations were drawn in reverse on box wood blocks in pen and ink or wash, mostly the latter. The lines of the artist's drawings were made into relief by the en- graver cutting away with a knife all the undrawn parts of the block, leaving the lines of the drawing standing like type— and these blocks could then be printed with type—this is the original method of wood cutting, the method used from the beginning of illustration, as soon as the scribe’s writing could be multiplied by printing, the method of to-day — only to-day the wood cut has vanished almost before the mechanical engraving as all aceasta aie - CALLOWHILL STREET BRIDGE PHILADELPHIA THE FIRST OF MY PHILADELPHIA ETCHINGS I 881 hand work is vanishing. The wood en- graver, employing the tools of the steel engraver, learned also to translate washes’ into line, in the same way, and most of these early drawings and etchings of mine photographed on to the wood block were engraved in relief in this manner—but I was one of the last to draw on wood—or rather the earliest to escape the drudgery of it. Wonderful work was done by these engravers—but till the advent of photog- raphy, by means of which the artist’s drawing was preserved by being photo- graphed, all the originals were destroyed in the engraving and the engraver was the supreme critic and final authority—for nothing remained but the engraved block. Never shall I forget one experience. I was asked to make a drawing of a daisy field seen through a worm fence—to illustrate a nature poem. I drew it on the prepared block with pencil and wash, and when I got a proof the field of flowers I had so carefully drawn from nature to illustrate my author had become a rushing river. I protested, but the overlord, the engraver, wanted to know if he was to ruin his eyes engraving that flower stuff when it was easier to do ariver, and his engraving was far better than my drawing anyway. {188r | CHAPTER VIII: THE FIRST COMMISSION - START ON VISIT TO NEW ORLEANS WITH CABLE - MEET OSCAR WILDE THE VOYAGE OF THE MARK TWAIN DOWN THE MISSISSIPPI PN ar A am — gh Worthka — clon Xe, spn Sor SKETCH FROM A LETTER TO MISS ROBINS MRS. PENNELL ANNOUNCING THE TRIP TO NEW ORLEANS WITH G. W. CABLE TO ILLUSTRATE HIS ARTICLES ON THE CREOLES OF LOUISIANA NE day, in the fall of 1881, soon after my first article, “A Day in the Mash,”’ was published in Tue Century, Drake or Gilder wrote me to come to New York and, taking as usual the fast seven o'clock train, for we thought that train the fast- est in the world and the best, as every- thing then was, it landed me in Jersey City in time to see the big buildings come out of the mist. I walked across to Broadway, and took the horse car to 743, Scribner’s Building, which more or less is still there, and I climbed to the attic and there was Drake, the top of his dear bald head shining in the distance. I was at the office before ten o'clock, usually the first to arrive. I could not then, nor can I now, understand why people hate to be early, have to have day- light saving to get up—though I can understand the curfew to put drunks to bed—we want it badly. If not the first caller I had to wait in the outer room. There were magazines and illustrated papers to look at, and this was one of the few places where I could see them, as there were no free loafing libraries in those days. Sometimes others were wait- ing, students with portfolios and with- out ideas; engravers with blocks and proofs, deadly afraid of Drake, for he was an engraver, not a business man; artists with ideas or wants; process peo- ple with schemes; and once in a while some one who had arrived, Howard Pyle, looking like a pompous parson, towering sulkily in a corner, or Brennan, ina green overcoat with Roman coin buttons, would rush in, rush through the waiting room, and be greeted with a beaming smile by Drake, and that was the reason for his success, and, incidentally, the success of the Magazine and American illustration, for Drake not only knew but was willing to learn. I determined to follow Brennan —I dont mean in the green coat—but by getting in. I had my scheme and with { 188x } Sosoteammestommesn ise nom se LEAF FROM A SKETCH BOOK FILLED WITH PORTRAITS OF PEOPLE BROUGHT BEFORE THE GRAND JURY ON WHICH I SERVED IN THE COURT HOUSE PHILADELPHIA - MOST OF THE DRAWINGS OF THIS PERIOD WERE DESTROYED « THIS BOOK ESCAPED THE WAR THE FIRST COMMISSION - TO ILLUSTRATE CABLE 89 some excuse I would pass into the second room and talk to Miss Gleason, the Sec- retary. How I made up to her, till Drake would see me and call me in to him, and tell me, when he was done with me, to come back and we would go to lunch at the St. Dennis or the Vienna Café. My, what a spree, otherwise, one might wait all day. And I remember the rage of Pyle once—I heard about it after—when I went in to Drake before him. His morning there was a solemn talk with Roswell Smith, the President, and I was told all sorts of nice things by him—that they could depend on me to do things when I promised. I have never yet seen why an artist should not; lazi- ness or inability to do the work is the real reason. I do not believe in tempera- ment. And I was told, too, that the Edi- tors would like me to go to New Orleans and do the illustrations for a history of __ Louisiana that G. W. Cable was writing. And nothing was said about a contract or expenses. There were difficulties about getting away, for I was just twenty-one. I had voted for the first time and, with one exception, when I was fooled by Wilson, the last time. I am never settled long enough to get a vote. As the result of my first, I was summoned on a grand jury. I tried to get out of it, for I was working on my etchings of Philadelphia. I went to the Court and stood up and told the Judge I was sure the summons was for my father, that I was too inno- cent and ignorant to be of any use on a jury; and his answer was, “‘Sit down. By the time you get through you will know as much as any bald-head on it!”’ I sat down and continued to sit when we were told to stand up to be sworn, and when the Judge commanded me to stand and swear, I said I would not because I was a Friend, and so with a growl from him I was affirmed. For this Judge not so long before had summoned another Friend, who came reluctantly and walked up the Court Room with his hat on. He was in plain clothes. ‘Tell that man to take his hat off!’’ said the Judge to the Crier. ‘‘Hats off !’’ yelled the Crier. The Friend paid no attention. “Take his hat off,’ said the Judge. The Crier knocked it off. The Friend walked up to the Judge bareheaded and said quietly, “‘Judge, I give thee and thy Court in charge for assault and battery’’—and walked out hatless. And they had to bring him his hat and an apology. The Friends are ‘‘a peculiar people’’—or they were. I learned much on that day, that condemned pris- oners spent their time knitting and were fed on paté de foie gras and champagne, at least we were, and mad people had balls every day. I made many sketches in that old grand jury room in the basement of the old City Hall at the east end of the State House, which they have recently re- stored because—as it was tumbling down —TI made them do so; but no one in Phil- adelphia has said ‘Thank you”’ to me. There were other articles, among them one on the “‘State in Schuylkill,” the old- est fishing club in America, and though I was not asked to one of the Club’s func- tions at the old castle at Gray's Ferry, I have since assisted at their new place up the Delaware and spent delightful days with the governor and the citizens. ARLY in 1882 I left for the South. That was the winter Oscar Wilde discovered America. I had met him at the Lelands and heard him lecture—on the day when in velvet and knee breeches he faced a deputation from the Univer- sity of Pennsylvania, each with ‘‘a sun- flower ora lily’’ in his very modern hand; but Oscar brazened that tribute out. He and Archibald Forbes were on the train { 188x | go CHAPTER VII: THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR to Washington, and I chummed up and then had nothing to say to them or they to me, and I did not know how to get away nor they how to get rid of me. From Washington I went to Louisville and made an etching, and then to Mem- phis, where I took a steamer down the river. I wrote an article on the boat, - Leland knocked it into shape for me, and it came out, “The Voyage of the Mark Twain,’ but anonymously. On the way down I met the man who shot Wilkes Booth and asked him to write his story for THe Century, and at a bank in Mem- phis I saw the son-in-law of Jefferson Davis and asked him for a letter to his father-in-law—to get him to write also for the Magazine. And these articles which I got for THE Century, with the first by Colonel Boteler preceded, or that by Colonel Boteler did, THE CrEn- tury War Series; though I had no idea of starting a War Series. I really was a born journalist and was so regarded when there was journalism in this country, in- stead of drivel, photographs and adver- tisement. There were good dinners and endless poker, which I dont play because cards bore me, on board the Mark Twain, as we ran all day by bare cotton-wood forests hung with dead men’s hair wav- ing in the wind; at night steering to the bank in the darkness and letting down the gangplank after a light was lit; and I remember the Jew drummer, told by the captain to jump when the boat swept by the shore a few feet off, who asked, t % = ag: \WaLconE 10 DOREY Peep nn ‘“D’youse spec me to valk on de vatter?”’ “No,” said the captain, “You—”’ “‘Mark Twain,”’ yelled the man with the sound- ing pole, and the light went out and the boat went on; and the snags came up out of the water, and the rowboats dodged them, pulling far from the shore with passengers; and all day we sat by the texas, and talked with the captain and the pilot. Once some one on a point yelled and the boat crossed over. ‘Say, any you frens what want to see a scrap over to Arkinsaw City, why jest come long. I got traps and we kin drive over and see it beforethe boat gitsroun’’—and most went. I did not, for I dont like fights— save bull fights—and have never seen a man fight, but virtuous Americans love them. We panted, groaned and wheezed all day round the curves of the river, and got to the town at night and found everybody full and happy and the fight over. To-day they would have lost their money and been dry, too, or bloated with soft drinks and cold storage. Then we came into a flooded region, the river as wide as you could seeand people sitting on chimneys and in trees. We took some of them off and made short cuts where the water was deep enough—and the scenery and the people became delightfully miser- able. I saw from the railroad last year, going south from Memphis, their descen- dants sitting inthesameflooded countryon fence posts, waiting for the train to pass. You would not find such types inany other land,theyare thelast of the American race. ies SKETCH FROM THE TRAIN TO NEW ORLEANS 1921 A DECK HAND ROUSTABOUT ON THE MARK TWAIN -: PORTRAIT IN MONOCHROME MADE ON THE TRIP DOWN THE MISSISSIPPI * WOOD ENGRAVING UNSIGNED PUBLISHED IN THE CENTURY CHAPTER IX: WITH CABLE IN NEW ORLEANS: A DELIGHTFUL MEMORY OF A DELIGHTFUL WINTER IN A CHARMING CITY WITH A CHARMING AUTHOR - ASKED TO OLD NEW ORLEANS WASH DRAWING ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY J. F. JUNGLING + PRINTED IN THE CENTURY - ONE OF THE SERIES OF DRAWINGS MADE FOR CABLE’S CREOLE ARTICLES GREw tired of the river at Vicks- burg—lI had had a week of it—and took the train, which waded through the flooded country in the dark to New Orleans. I went to the St. Charles Hotel. I remember my delight in finding in a New Orleans paper an article about the drawings in THe Century I had made at Bethlehem ; papers took illustration seriously then. This I saw when I came down to the office in the morning: a big room with big chairs, big slouch-hatted men and big spittoons all about. And then there slid in a tiny little man with a black beard and bright eyes, and that was Cable. He was so tiny and so charm- ing, and he carried me off at once to find a place to stay. As the work was mostly to be about the Creoles—it was, he told me to be called THe Creorzs or Lout- sIANA—we walked over to Canal Street and turned down the Rue Royale, and right into France. America stopped in the middle of Canal Street. The people { 1882 } 904 CHAPTER IX - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR on one side were American, on the other Creole. The signs on one side United States, on the other French. Newsboys yelled THe Picayune to the left and L’ABEILLE to the right, and in the Rue Royale we stepped into Cable’s stories. At the end of the street were the Cabildo and the Court House, and above and be- tween them the spires of the Cathedral, the great Place d’ Armes in front, with its palms; on both sides the Pontalba Mansions, dignified and imposing, each with empty storerooms on the ground floor and a black hall leading to stairs at the back; on the second story a verandah as big as a room and behind it a bigger one. All this we found after banging at the great front door with a sign Chambres a Louer on it, and there I was dumped down, without anything but my trunk and my school French. The landlady had not even Ollendorff American. Iwas pitch- forked right into France from Philadel- phia. Cable began to take me about, first to Madame Antoine’s, where I had my first real breakfast, and then all over the Creole town, his town, to Madame Del- phine’s, to Jean 4 Poquelin’s, to Belles Demoiselles plantation, to his home. I dont know what Cable is like now. He writes me once in a while, and he came to London some years ago and was taken up by a strange lot and I never saw him there. Then, he was just Cable, just a workman, proud of his work and his family, his church and his town. I found soon that in the French Quarter it was just as well not to know Cable, for at that time the Creoles could not stand him —I dont know why—but I think it was mainly because of THE GRANDISSIMES, and the famous scene of Raoul Innerarity and “‘Louisiana refusin to hanter the Un- yon.”’ But it is all vague—forty-two years ago—and I never madea note. Those were delightful days I spent drawing in courts, on plantations, atop the levee, up the bayous—new subjects, but the subjects of Rico and Fortuny, about which I raved, as did the other illustrators. These Mas- ters were far better worth study and far more difficult to follow than the slipshod methods and clumsy gods of the present, and that is the reason why they are not followed. All day I worked, stopping only to buy fresh bananas for lunch, if I had any, and thinking of the good dinner with wine which I learned to drink at night, for] became a pensionnaire at Ma- dame’s, and my dinners with wine cost eighty cents. ‘‘Dont you wish you did not have to eat?’’anew American said to me the other day. ‘‘No, I wish I did not have to do anything else,’’ Ianswered. But it was wasted, she had never dined, and a million like her are in the land to-day cocksure in the ‘‘valor of ignorance.”’ NE morning, after a great storm, there wasa telegram from Harper's: “The New Orleans levee will break and destroy the city; draw it.’’ So, though I could not see any signs of the catastrophe save that the ships and steamboats looked down, more and more down, on the town as the river rose, I did it—the river break- ing in and the first house going over. I was on the spot and drew the house, Canal Street a torrent, horse cars upside down, the Cathedral spires jammed with people, the prisoners in the calaboose drowning, and all the rest of it. I sent the drawings off to Harrer’s WEEKLY—and the levee didnt break and the article did not appear. I forget if they paid for it. But the levee did break below the city, and a long day Cable and I passed there, watching the water tumbling, roaring, rushing through the crevasse and spreading out over the cane fields, the odor from the sugar mills on the other side of the flood { 1882 | G. W. CABLE - PORTRAIT BY ABBOTT H. THAYER FROM THE ORIGINAL IN THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND LETTERS : THIS PORTRAIT A MONOCHROME WAS ENGRAVED BY TIMOTHY COLE AND PUBLISHED IN THE CENTURY + THAYER, COLE AND I ALL BECAME MEM- BERS OF THE ACADEMY AND I SUCCEEDED TO THE CHAIR FORMERLY OCCUPIED BY THAYER 96 CHAPTER IX - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRAIGE: filling the air. On the levee a long line of darkies, each with a little bundle and a big umbrella, tramped toward the town, and the planter on his big horse in front of his big house, said: “‘See them niggers —you give ‘em freedom—now theyre getting it. "Fore the waw Id had to feed ‘em for six months; now they can feed themselves or you Yanks can.”’ This was not so long after the Civil War, and those were real experiences and not inexperiences as we had of the World War. The people down there had been through the war; up in the North I dont believe the patriots knew any more about the Civil War than about the World War—those who stayed home and did the shouting, when the world died. O THER days we would cross to Algiers where the darky quarters still stood and the darkies still lived more or less as they did before the war. And there were days on plantations; days in and about the old prison, murderers and boys and debtors wandering loose together from sunrise, cooped up in cells at sunset, when the foul black bats, like the spirits of crime, with ghoulish chatterings, came out in clouds from under the eaves and flew shrieking about the dismal deserted square; visits to the old voudou priestess from whom we could get nothing; and to the battlefield, where we got full evi- dence of the stupidity of the British in one of the few battles they ever fought by themselves, and of course were beaten —they even had Hessians in the Revolu- tion and were beaten then; and visits to people who had done things, like Judge Gayarréand Lafcadio Hearn, I think, who was there, though I heard he treated Cable scandalously, just as more than one thief and imitator did later; and visits to church, morning, afternoon and evening, with Cable and his family, after a day of which Mark Twain said, ‘‘I got nearer to Heaven than I hope I ever shallagain.”’ But a little later he had a birthday and Cable made each of his friends send Mark an unpaid telegram of congratulation, and he was delighted till the bill came and it was about a hundred dollars. And E., the day Cable died, just as this chapter was going to press, reminded me that one morning, when Cable was singing and talk- ing in our city, Major Pond sent us a tele- gram telling us to come at once to his hotel. I found her, and we went, and there was Pond looking most serious, and he took us upstairs and into Cable’s room and he was in bed, and we were fright- ened. But as we commenced to ask what had happened, Cable sprang out of the sheets and blankets full dressed, and I took the party to the old Bellevue and we had so good a lunch that Cable told Pond he must stop there the next time, but that excellent lunch served by the excellent Bolt nearly bankrupted me. And I remem- ber too that the last time I saw Conant of Harper's WEEKLY just before he disap- peared, and the only time I ever dined with the Clover Club, which I found stu- pid, was in the old Bellevue. A little later Lavery came to America and stopped there and he had been told to beware of mos- quitoes for they would poison him. And so, when he returned late at night it was in the fall, he shut his windows before he lit the gas, and then got undressed and into bed, and just as he was falling asleep he heard a loud buzzing. He jumped up, lit the light, hunted all over the room, but could not find the beast. He lay awake a long while before sleep came and then, all of a sudden, he was waked again by the buzzing, but again could find nothing. He looked out of the window and then he saw and knew that it was the last trolley at night and the first in the morning which { 1882 | ® ¥ LETTER FROM G. W. CABLE TO JOSEPH PENNELL CONGRATULATING HIM ON _ HIS MARRIAGE TO MISS ELIZABETH ROBINS AT PHILADELPHIA JUNE 4 1884 q : : ; a WITH CABLE IN NEW ORLEANS - I SEE JEFFERSON DAVIS 99 he had heard. They did not have trolleys in Glasgow in those days, but we did, and mosquitoes too. T HERE was a trip when a schooner was hired and the Frenchman came along, a mysterious Frenchman who wore a hel- met and eyeglasses. We picked the schooner up on Lake Pontchartrain and meant to sail up and down the bays and bayous, but the wind and tide did not mean us to, and we spent days amongst islands inhab- ited only by distant flamingoes and near pelicans with everlasting alligators on the shore. The Frenchman—who was later to mix up diplomacy and brick-making in Mexico—had a passion for sport, but he was so near-sighted he had to jam his eye- glasses on and hold his pith helmet while he let off his gun at the pelicans, who stared at us and looked at him sadly as they shook the shots out of their feathers. The alligators merely opened their eyes and shut their mouths when he fired at them before they rolled off their logs. I recall trying to control a jibing boom which chucked me right out of the ship; and the mosquitoes; and the big seas in the river down by Eads Port and Pilot Town. In the evenings we would pull up by an island and the captain would make won- derful gumbo soup and mix rice and tomatoes and things out of cans, for there was nothing but sand and pelicans on the islands. Then Cable would sing, and sometimes tell a new story—and down there I heard for the first time of Lost Island—and all this was before he sang or talked in public. But at last we gave in to the head winds, boarded a steamer coming uptheriverand it brought us back to town. o one could have been kinder than N Cable and some of the people to whom I had letters, for my mother died while I was down there, and my father almost died too. But I made my draw- ings and ate my dinners at Madame An- toine’s, and helped by the people I met, the time passed quickly, if sadly. Carnival came and I did that for Harper’s WEEKLY, and Parsons, the Art Editor, said he would only print the drawing I sent if I signed my name to it, so afraid of it was he, and I answered—I had learned how to answer editors—that I would not let him print it if my name was not signed to it. There was also a series of etchings of the houses in which Cable’s people lived, and Mr. Edward L. Tinker pointed out to me that Lafcadio Hearn wrote an article about them in THe Century, but I do not remember ever seeing him. There was also a scheme that Cable and I should go to the West Indies and do them, but it never came off. The Cable work was as interesting as any I ever did, because it took me to a foreign land, as Louisiana was then. How the na- tives hated Americans. One day, as I was sketching, a Creole man got in front of me and I asked him to move. He felt for his knife, saying, ‘Hi ham a Creole and you har han Hamerican, and for feefty censa I will cut you hinto small piesces.’’ But there were Creole ladies; and how charming they were and what times we had. The last I saw of Cable he stood on the levee, seeing me off, beside him Jefferson Davis, seeing his daughter off to New York. I got back and the Editors liked the drawings. Some of them had character. I learned what sunlight was, tried to draw light, learned something of beauty of form, and that the South was not the North, and people seemed to like them too, but they only made me want to see new subjects. They were all engraved on wood and printed well, most of them. There was something else when one returned. Drake would give you a cast, or a Russian lamp, or a coin, with your voucher, which you { 1882 | 100 CHAPTER IX - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR presented at a straight and narrow brass- barred window to a most severe cashier- ess, who glared at you as she paid out the notes and it seemed as if she was tearing out her heart, and she scared every artist to death. Only, if it was near lunch or dinner time, there was Drake behind you, and he carried you off to Dorlan’s and fed you on scallops, or else home to dinner and to a show and after- wards gave you lobster and porter at midnight, in the dear, dead days. EFORE I left the office the morning I Baie from New Orleans, Gilder asked me to go to Italy and illustrate a series of articles with Howells on Tus- cany. Then I hurried off to Germantown, my father alone, my mother dead, the house shut up, but there was a year of work before I went to Europe—then the hope and the dream of the young artist. But in those days American artists were properly trained, studying here with the hope of Europe. Now we have scarce a i i f ee) \ he eel Po ‘ er * j yal he a A FULL RIVER FROM THE LEVEE - decently taught painter and the ignorant duffers glory in their ignorance and in that they have never been to Europe. They steal their art from photographs and fake it in museums—just as the British did in the mid-Victorian age, which is our age here to-day. F this country is to become a world | power in art we must adopt world methods—or the coming artists must— we must carry on tradition. Students can be trained in some of our art schools per- fectly well up to a certain point—but after that, despite the great and still grow- ing collections here which can be and must be studied if we mean to progress, the student must travel, here first if you like, and then abroad to see the old work in place and to see how it was created to fit in with its surroundings and to see the men and the methods of the present, and learn from both. This was the method of the past, the right one; the way Diirer worked in the past, Abbey in the present. PENCIL DRAWING ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY W. R. POWELL { 1882 | CHAPTER X: THE JOURNEY TO EUROPE - THE CROSS ING - LONDON - MEET ABBEY AND PARSONS: PARIS: DOWN TO ITALY - MY IMPRESSIONS OF HOWELLS AND. FLORENCE er WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS AND MISS MILDRED HOWELLS - FROM THE RELIEF BY AUGUSTUS ST. GAUDENS - NOW IN THE POSSESSION OF THE HOWELLS FAMILY - DONE AT A LATER DATE SIsaid, the Editors asked methe ; day I returned from New Orleans . to go to Europe and illustrate, ; : with twelve etchings, a series of articles to be written on Tuscany by W. D. Howells. They offered me for a print from each plate I should etch fifty dollars, my passage out and back, and a railroad ticket to Florence from London. I knew my name would be made and I jumped at the chance of six months’ work for six hundred dollars. I thought I was paid like a prince for the plates, and in the end Iwas. Later I found out that the Editors had offered the same, or a larger sum to Charles A. Platt, and he had refused it. Well, I am now known in Europe artis- tically, and the etchings made me known. An illustrator receives more publicity from a magazine which publishes illustrations than any other artist, for though large numbers of people may see in one city an art exhibition, an illustrated magazine 1s an att gallery for the world—or was in those days, now I fear the illustrator must do other work to be remembered. Even Drake used to say what he had done was not remembered—but his name will not altogether die. The same day they paid me for my four months’ work in New Orleans—before the drawings were pub- lished. Iam giving these figures and facts for one purpose—to show that I loved my profession as an illustrator; for I was now an illustrator, and I worked at it because I loved it. My father was not so enthu- siastic. He said I would have earned far more by this time from the railroad. But { 1882 } 102 I earned enough to live as I wanted to live and was to have the chance to make the etchings. I do not know what others got, or get; and I do not care. I accepted the Italian commission with one aim in view. I wanted to do the etchings, and to see Europe and to study art. The pay helped me to try to do better work than my rivals and by such aid I have been able to keep on drawing and etching all my life, and my knowledge of Europe and European art has enabled me to see America. That is the one way, by study and travel in Europe, not by sulking at home, that the best American art has been cre- ated. The present belief that art is an easy road tofortune I knownothing about, save from the letters and inquiries of stu- dents asking me to direct them to it, or by watching some of my students wait- ing for inspiration, or American painters hanging on to millionaires. Art means the hardest work in the world, and the more ability the artist has, the harder he works. Unless he can win in art by fight- ing for a position among his fellows as an artist, he is worse than nobody. But art has become the business of nobodies, the occupation of art masters, the sport of those who would do good to art and who encourage failures, a refuge for incom- petents who fill art schools, especially those out to make money and a social standing quick—the art does not matter —and for newspaper reporters who call themselves critics. Recently I talked to an art school with two thousand pupils and I was careful to tell them I did not believe two of them would ever become artists. I have not been asked to talk there again. I was asked to award prizes at another art school, and as the works in competition were not signed, I gave the prizes to the three I thought best. I was told by the master, after I had CHAPTER X - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR awarded the prizes, that they were all by the same student. The master asked me to change the awards. I refused. He told me I knew nothing about teaching att, which was to give as many prizes to as many pupils as possible. That would attract students, and he was paid by fees. That is not the way I teach—I do not offer prizes to my pupils. . HE TUSCAN commission was given me in May, 1882, but I did not start until the following January. There were New Orleans drawings to finish, for I could not then do everything from nature as I try to now. I had made many sketches and studies, carrying out the good ones, trying to correct the bad, and several etchings, which had to be printed. Any sureness of hand or head I may have ob- tained is entirely owing to the hard training I went through with the definite idea of beating my contemporaries by better work. I also did a number of drawings of old Philadelphia for Har- PER’s WEEKLY, to illustrate a series of articles by E. on the Bi-Centennial of the City. I was even put on a City Commis- sion for the Celebration; now I am care- fully kept off. And together we, E. and I, did a lot of work for a forgotten paper, Our ConTINENT, edited by an almost for- gotten author, Judge Turgee. The Art Editor was Miss Emily Sartain—the only trained woman art editor I ever knew, and she did know. The Philadelphia etch- ings were printed in THe CenTurRY, with an atticle by E. They were reproduced wonderfully by wood engraving—the work of wonderful wood engravers. An article by Mrs. Van Rensselaer on Ameri- can Etchers, most of whom could not etch, also contained wood engravings from my © prints. These were amazing examples of misdirected energy, but they were amaz- ing and made, or helped greatly to make, { 1882 | ee li BEA: Ss lag icc rtm, tian THE PONTE VECCHIO FLORENCE + THE FIRST ETCHING MADE IN EUROPE - REPRODUCED FROM THE TRIAL PROOF IN THE COLLECTION OF MR. JOHN F. BRAUN OF PHILADELPHIA 2 “2 - ] THE JOURNEY TO EUROPE - THE YEAR BEFORE I WENT 105 American wood engraving known all over the world of art. But a photo-engraving reproduces an etching better—one of the few things it can do well. N the same summer of 1882 I went with Mr. Buel and Mr. Johnson to the Union and Confederate Reunions at Fredericks- burg and in The Wilderness, Toe Century having begun to collect material for their War Series. The Reunion in The Wilder- ness was the most extraordinary I ever attended. On the battlefield a Confeder- ate parson told how, in the midst of the week of battle, Stonewall Jackson rode out of the Confederate line, into the smoke and fog hanging over the swamp, on the corduroy road, to reconnoitre with his staff, of which the parson was a member; and how, right in front of them, appeared a Northern picket, who shot Jackson down; and how they lifted him up and got saplings and made a litter and car- ried him back towards the Confederate lines; and how again out of the smoke and fog came a picket of his own men and, taking the group for Northern troops, killed nearly the whole staff—and then he broke down. The Northern men told their version of that story, and ‘‘Dixie’’ was played and “Yankee Doodle,’’ and it ended with “The Star Spangled Ban- ner.’’ Twenty years after, one had only to wander a little way in the swamp to find rusty guns, cartridge cases, skeletons; the unknown soldier rotted where he fell; flies and not Red Cross nurses saw his death. Afterwards both sides talked it out. This Reunion was magnificent, and I saw and heard history at Fredericks- burg. One story told by a Confederate officer was that my future brother-in-law, Colonel (now General) Henry T. Doug- las, who may have been present at the Reunion, was in command of the Con- federate Artillery in the cemetery on a hill, and he fired away all his shot and shell into the Union forces under Ben Butler, or Burnside, advancing across a level, open field a mile wide, after they had forded the river. And then Colonel Douglas smashed the gravestones and fired them. “Why did you send your men over that river and across that field in broad daylight?’ said the Confederate officer. “To win the fight,”’ said Butler—or was it Burnside? “‘But you didnt, and we kept the graves.”’ P ERHAPS the best story of the Battle of the Wilderness, or any battle, is Ste- phen Crane’s Rep BapGE or CouRaGE. It is scarcely known, and he and his friend, Harold Frederic, are neglected for the time. It was unbelievable to listen to this exchange of history between the men who made it. Unfortunately most of them could not write, as THE CEN- TuRY articles prove, and few who could write did. I have seen the German staff winning the battle of Mars-la-Tour in lectures, given thirty years after, to their young officers on the field, but there were no French officers to tell their side of the fierce fight. I have seen English officers losing sham battles before an audience of Royalty and gentry out for a day’s sport. I have seen ‘‘the French army amusing themselves,’ as a peasant said of the manoeuvers we once watched, over country they later died for. But never before was seen, never again will be seen, two foes fighting their battles on the field peacefully, certainly not in America, where the spirit of reconciliation is as dead or deader than the bloody shirt, or Bok’s forgotten peace plan. We have lost the spirit and the faith that won the Civil War, though there was no reason for that war, and it would not have hap- pened had it not been for those who brought it on for their own gain, the { 1882 | 106 predecessors—not the ancestors—of the prohibitionists, the cowardly, money- loving, decent-living-hating tribe who have wrecked the land they have stolen. Is a prohibitionist or an advertising peace peddler a true American? How much bet- ter, cleaner and saner was the world, or these United States, then than now— then, when we lived decently, played decently, ate decently, drank decently, read decent books and magazines, and were happy. Fools, fanatics, reformers, uplifters, advertisers, females and the War have wrecked us and we have be- come the joke of creation, but a sad joke, and the new Americans are too stupid to see it. But they will, and run, and the country will fall. M ucH work kept me busy all the fall and was only interrupted by getting out of the studio Poore and I still shared; for we could stand each other no longer. By the end of the year I was ready to start abroad. To the commission for the Tuscan etchings, THe Century had add- ed another for drawings, to illustrate an article by Andrew Lang on Edinburgh, which helped out the money problem. But the voyage to Europe was a great undertaking. My father came to New York with me and saw the ship the day before she sailed, and I am sure wanted to go. But he went back to Philadelphia alone and sad the same night—after he kissed me—saying his only friend was leaving him. But I stayed at a boarding house and took a charming young lady I knew to a concert, and she confided in me, and somehow, before I left, I had ar- ranged her engagement with a distin- guished young man, and they have lived happily ever since. That was Professor Holmes, who tried to get me on the Goy- ernment Survey. On the steamer I was shown, by a Canadian, a copy of the latest [1883 } CHAPTER X - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Century, with ‘‘The Voyage of the Mark Twain’’ in it, and I became a big person, for it meant far more then to be in THE Century than it ever could now to be among the ads. of THe Lapies’ Home Journat, and to different people, too. I do not remember anything about the voyage on the Alaska, except that I was in the bows under a donkey engine and it was always at work; and when I escaped it, to go to the dining saloon that adjoined the galley, the smells were solid, for it was so rough everything was sealed up, save the concert for the mil- lionaire sailors’ mission, which was held as usual. I do not even remember get- ting to Liverpool. But I do remember going over with the Canadian to Chester and eating a ‘‘veal and hammer”’ in the Rows and seeing my first cathedral, and on to Oxford, and staying at the Mitre, and bumping my head and stubbing my toes continually in that respectable home of uneven antiquity. And then we went on to London, but I cannot imagine how we came in at Charing Cross; or my im- pressions are confused with those of a few months later, when I came back from Venice. Certainly it seems as if it was then that I first crossed a bridge and saw and smelt London—the sight and the smell that have never left me, though, little did I think that for more than thirty years I would know this sight and this smell every day and every night from our windows. puT up at the Craven Hotel, as my Canadian advised me. He had been fearfully impressed because Leland had given me a letter to Walter Besant. I was rather impressed myself as I left it at the Savile Club. In answer, Besant promptly asked me to a dinner of the Rabelaisians to meet Lowell, and at that I was so scared that I left London almost i : . Pe esOURNEY TO BUROPE «THE TRIP TO ITALY ' at once. In the meantime, I had been to Cassell’s, where I learned that Henley was the Editor of Tot MaGazineE oF ART, though Henley never let it be known, or signed his letters, as a good editor does not; and he gave me a commission to do Urbino. I went also to THe Art Jour- NAL and got another on Barga, both to be written by Vernon Lee. And I went to Harper's at Sampson Low’s, where I met W. M. Laffan, and he took me to Abbey and Parsons’ studio, where I saw them for the first time, and they gave me my first drink of whisky, and Comyns Carr, com- ing in, tried on the corsets of the model, who was posing for ‘‘Sally in Our Alley,”’ and asked us all to dinner. And Abbey told me that Leighton wanted to see me, having seen my etchings, and I got more frightened than ever and eager to be off for Italy. Had I stayed, of course, like almost all the rest of the American artists then in London, I should have become an R.A.; but I have now so many other Academies that one more does not mat- ter. Before I left London I lunched at the Cheshire Cheese, the only place I could find open on Sunday, save St. Paul’s— and that only for service—the pubs only open between services—and as I went out of the Cheese, full of pudding and porter, one waiter said to the other, “‘Gent ‘asn’t guv me nothink; ’e wants to guv yer some- think ’Arry.’’ And I dropped all the sil- ver I had in his hand. And in London too, I felt that horrible loneliness in the big crowds in the streets of the big city. O n the way to Paris I held the hand ofa French maid on the steamer, but she helped me when we landed, for my French even after New Orleans did not go far. In Paris I ran into Platt, who had come over before me. He gave mea lunch that was better than those in New Orleans and took me to the Luxembourg, where 107 —or it must have been in an exhibition— I saw Bastien Lepage’s ‘‘Joan of Arc.’’ I was paralyzed by it. How it has changed, —or 1s it 1 who have changed?—since it got to the Metropolitan. And then, after trying to talk French when I got lost, coming home at midnight—I was stop- ping at the Hotel Castiglione, where I had spent a lot of the six hundred dollars —I started for Florence. On the way down to Italy I remember only five things. The sunset view from the train at Lugano, which was heaven—I have never seen it since and shall never see the like of it again. The man in the compartment with me who took off his shoes and set them up on the seat opposite—we were alone —and talked to them and beat them, just before we got to the St. Gothard tunnel; I left the carriage at Goschenen, which was probably what he wanted. The climb up in the winter snow, dark and cold to the dreary, coal smoke laden, black tunnel, and the sun, warmth and beauty of Italy where we came into spring leav- ing winter behind. The dark streets of Milan, the hotel bus, and the Dazio man who stuck his head in and scared me to death when he looked at me and asked me if I had anything to declare, in Italian, of which I did not understand a word, for I thought him a brigand and the whole thing a hold-up. And the morn- ing after, the view coming down the mountains to Pistoia, all Tuscany beyond, and then the city of Florence and the Hotel Minerva. I did not see Howells till after dinner, when he took me to his rooms and introduced me to the family. He did not like me, I somehow felt at once, and I dont think he ever did. But the family were charming. He was most impressed with himself then. He and James were the American authors; they even got in Puncn, standing on each other's heads and only { 1883 | 108 CHAPTER X*- THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR reaching Thackeray's knee. Though How- ells stood me while in Italy, I know I was very fresh, he had little use for me and never praised anything I ever did, though he did buy two Venetian draw- ings. Finally he forgot to answer my let- ters, and took in the end to illustrating his travel books with commercial photo- graphs. His want of interest in art, or in my art, is characteristic of many of the authors with whom I have adventured. And yet, he was connected with artists and his son is an architect and cared for things even then, and his daughter was a charming Lirrte Girt AMONG THE OLD Masters. I do not know why it was, but We were not simpatico, even from the be- ginning. But I went to Italy to make my etchings and they were what I cared for. All day and every day I worked at them, drawing them straight on the plates, and that is why they and all other proofs by 21) phe PZ ge AE a ue Niglte Fmt, Vy pe rie -— ep eee & ot 4 ON THE ARNO PUBLIC LIBRARY -; Li ekcaptegemereiant tert crate on pe ween TIES. canes — Sec at - ETCHING MADE IN FLORENCE 1883 PUBLISHED FIRST AS A WOOD ENGRAVING IN THE CENTURY MAGAZINE etchers who draw from nature on the cop- per are reversed in printing. I even tried to bite them out of doors as I drew them —Hamerton had recommended that—but only once, for I could not see and I swal- lowed the fumes of acid as I bent over the flat easel which held the bath, and then I upset that. One experiment was enough, but the crowd enjoyed it, especially when the fumes ate the skin off my throat and I spat blood all about, and they wanted to send for the Misericordia brothers and take me to a hospital, but by that time so great a crowd had gathered that the police came out and drove us all away. The poor artist always draws a crowd he dont want, the poor pedlar rarely gets the crowd he longs for, and the police move us both on. But sometimes the artist turns. Whistler would threaten to stab the nearest with a needle. I could spatter them with ink as I pre- tended to clean my dirty clogged up pen. + FROM THE PROOF IN THE NEW YORK [1883 } ao hae tie : : E é Sie PER Xl PERORENTINE DAYS - A WINTER IN ITALY WITH HOWELLS - DUVENECK’S BOYS AND OTHERS N CITIES FOR THE CENTURY = —— = ee NU ; tpi Sauer Bs " Mitta 2 : i sie HUY foes THE SWING OF THE ARNO PISA + WOOD ENGRAVING FROM THE ETCHING BY R. C. COLLINS PRINTED IN THE CENTURY + TO ILLUSTRATE ONE OF HOWELLS’ ARTICLES ON TUSCAN CITIES NE or two days and nights of the respectability of the Min- erva Hotel, where the Howells were staying, was enough for me. I may have been enough for the Howells family. They dined in their rooms and I was invited; but I mostly went to the table d’héte, for I was very young and very keen, and wanted to see new Italians. I found British old maids. So when Howells saw that I did not appreci- ate the hotel, he suggested a lodging with a respectable Swiss lady who had a number of German archeological or architectural authorities and C. Howard Walker, just back from discovering Cyprus or Cythe- rea, or somewhere, for boarders. Here I was to learn Italian. One lesson given in German by the Swiss landlady was all I had; I had had one in Philadelphia, be- fore I left, from a Hungarian Jew; with these two my language lessons ended. The first night in the pensione was very cold and what is called a frate was put in my bed. Now a frate is a long-handled scal- dino, and a scaldino is a covered copper dish to hold burning charcoal, and they stick it under the bedclothes within a frame- [1883 | I1o CHAPTER XI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR work to keep it from setting the bed afire, and leave it there to warm the bed. When the bed is hot and you are ready to turn in, you should put the apparatus outside the door. I kept it in my room and, in a heavenly state of comfort, blew out the smelly Roman three-wick oil lamp and went to sleep. Some time later, I found my- self in my nightgown being hammered and punched and rapidly rushed up and down in my bare feet in the snow on the flat roof of the house. And when I became sufficiently roused, I was told in many tongues that no one was sure whether I was an utter fool or a determined suicide, as I had shut myself up in my room with a burning pan of charcoal. Whether they smelt the charcoal or missed the scaldino, I do not know, but they got me out in time. I had a headache for a week. HAD had enough of friendly help-and I chose a place for myself on the Borgo Ognissanti—a big flat of two rooms with a fireplace and a terrace. I think it cost twenty-five francs—maybe fifty—a month. I could have my coffee and rolls and a light; nothing else. I chose it because it was opposite the American Consulate, and I had my letters sent there. I told Howells what I had done. I think he was alarmed. I told him the padrone spoke French, though I could not understand it; it was perfect Florentine, he chucked his h’s about like a Cockney. Howells suggested that I should still dine at the hotel. Incidently, I might say the Florentines called him ‘‘Woulsey’’, while I became “‘Pennelli senza 1.’’ His brother-in-law, Larkin Mead, the sculp- tor, who lived in Florence, said that he would look after me and introduce me to “the boys’’ who dined at a trattoria in the Via Guelfa near him. He took me there; they were ‘‘Duveneck’s boys’’, or what was left of them—Rolshoven, Grover, Freeman and Mills—and he dumped me { 1883 } down on them. But anybody who had not studied with Duveneck was nobody. I thought I should learn Italian now, and it was the purest Florentine I acquired. To this day I ask for a hasa and a havallo, or a hamici, and say ja. Mead impressed them with the fact that they must look after me, or at any rate endure me. The trattoria had no name, only a number on the house, and I forget that. For us it was The Trattoria. It was an ordinary tratto- ria, mostly wineshop in front, then counter to left, tables to right; a-vaulted passage next, rooms branching out on either side, the favorite one so narrow that the first man went to the further end of the table and the rest took their places on each side as they came in. Didi, the pretty little lame daughter, who waited—there was another older one who married at once— either spun the plates along the table or else climbed on it or crawled under it when she served. I dont suppose we could have found a worse and more expensive place of the sort in Florence; but we loved Didi, and she loved us, and when anything hap- pened, burst into tears and violently em- braced whoever was nearest. The mother was rather cross and the father was only heard growling in the kitchen. Ifthemenu was limited, we invented new names for it. Only a few come back; dotteri nocie, stickei ostra and bestecca, of which there were varieties; bestecca di manzo and be- stecca di bestecca for swell occasions. One of the other words istheequivalent fornuts ; the other is translated toothpick, and be- stecca might go in Volaptik. All Florence got to know of that trattoria and all sorts and conditions of men—and a few wom- en—came : Howells, Mead, William Sharp, Stillman, I think James Bryce, the Duke of Teck, “‘the only Jones’’, and all the other artists save Arthur Lemon,who said he would not go in, once he saw the out- 4 q 4 ; i FLORENTINE DAYS - BOCKLIN AND THE BOYS side. The most constant was Arnold Bock- lin, whom ‘‘the boys’’ loved. He would come, talk long over the bad dinner with Rolshoven in German, get the salad bowl or a soup plate and a from his pocket, then take his pipe or a straw, and make soap bubbles, look- ing at them with the little smelly three- branched lamp _be- hind. And there it was inthattrattoria, with soap bubbles in a soup plate, that Bocklin found his iridescent dreams of beauty; or I suppose so, for I was totally unable to exchange anything with him but smiles. They said he had a fountain too, up in the Villa Lan- dor where he lived, © with a basin about as big as a bathtub, and that Venus and Au- rora and mermaids and mere men sport- ed there beneath the cypresses, as you may see them in the German and Swiss galleries to-day. The popularity of the placewhen I arrived was not so great; “‘the boys”’ had just moved in. There had been another out by the Porta Romana, in which many decorations, mostly in charcoal, had been made by Duveneck, Alexander, Bacher, De Camp, and the rest. These became fa- mous and “‘the boys’’ determined to give their lady friends a dinner and show them. The padrone prepared a banquet and, to have things perfect, an hour or so before the company arrived covered the decora- MY OF DESIGN :- TIMOTHY COLE PAINTED BY HIS SON - DI- PLOMA PORTRAIT IN THE NATIONAL ACADE- COLE WAS AT THIS TIME BEGINNING HIS WOOD ENGRAVINGS FOR THE CENTURY OF OLD ITALIAN MASTERS iit tions with whitewash. Then they moved to the Via Guelfa and the padrone was disgusted with ‘‘the boys.”’ Qe came at times. There was the Sunday-school teacher from Canada- ragua, who had aban- doned wife, family and country in order to learn to paint in Italy. Then he was going to the Holy Land to paint that —and, eventually, something was to happen in Skaneate- les. What did happen to the kindly giant, I do not know. And there was another art- istman whohad made enough, touching up pictures in churches at home, to travel abroad and study.He always had his re- ceipted bills in his pockets and they read something like this: To rebuildinga fiery furnace for Shad- rach, Meshech and Abednego . 1 52356 To making one new blue heaven and set- ting 39 golden stars, thereins 2. 2 yeaa To arraying Solomon in all his glory . . 7.29 Another had ideas on dress reform and one day turned up ina toga. The next day he did not appear, but on the following he did, clothed and, for the moment, in his right mind, and explained that the night before the toga had blown off and he had had complications with the stu- pid police, especially after he had called them imbecile; but Bunce, passing through Florence, had paid his fine. Still he spent [1883 } FLORENTINE DAYS VISITORS TO°\THE TRATTORIA the night in the cells of the Bargello, or some such place. He afterwards chose to array himself as an early Florentine, and so arrayed attended a tea party. He often adapted costumes he found in old pictures to his requirements. Another time his whole family moved from their lodgings outside the town, with all their belong- ings in wheelbarrows. The Dazio people demanded duty at the gate, and they left barrows and all and walked into the town with only the things they had on their backs. He is now internationally famous, and only lately I awarded hima grand prix at an international exhibition. AN ND there was Forepaugh, who had in- vented a great actress, and knew every- body and everything. But the only thing I ever found he really did know was the best cantina to go to for a glass of wine. And he could tell a good story, but I never remember him doing a stroke of work or even pretending to. We would go toa caffe, opposite the side of a palace, at midnight, buy hot rolls, borrow tumblers, then cross the street, knock at the little window in the palace wall, and for two soldi wine was handed out to us through the win- dow. This was the way the Florentine nobles sold their vintage. We went back to drink it and eat our rolls, while he spun yarns between drinks till dawn. And the stories he could tell! One day he was lunching with Olcott or Sinnett, the prophets of Madame Blavatski, and one or the other lived in Irving’s rooms on Bond Street. He and Forepaugh got talk- ‘ing about astral bodies and mahatmas and esoteric things and he said: ‘You dont believe. Well, I'll show you. Hold on to the table.’’ “‘I held,’’ said Forepaugh.‘‘It rose up with all the things on it, us hang- ing on, sitting in our chairs, went out through the window with us sitting at it, sailed down the middle of Bond Street at 113 the height of the third-story windows, over the hansoms and four-wheelers and busses, round the lamp-post by Egyptian Hall, and back again over the cabs and busses, came in through the window, and we sat down with a bump. ‘Now,’ said he, ‘do you believe?’ ‘No,’ said Fore- paugh, ‘give me another drink’— But I held on like hell.’’ And there were musi- cians and opera singers that were to be. The one I loved best of all had a lisp. He was to be the great American tenor. When one day I asked what part he would sing in Faust, as he was to be in it, he retorted magnificently, ‘‘I am F-F-ausht!’’ But I cant write the lisp. Then there was the New Englander with a chateau in Prov- ence who engineered an encyclopedia, with a stutter, and he would meet you with, | Yoy-yes, 1t-1t-1t iss a-a-a-2) ten he would slowly spell ‘‘v—e-r—y f-i-n-e d-a—-y’’—and at last burst out, “‘You bet it’s a bully fine day!’’ And the man from Chicago, sent by a trust. He received one hundred dollars on the first of each month and on the second we had the best part of it inside us. But those feasts were given at Doni’s, not at the trattoria, and I, the out- sider, was seldom asked. I wasnt ‘‘a boy.”’ He was an artist. His trouble was to find a model for his young Sophocles, for no one was as beautiful as he, and he could not pose and work at the same time; “‘but get him half drunk and he could talk any language except Eyetalyan:’ Poor Donahue. [ee man loved best of all was the ama- teur, if he was rich. He could intro- duce “‘the boys’’, if he would, or he could be taught to appreciate them. Now, money was no object to us, but at times a neces- sity. Some things had to be paid for at once—stamps and cigarettes—all things sometime, and in those days art students were utterly honest. Bills might run on or run up, but I never heard of a man who [1883 ] 114 did not pay in the end. They were igno- rant of up-to-date methods of not paying and running away. Therefore, the rich were cultivated, not to say pursued, for they could pay, and so they were useful. There was scarcely a tea or a dinner, a ball or a picnic, in which ‘‘the boys’’ did not figure prominently, or try to. They even went to church and the Parson some- times and the Consul once dined with us. One reason I was never altogether liked was because I had come to Florence with a commission to make etchings. They, inspired three years before by Whistler when he was in Venice, were occasionally doing them. I had money; it worked out at fifty dollars a month. I meant it to last a year, after I got over. That is what I spent, and that fifty dollars included everything —tailway journeys to Siena, Pisa, and, finally, Venice. Some months I saved a lot. The others lived on the future and hope—and their friends. In the future, they would all become—and most are— known. There was the memory of Giotto behind them; before them the hope that a Roman cardinal or an American mil- lionaire would discover them, or rather they would discover him; and they went into all sorts of adventures with this in view. But the most popular, or rather the simplest, method, and the most success- ful, was to marry a rich girl; and for this all tried, and a few were chosen. But with my fifty dollars a month I was an outsider. I had certainty; they had faith in them- selves and the Florentine world trusted them. It was spring in Tuscany. was not alone in being disliked. There | was a man—English, of course, and we loathed the English—who got forty dol- lars from some idiot every time he made a sketch. Then there were the English traveling students with one thousand dol- lars a year. They would scarce condescend CHAPTER XI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRYvIOR: to speak to us. And there was the first American student with fifteen hundred. We hated him worse than all. We were working for fame; these creatures had money to buy it—money to spend. But they would not spend it on us—or with us. I knew none that ever gave a dinner to us—or even stood a glass of vermouth or tamarindo, or a sigarro Toscano. Abroad now, every student of art hasa scholarship or a patron or is in an Academy. They live in their palaces, boarding houses, clubs, dine in tea rooms and are looked after by benevolent collections of millionaires, safe from the contamination of the foreigner. And now we have an Academy in Rome. uT the encouragement of art as now practised is a curse. No artist can be made by it and not a few painters and sculptors are ruined. The man who starts by winning a scholarship and a thousand dollars for three years has a far harder time to get on when his scholarship ends than he who has had to fight his way through every sort of difficulty for him- self. Even the French know this, and if it was not for sentimental, political and financial reasons, the Villa Medici would be closed to-morrow, though the French and Spanish students are very different from the American, and the French and Spanish Academies are government insti- tutions. Yet a few men have come through the American Academy without harm. Some have even made a name for them- selves on their return. Then, the decora- tive fad, the belief that any painter can make a decoration, had not been invented. There was the story of a commission given Duveneck—a Columbus—and he was al- ways going to do it. Now infant prodigies decorate schoolhouses for practice when not studying comics, while the only great decorator—save Whistler and Hunt—that America has produced, John La Farge, | 1883 } a. THE SKYSCRAPERS OF FLORENCE 1883 + PALACES IN THE OLD MARKET AND VASARI’S FISH MARKET TO RIGHT ETCHING THE PLATE IS REVERSED » FROM A WOOD ENGRAVING BY R. C. COLLINS + PRINTED IN THE CENTURY ;- TO ILLUSTRATE HOWELLS’ TUSCAN CITIES FLORENTINE DAYS - MY FIRST ETCHING AND THE DUSE could scarcely get a commission from the artless architects who mostly have stand- ardized their art in this land. OURNALISTs came to the trattoria 1 and the papers at home and in Europe reeked with announcements of what “‘the boys’’ were going to do, and what I was doing. And over that there was a row, for though all wanted to do things and tried to, any one who did was an outsider. All day, each in his studio worked at a master- piece and gave receptions—at least they did—to show its progress. We had coffee and rolls twice a day and called it break- fast and lunch. Then we dined for about a franc and a half, if not invited out, and went round the corner to the Piazza Inde- pendenzia, and there in the Circo Nazio- nale we either saw the Duse, then the wife of the Manager Rossi, play for twenty-five centessimi—I only saw her that winter, for I hate the theater—or we introduced special stunts for the American clown. Both had turns, but the audience, or our part of it, enjoyed the clown more than the Duse. For months this went on. Rolshoven painted a picture; Forepaugh told stories; Boécklin blew soap bubbles; Grover col- lected rings; and I made my etchings. Some of them are, I know, good, and even the world has said so. They were all done out of doors. The first was the Ponte Vecchio and I shall never forget the fury of Still- man, the critic and correspondent, mad on photography, when he found me perched on the parapet of the Lung Arno, and offered to photograph the subject for me so that I could do it more exactly, and I spurned his offer. He was a pupil of Rus- kin and Norton, and started as a farmer. I was so pleased with some of my prints pulled on the old wooden press in an old shop behind the Uffizi that I sent them to Ruskin, who kept or destroyed them and never answered my gushing letter; be- Lag sides, he was then too much interested in Miss Alexander, and her stories and draw- ings of Florence, to bother about me. Other proofs I sent Hamerton, who did answer and return them, saying he did not accept things from artists, but he gave me a commission—some Venetian draw- ings—instead, for THe Portro.io and re- mained, with intervals, my friend till his death some years after. lee in the winter, there were masked balls, to one of which I actually went with the Howells—the first and last time in my life—and was bored to death. I cant help it, Iam made that way. And I used to go to the gallerieswith Tue Lirrte GirLAMONG THE OLD Masters, and How- ells wanted me to take Johnny to Rome, but I did not. Inthe spring came the Carnival— and then Easter—the Carro del Scoppio, and the function of smashing the top hats of the English, and other functions, and flowers in and out of the City of Flowers, Firenze. People from home would turn up, to whom the Consul gave lunches, to which I was asked. Afterwards he would take the men to his club and send me off to show the old town to the women. Then Florence was old; all beyond the Via Tornabuoni, and seemed perfect to me, though much had gone. The streets were alleys lined with open shops of craftsmen up to the Mercato Vecchio. The Piazza was a dust heap; on one side Vasari’s unfinished fish market, on the other the skyscrapers of the Medici, and the Buonaparti, piling up stories high. I etched them long before there were any in New York. Under them were dark pas- sages, with holes, to drop molten lead on your enemy’s head as he went to the Duomo, the dome of which, with the Campanile, soared and composed beauti- fully over a tangled mass of low roofs before it—the etching of that was de- [1883 ] ies) CHAPTER XI- THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR stroyed, and the prints too. On the other side was a gossip-crowded fountain. Near by, the new market with the new straw hats and the Medici arms, pawnbrokers’ balls, hanging out. Tiny black alleys, a few of which still remain, led to the Arno; in one of them, John of Bologna’s Devil was fixed forever, the Florentines be- lieved, to the wall, though I have heard it has been frequently stolen and replaced by copies, each probably acquired by American collectors as the original. The streets were nearly all as narrow as those of Venice and a loaded donkey would block them, while a party of British or German tourists guided through them made a sensation. We worked on our plates and finally there was an exhibition by ‘the boys’’, but Bradley, the English etcher, and I were rejected. Already, Amer- ican art was the only art that existed for Americans, and the only Americans were ‘“Duveneck’s boys.’ ree waited for the spring and roses to go to Pisa, Lucca and Pistoia. Before we started, I grounded some plates in my big room in Florence. The alcohol for heating them was used up and I took turpentine instead, and the fire depart- ment of Florence was almost called out with its one engine and solemn members who walked to fires led by a bugler. Later the spring nights were full of beauty and mystery, as they still are. But no longer are the sick brought from the dark alleys by the shrouded white or black Miseri- cordia brothers, awfully picturesque, and carried in horrid closed litters, the way lit by flaring torches, to the hospital, though the brothers still do their good work at the solemn call of the bell. No longer do the bel’ giovanni march the streets, humming like a great mandolin, one singing the words, in the summer nights. Therewere days, too, of excursions, always on foot. I remember a wonderful one with Arthur Lemon from Ponte a Mensola to Vincigliata, then along the hilltop to Fiesole. How often have I done it since? There were no trolleys to Fiesole, only an occasional omnibus, always full. Another wonderful walk was outside the Porta Romana with the Stillmans—not one of us was under six feet—an immense success. I also did an article with Still- man, on the Villa Boccaccio, the draw- - ings made from his photographs, but I wrote him a letter later, about what I be- lieved was his criticism of my etchings, printed in Tue Natron for which he wrote till N.N.—Mrs. Pennell—succeeded him, and the article never appeared. I wonder what THe Century did with it? And there was a boating trip to Signa which ended in the shipwreck of William Sharp, owing to his being too heavy to let the boat get over the shal- lows. I went off to the little cities with Howells and when we came back the others were leaving for Venice. As each went, promising to pay his debt at the trattoria—and Iam sure they did—Didi wept and embraced him, and finally my turn came and I wept too. She didnotweep so much over me, for I paid my bill and gave her a souvenir. Once, a year after, I came back alone. Didi was changed; the mother was dead; the place was full of contadini, the dinner was worse; I got no embrace. I’ve never been back since. But it is good to remember. Gees were about a dozen etchings done in Florence and the surrounding towns of Tuscany. Wood engravings of them were printed in Tae Century with Howells’ articles and shown in many ex- hibitions. On the strength of them I was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Painter Etchers, and taken, like Whistler in his early days, quite seriously in Eng- {| 1883 | meOceN TINE DAYS: THE PLATES DESTROYED 11g land. The Keppels published them in New York, and then, before I came to Europe again, I smashed the plates. I had a com- plete set of the prints, but they went in the War, and now I do not know where I could find one. No catalogue was made. I alone remember all the plates which few then wanted. Now that more want them, they cannot be had. As Drake used to say, “All the history I make in the Magazine is vanishing.’ To preserve it is one reason why I have written this book. But who can save the art, the literature, the archi- tecture of our country, whichis daily being wiped out? Italy is going, too, all old Florence and Rome are gone, Venice went in the War—for the people everywhere hate art, unless, as in Europe, they fear it. Here, from the architect to the hod- carrier, the clay-worker to the sculptor, the commercial artist to the painter, the photographer to the comics man, they destroy it for their own profit. They are amongst the vandals who have ousted us. 2.0.6 OLLINS a ie See | *THE HARBOR AT LEGHORN - WOOD ENGRAVING FROM THE ETCHING BY R. C. COLLINS > PRINTED IN THE CENTURY - THE MARVELOUS FIDELITY OF THESE WOOD ENGRAVINGS WAS AMAZING { 1883 | CHAPTER XII: SIENA AND SOME OTHER TOWNS: AN ADVENTURE IN SIENA - TUSCAN CITIES - LITTLE JOURNEYS be OG ny a Uy, 7 aN > Str, Ns Sy Pav my > Y : ~ Loy Le Darl me San ‘i i ee PISA FROM THE LUCCA ROAD +: FROM A PEN DRAWING NOW IN THE UFFIZI GALLERY FLORENCE OWELLS first scheme was to in- clude all Tuscany in his articles, but this was not carried out. Twenty years after I did the country with Maurice Hewlett. Howells finally went only to the towns near Flor- ence. In the middle of the winter, the whole Howells family emigrated to Siena, to the Pensione Tognazzi, and he soon sent for me. They took an apartment in the huge Salustio Bandini palace, which he, Howells, rented from a priest. I lived in the garret with an ancient caretaker. We dined in the pensione in the palace, but took no active part in its social life, though endless teas were given, to which the givers endeavored to entice Howells and even me. But it was cold. When I came I found him in the room in which he wrote with a fire—an awful luxury—his hat and Overcoat on, and a mattress on each side to keep off the draughts. But in front, the sun without warmth streamed through the windows, below which stretched gar- dens to the distant walls; then Osservanza on its hill, and the blue mountains be- yond. I had the same perfect outlook from an unwarmed garret. I dont know what he wrote about Siena. I did my plates— there is one I think really good—the great arch of the unfinished cathedral towering over the town. A steep street runs down to the house of St. Catherine and then climbs the opposite hill. As a study of perspective, it is extraordinary, and I re-- member to this day how I fought that per- [1883 } Sages OP) eel” eee, THE STREET RUNS DOWN TO THE HOUSE OF SAINT CATHE- RINE AND THEN CLIMBS UP TO THE GREAT ARCH OF THE UNFINISHED CATHEDRAL FROM THE UNSIGNED WOOD ENGRAVING IN THE CENTURY MAGAZINE . UP AND DOWN IN SIENA ETCHING bi — SIENA AND SOME OTHER TOWNS : IN TUSCANY 128 spective out and got it right, with numbed fingers, in the bitter cold—I cried over it —but it was all in a day’s work, which was to get the subject on the plate, and I did. Set up with that success, I started another—the great archway, beyond which a mountainous alley climbs down to the Piazza, and over this the Mangia soars. I sat there in the cold, though I did not notice it, all the morning. I lunched at the pensione, where I paid, I think, four francs a day, vino santo, which Tognazzi himself brought round, included. And when midday rang out from the Campa- nile and the other towers, and I tried to get up, I could not; my legs were stiff. I could only yell, and I did when I moved. I could not explain any more than I could move, for I did not know the Italian word for what I did not know was the matter with me. Finally, some one saw some- thing was wrong, so a cab was sent for. Now, I believe there was only one cab at that period in Siena, and it was usually at the far-away station. It came at last; I was lifted, yelling, into it, along with my traps, lifted out at Tognazzi’s, and carried, yelling, to my garret. Mrs. How- ells suggested a doctor. He was brought in a hurry, prescribed things; but the old cameriera did things. She undressed me, only the upper half of me would work, put me to bed, covered me all over with mustard plasters and then built a wall of hot bricks around me as I yelled; but she cuted me. The plate was never finished, nor have I ever had rheumatism like that again. There are some other plates and a number of drawings, but Siena is a very difficult place to illustrate; it wont com- pose somehow; the sky line is not right. There are things I have since done, high views, looking down on the churches and the fountains. I did one plate of the Fonte Branda, awfully printed, in Florence; it is gone, all went, all my proofs, in the War. I could make something of it now. There were others of the earthquake arched streets of stairs and glimpses in the beauti- ful Fortezza. The art I ought to have appre- ciated in the Academy—or ought I2—the art of Siena still bores me, but I can spend hours in the Piccolomini Library with the Pinturicchios, though I havent been in the museum for years. There is a beautiful Madonna, too, ina church near the Piazza, but what interested me most—and Howells a little—was the life of the place: a man having an argument with his donkey, and finally picking it up, because it would not turn round, and setting it down faced the right way; the swells at the club opposite the caffe; the white oxen that blocked the way; the real Siena in spring and sum- mer, the feast of St. Catherine and the Palio; all these I saw later with E. and Helen and Leland, and later still with Hewlett, and again for James. HEN Howells and I went to Pisa, Lucca and Pistoia it was in a rush, such a rush that in Pisa we stopped at the Minerva, not only because it was at the sta- tion, but because Howells said he always stopped at the Minerva and there used to be a Minerva in every Italian town. Then we drove that idyllicroad to Lucca, looking back on fading Pisa and its towering mon- uments, looking forward to Lucca, show- ing over its walls, the young green of the old trees on its dark red bastions; and we walked round the place—we walked every- where—and he made notes and I made sketches. Thence to Pistoia, where I re- member we drove, too, Howells making suggestions for my work, to which I paid no attention. I remember too, that the women in Lucca wore hairpins made of gold wire, now no more, and I bought some; but when they reached Florence, nothing but gold wire was left. At Pistoia { 1883 | 124 we went to a theater to see ‘‘Stentorello”’ and instead, we had seen so much during the day, we went fast asleep. Howells spent the time on the way back in the train writing up his notes, he virtuously did so every day, and when they were finished talked to a priest and missed the scenery. Ireturnedanddidthetownsalone, and made my etchings and drawings.’ CHAPTER XII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Howells was then at the height of his success and had little time to waste on me. Even then I thought Venettan Days far his best travel book, and I think so still. All this is vague memory of youth, for I made no notes. The etchings and draw- ings remain, in magazines, museums and collections. They are the only records left of all my work of that delightful time. THE PIAZZA PISTOIA WITH THE PALAZZO PUBLICO IN THE BACKGROUND * FROM A PROOF OF THE ORIGINAL ETCHING PRINTED IN THE CENTURY AS A WOOD ENGRAVING [1883 ] Pearle Rex ALITTLE JOURNEY WITH THREE LADIES - VIOLET PAGET: MARY ROBINSON: EVELYN PICKER- ING: FROM BEAUTIFUL FLORENCE TO DUCAL URBINO:-AND WHAT CAME OF IT - RETURN ue at CITY OF FLORENCE SKETCH FROM MEMORY IN A LETTER TO E - MISS ROBINS - HE Other articles I was to illustrate were written by Vernon Lee, to whom Howells introduced me. In her amazing house I met everyone —Russians, artists, authors, diplomats and Mary Robinson—all names and nothing more to me. One more blankly ignorant of all that life never existed. But Florence was a somewhat strange place—expatriated Scotch, English, Americans—some there to save, some because they liked it, some be- cause they hadto. What dont I remember? The good dinners of the banker who had a difference with his depositors; Ouida and her dogs, all in the carriage together, and how she hated Livingstone, who could we Cae, cua he 3 Beant oat SY q Saath a Ciné le WRITTEN FROM FLORENCE 1883 drive eight horses tandem round two cor- ners without the police stopping him or his seeing where he was going, or what was coming; the pretty English girl who used to give soldi to the counts, when they left the front door of the club and followed her, and she called each one ““poverino.’’ And the adventures of the tourists in Italian—those who were sure they could talk it—when overcharged ; the one from Kalamazoo who remarked to the cabman, “‘Si voi credevi qui vot putavi s’accommoda sopra una citadina Americana voi s’baglato.”’ And the other who had only one horse for a drive and was charged for two courses, ““due horse’’ { 1883 | 126 being the purest Florentine for corse— she had stopped on the way. And in the early morning I would be waked by the Bersagliere, their cock feathers waving, headed by their buglers, trotting back to their barracks from their drill; and in the late evening the men who hummed like a great mandolin, while one sang as they walked the moonlit streets, lulled me to sleep in dear dead Florence. I T was arranged finally that Vernon Lee, Evelyn Pickering—she later married William De Morgan—and Mary Robin- son, who married Darmesteter—and then Duclaux—should go to Urbino to do an article on Raphael—it was to appear in connection with some Raphael celebra- tion—and that I should be their chaperon or knight or encumbrance. One May morn- ing we left Florence, second class, and wound up the Val d’Arno by Arezzo and Trasimeno to Perugia. Then no trolley or motor bus carried you to the swell hotel; I dont think the hotel existed. We stopped at a little inn, the Belle Arti, in a dark piazza, in the center of the city, for the ladies said they loved the life. Never shall I forget the first sight of the great plain from the great piazza, by the great gate of the city, far-away Assisi, where we would next stop, glowing in the sunset light high on its hillside. But as we looked, Miss Pickering fell ill, and she was sent back to Florence alone. That evening we three went on a search for the Baglioni, then and now only a name to me, up to the great piazza, where the Pope still blesses every one who passes, then down through the dark, vaulted streets till we came to the blank black wall of the Ba- glioni Palace. And as we stood there silent, from the mystery round us came an echo of the fight of long ago. Again and again with E. and Helen and alone I have stood before that grim wall in the darkness, but CHAPTER XIII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR never since has it given back the sound of battle, the wails of the wounded, the shouts of the victors. It was only a mur- mur but it was real. Frightened, without words, we came out of the blackness. For we had heard. EXT Morning we made our plans to N start. We hired a carriage with three horses, fine in feathers, and tinkling with - bells. The day was spent, after this, in galleries and churches. To me, then as now, the charm was in the city and its character, yet Vernon Lee said, and that was the end of it, ‘‘All Italian hill towns ate alike and all uninteresting save for their history.’’ That is the author’s point of view. We did the Peruginos in the Museum in the piazza, and the Raphaels in the convent outside the walls. In the evening we went again to the Baglioni Palace, but there was not a sound. Next morning we started for Assisi, down the long hill, across the plain by the Etruscan tombs, the Roman remains,to Santa Maria degli Angeli, and then up and up the mountain side to the home of the blessed Francis, Assisi mounting ever above us. At last we came to the gate of the city. No touts acclaimed us for their hotel. We rattled and jingled to the one albergo, and there we were the only guests, the whole town showing the way. The leg- end of the Blessed Francis was not yet known abroad and had not brought riches to Assisi. Since I have ridden that road more than once. The second time E. and I cycled it on our tandem when we rode and wrote our Two Pitcrms’ ProGress. That evening we dined on the terrace be- side the Church, as the long lines of light stretched across the plain, touching the Temple in the Valley of the Clitumnus with gold, turning the Tiber to silver and washing the mountains with blue shad- ows. And when, in the twilight, weasked { 1883 } + By es i Sah apie Fy ey f eellitw # yeh 1 DUCAL URBINO STANDING ON ITS GREAT ARCHED FOUNDATIONS: FROM ETCHING MADE IN 1883, i A LITTLE JOURNEY TO URBINO - I RETURN TO FLORENCE 129 the waiter about a map and our road, he confessed that he did not even know the way out of the town, any more than our driver, who explained it by saying that he was ‘‘a little bad in his eyes.’ Next morn- ing we saw thechapels inthe LowerChutch, and that blue Heaven with its gold stars is still before me; and the ladies raved over the Giottos in the Upper Church, the first I had seen and I did not understand them. Outside was onlyasadcity of ruin and pov- erty. But the driver had found our road. We started and we wound and wound ever up to Gubbio, and down again acrossa valley, and thencamea climb. Twooxen were add- ed and we mostly walked, and up and up we went till at last the high pass opened, and away above was Urbino, beyond another vine-filled valley, the city stretching from mountain to mountain, built on mighty arches. Our coming was known before we reached it, and a crowd awaited the Milors, and rooms and a dinner with little birds were ready. In the morning, the ladies looked up Raphael and I made an etching of the City from the valley. I have no idea what Raphael had to do with it, save that he wasbornthere. [think Idrewthehouse. But I do know that I have never seen such a bridge as that on which Urbino stands. At that date, though there were no new artists, in one way I was one, for I never went to see an old picture if I could make a new one; but I was a very young fool. H ERE Our triumphal progress ended. First of all there were complications with the drivers of the carriage and the oxen, which I, owing to their knowledge of the language, left to the ladies. But when we started, the landlord, thinking we were successors of Ruskin and ‘‘Milors Inglesi,’’ asked the price of his hotel for keeping us in it, the ladies collapsed and I settled matters by handing him a proper sum and saying “Questo o nienti.”’ I found then that sufficient ignorance of a lan- guage is a great advantage—in certain cases. Humbly, alone, without a crowd, we carried our things to the diligence and meekly took our places among the peas- ants and drummers who filled it. I was on top. Down we started, San Marino on its mountain to the left; below the great plain with Rimini in the midst of it and the sea beyond. Ina little while, through the streets of Rimini, weclattered to another dark, dreary palace, turned hotel, upstairs, asmost hotelsthen were. The ladies fell upon Malatesta and I fell to drawing, as I have tried again and again to do, the Roman bridges ; but I have never forgotten the maj- esty of the chapels or the sadness of the gtass-grown, silent, empty, palace-lined streets. We discovered, too, that our money had nearly run out. The ladies wanted to see the mosaics at Ravenna, then un- restored, and the Pinetta, then unburned, but there was not enough cash to take us all.So we drew lots—or they did—and the result was that I was sent straight back to Florence, third class,without a centessimo inmy pocket to stop in Bologna, or even to buy anything to eat or drink on the way, while they, having won my money, wrote me that they reveled in Ravenna. How- ever, I had my revenge, for I ate a good dinner in Florence and when, after a week they came back and I called, Iwas told that they were always in bed. They got out eventually, and so did the articles, and the curious may find them, Urbino in THe Mac- AZINE OF ART, and Rimini in THe ENGuIsH ItLustRATED. But though we all live, the magazines are no more. This was not my only journey with ladies alone; years later I traveled from one end to the other of Dalmatia with Miss Harriet Waters Pres- ton and her niece Miss Louise Dodge and the articles I did with Miss Preston were also printed in THz Century MAGAZINE. { 1883 } CHAPTER XIV: THE HOME OF CRISTOFO COLOMBO A WALK IN TUSCANY - CORPUS CHRISTI IN BARGA AND A DINNER WITH THE CITY OFFICIALS - BACK: TO FLORENCE THE DEVIL’S BRIDGE NEAR THE BAGNI DI LUCCA : FROM THE DRAWING IN THE UFFIZI GALLERY ATER in the spring I made a sec- ond little journey, this time alone and this time again, to illustrate an article written by Vernon Lee. I hired a carriage in Lucca—I could get no bicycle—and after a detour to see the Devil's Bridge, reached the Bagni in the evening and stopped in a little hotel by the river. Outside the nightingales sang, and, when they stopped, the river rippled on till morning. At sunrise, I started to walk to Barga and the towns round about. It was Corpus Christi, though I did not know it; the article by Vernon Lee had nothing to do with the festa. The road, which I have cycled and motored since over and over, moved up among the dark shadows of the chestnuts and then came out into the open country. Tired of tramping it, I climbed up to the first hill town I saw, wonderful from below with its campanile. Within { 1883 | its narrow streets all was dismal, all was poverty and squalor; though not the filth the Italian makes when he gets to Amer- ica. But in America he becomes a differ- ent sort of Italian, and he no longer comes from Barga. It was a largish place and as it was a festa, every one was about. There was no inn, only the house with the bush above the door. There was wine, no Chianti, though this is almost its country. There was no meat, though many goats; no eggs, though plenty of chickens ; noth- ing but stale black bread, ancient cheese and sour wine. But after a five-mile walk at sunrise and no breakfast, anything is good. What do these people eat, or do they, as I have been told, learn to live without eating? So we will have to live, because it costs too much to dine, and under prohibition we cant dine decently. But most new Americans have never dined : BARGA AND ITS CATHEDRAL FROM THE CHARCOAL DRAWING IN THE ee aa Ss 2 iis Boe UFFIZI GALLERY FLORENCE 1) THE HOME OF CRISTOFO COLOMBO : THE MAYOR’S BANQUET or done anything decently. These hill people were grim and silent. The inn re- minded me of the English country “‘pubs,”’ the most miserable in the world, till now that America has gone dry, with only cereals, cold storage, chewing gum and candy to live on, the new American “‘eats’’ —the new American word. I got away as soon as possible. The people were honestly poor, for they scarcely charged me any- thing, and offered last year’s chestnuts and showed me a cut across the high hills to the main road to Barga; and some went with me, till I could see the highway glittering in the light below. As far as I could make out, all the talk was of America, and that they wanted to gothere; but we had no prohibition then, though [ hear the Ital- ians have all the wine they want in this dry desert to-day. Once back on the high road, I found it filled with the gayest, brightest crowd; and, at last, we wound up into the town of Barga, crowded with people. Mass had begun in the cathedral at the top of the great flight of steps, and before long a procession came out of the church to the peals of the bells and music of the band. First came small girls, carry- ing great baskets of roses, and as they walked they strewed the streets deep with them, and from the crowded windows and balconies above, draped with hangings, more roseswere showered down. Thencame the city authorities—the Mayor gorgeous in sash and top hat, then priests, acolytes, and last the Bishop, carrying under a can- opy the Host, and finally all the confrater- nities of the country round, moving over the bed of roses. As the Mayor went by, he eyed me closely. I supposed I had done something, though I knelt with the rest as the Holy Thing passed. While the pro- cession wound round the town, I waited on the great terrace strewn with roses, in the glittering air. As I rested, every little 5 while crashes of bells surged from the tower of the cathedral and when they ceased, one after the other, all round the valleyand up the encircling church-crowned hills, the pealing jangling was taken up by church after church, dying away in the far distance, then coming back nearer and nearer, till the cathedral bells alone crashed out again. Soon the procession re- turned, for the route was short, and soon the Mass was over. Then straight to me came the Mayor. ‘You 'Merican, you?”’ “Yes.’’ “‘You know Five Pointa, New Vorka? Yes aay ese Mei sclisnim Cristofo Colombo; me—rich man me. Come dinner, you2?’’ I came. Under his own vine and fig tree, on that perfect day, by the side of the church, we dined, look- ing down on his vineyard bought with Cristofo Colombos, and surrounded by the Common Council of the town, the ec- clesiastical dignitaries and distinguished guests from all about. And Cristofo Co- lombo, the hero and cause of it all, was not there. Every one, save the priests— and some of them, too—knew New York, Boston, New Orleans and San Francisco better than I—had tramped our land, each with his tray of plaster casts, and had sold them; and each one, when he had saved enough, came back and bought his little farm or vineyard and was going to ~ live happily ever afterward. For I then learned that all the sellers of plaster casts come from about Barga. At first they did not quite trust me, for my local knowledge of Italian quarters in big cities in America and Europe was vague, but they had an- other test: ‘‘ ’Merican soldier here—want talk you.’’ A long-haired, white-bearded prophet sat at the table and I was solemnly introduced. His Italian even was not very fluent, only a few words, and he was deaf; but gradually his American all came back: ‘“Me—interpretario, was in war.”’ ““What { 1883 | 1 34 war?’ ‘‘’Merican War.’ ‘“What American war, the Revolution?’ ‘“Yes ; me know Win- field Scott, General United States Grant, General Sherman, Santa Anna—me inter- pretario for General Scott and Santa Anna, Mexico.’’ And here was a veteran of the Mexican War, without a pension, and not asking for a bonus; but evidently he had made something out of it, for he was one of the magnates of the town, and he went up still higher in official esteem when his American came gradually back to him. I was able, through the Mayor, to assure the company that his story, which they had apparently doubted, was straight; anyway he knew more of the Mexican War than I had ever heard. And then we dined in the shady pergola. HAT was the first real Italian dinner I had ever had—vermouth and pastic- cio and capretto arrosto con piselli and finnochio and dolci of zabione and sempre chianti. But why tell of it to a nation, a hundred millions of whom never had a decent dinner in their lives, and have de- stroyed by cold storage and prohibition what they had, and cant stand any one else living decently, and who, like the Senator from Georgia, ‘‘thank Gaud, we dont eat like Yu-rope-ens.’’ The dinner lasted till Vespers and then there was vino santo and cognac and strega and sigarre Toscane, and we sat on until dark, and the Angelus rang down from the cathedral and was taken up by one church after an- other low in the valleys, growing fainter, VOLTERRA DARK ON THE DISTANT MOUNTAINS ° CHAPTER XIV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR and farther away by those high in the hills, till it died in the distance toward Volterra, black on the furthest mountain; then it came back, and a last loud burst from the cathedral bells closed the day. If there is anything anywhere more beau- tiful in this world than the Angelus on Corpus Christi at Barga, Ido not know it, and of beauty I know much—and have seen much. Then I had a little supper at the quiet but rather tired-out inn, and in the morning went to work, or tried to, for it was not easy to escape from the patrons of Cristofo Colombo; and to tell the truth, there was rather a similarity in their stories, and they apparently had no ad- ventures, and they had all prospered, and here they were, and they had little Cris- tofos—and—ecco! It was so genuine and they were so delighted with their success over there, but I had to work—at inter- vals. Luckily, there was a festa or market in a day or so, somewhere else, and by the time they came back, I had finished and walked down to the Bagni di Lucca. T HESE people had made their world,they thought, safe for themselves, and now someare killedand someruined by landand sea grabbers, D’Annunzio and his heroes, who dragged Italy into the War. Italy is finished, killed by the fools who made the War. Those I saw in Barga, thank God, mostly died before, and so escaped the ruin of the world—the wreck that has caught us all who are still alive. Even Mussolini cannot bring that world back. FROM A PEN SKETCH MADE AT BARGA { 1883 | CHAPTER XV: SAN GIMIGNANO - A WINTER WALK TO THE TOWN OF SKYSCRAPERS AND SUMMER DAYS WITH- IN ITS WALLS ON REPEATED VISITS DURING MANY YEARS j \ vy) Vi vy SAN GIMIGNANO ON ITS MOUNTAIN TOP » PEN DRAWING : SKETCH FROM THE PASSING TRAIN HAD been staying for some time in Siena when an English schoolmaster, with whom afterwards I kept up a violent correspondence, which is lost, and whose name I have forgotten, though we both may be famous—or he, too may be—suggested that we go up to San Gi- mignano. Every one who travels between Pisa and Florence can see its towers on the high horizon from the train near Empoli for a moment, that is, if not playing bridge, reading Ruskin, asleep, or devouring Mau- rice Hewlett; or if the Italians in the car- riage have not drawn all the curtains, for all Italians hate scenery as much as Amer- icans, who usually travel through it at night. Every one goes to San Gimignano now from Siena—it is the thing to do—or they motor out from Florence. But 1n 1883 very few people went, because there was no train or diligence. The nameless school- master and I determined to go and he bid an affectionate farewell to the young lady to whom he was engaged, while I stuffed a knapsack with food and drink that Si- gnor Tognazzi had provided, and we took the afternoon omnibus train to Poggi- bonsi. I believe there was some faint at- tempt made to get us to take a carriage, but no attempt to reduce the price of the hire of it, and while bargaining, the post cart went off and left us, or else it did not goatall. So we started in the dark, for the sun had set, to walk the five or ten kilo- meters up the hills. The road was said to be full of brigands, as all Italian roads were then, but I never saw a brigand till twenty years after; then he was on his trial in Lucca. We stumbled up the short way of the cross, a footpath, in the night and the cold wind, only to find the city gate shut. But we made such a racket that we waked the watchman, taking a nap be- tween his rounds of the town walls, dur- ing which he still informs the sleeping City that it is nine o’clock and a fine, or some other hour and other kind of night. I forget whether the schoolmaster spoke [1883 ] 136 CHAPTER XV - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR Italian, but we found out that there was an inn in the City Hall at the top of the great stairs in the great piazza. We groped our way through the black canyon of a street, through the inner gate and into the square, up the steps, and banged the door. It must have been half-past eight and every one was in bed to keep warm, for it was very cold; but they turned out, I remember, lit a fire and gave us soupand goats’ cheese and Chianti. We were happy and sat in the fireplace with the family. They led us to our beds with brass lamps, and in the great room, full of empty beds, we slept till we awoke—or I did—and it was pot black. I groped to the window and pulled open the inside shutters, to find there was no glass in it, and a bliz- zard going on outside and snow drifting through. The lamp,whenI shut them,would not burn, and there was no fireplace, so no fire in our room. Still, what did it matter? We dressed and had our coffee in the kitchen. Nothing mattered, save that I had lugged, as well as the food we did not eat, a lot of copper plates up the hill, and I went to work ona big one, looking down on the piazza and the people stand- ing in the snow on Sunday morning before Mass. After the snow stopped and the plate was finished—and it had some char- acter in it, though it never was printed; it was to be the title to the Italian etch- ings which were to be published in a set, but they never were; I sat out in the fields, for it got warmer, making other etchings. There are three made outside the town, and another within, at the city gate. I am always astonished how rightly I se- lected my subjects even in my early days. Again and again I have gone back and found that I did forty years ago just the subject I should select to-day, to say nothing of having suggested subjects to hundreds of people who have not an idea in their heads, and even when they steal mine, cannot do it decently. Only the other day I drew the very same gateway at San Gimignano over again. I do not know if it is really, as to point of view, a bit better, but I hope there is more feel- ing and there are less lines in 1t. OMEHOW, my memories of San Gimi- S gnano are mixed. I have been there so often, and with so many people, since. What became of the English schoolmaster after I opened the window on Sunday morning and let the snow in, I do not know. He just faded away, for he does not seem to have come back from seeing the Gozzolis, to which I, as usual in those days, refused to go, but he wrote me letters for a while. From the amount of work I did, I must have stayed on in the unglazed room a long time, feeding on goats’ cheese, for there are five or six plates, some of which appeared in THe Century, though I do not think Howells went up to the town, and some with a couple of articles by Vernon Lee in Tue Portrouio. In fact, it was she who made me go to San Gimi- gnano, and she later went up with me and some other forgotten people; but there were no adventures that time. Now, when- ever I am in Siena, I go up by road, for there are motor busses and a motor dili- gence. The landlords embrace me and the room where [slept is, I believe, a museum. Children guide you to the Benozzo Goz- zolis, and shy stones at you if you dont tip them, and demand franco boll ester1; and I think the Gozzolis, which I saw for the first time a few years ago, and I are the only things that have not changed. Now maybe I can, after years, appreciate them a little. Vernon Lee and Symonds and Pater understood them at once, only, like Ruskin, “‘they did not know what they were looking at when they saw it.”’ Nor do. their followers, Cook’s tourists { 1883 } T 1 ee ee ee eee ee rd _ oy a rai 3 ES rit ed a ahs ef q ‘a “94 +4 4 is *k fe bby ve So eqns + SAN GIMIGNANO + THE INNER GATEWAY + FROM A PROOF - ETCHING MADE IN 1883 SAN GIMIGNANO - MEMORIES OF THE FIRST VISIT and young ladies from Bryn Mawr who rave over them in a chorus quoted from Berenson. Or did Berenson, or Bay Smith, write about them ? though I never could read what they have written. VEN one of the towers has come down; I believe the authorities tried to make a power house of another. That Italians respect their monuments, or care for art, is bosh; the modern Italian is as great a vandal almost as the modern American. With its beautiful towers, San Gimignano is still one of the most perfect hill towns of Italy and the inspiration of the sky- sctaper—which was first built not in New York, but in Florence and Genoa and San Gimignano. Finally, somehow, I—or I suppose we—went back to Siena. But I forget all about the return journey. It is very strange how all of a sudden my mem- ory of some details of my adventures on ey, these trips becomes a blank. I can up toa certain point, acertain happening, live the life againand thenacurtain falls—I forget. It is the same with drawing. The better an artist remembersa subject and can see it, not only in his mind but on paper or canvas, the better hecandoit. Thismemory method is the method of the Japanese and can be developed as Hokusai did till ninety. Ab- bey told me he never drew a pen line till he could see his whole design on the blank white paper—and I see it too, if at times ina glass darkly, I carry for a long while these adventures in my head before I write them,some haunt me, others will not come, though, as Mark Twain, in his “‘Voice from the Grave,”’ said, the truest happen- ings are those that never happened. But these adventures of mine are all true and real even if they are not like those of the greatest of all the adventurers, Cellini. SAN GIMIGNANO FROM THE FIELDS : ENGRAVED ON WOOD BY J. F. JUNGLING IN THE CENTURY [1883 | CHAPTER XVI: IN VENICE WITH BUNCE AND DUVE NECK AND THE BOYS: MY FIRST SPRING AND SUMMER IN THE CITY OF THE SEA: DUVENECK PAINTS A PORTRAIT -1 DO DRAWINGS - WE PLAY CRICKET:-AND THEY MAKE PICTURES ON A CANAL + COPY OF A PEN DRAWING BY D. MARTIN RICO : MADE BEFORE I WENT TO VENICE WENT in the spring to Venice with “the boys’’, and at that epoch even we could afford a gondola and a gon- dolier. He cost, I think it was, ninety lire a month—the boat was thrown in— so we clubbed together and hired him, and he was happy, sleeping when we did not want him, when awake doing any- thing we wanted done, or yelling to or at his friends and enemies. Now he is miser- able if he cannot do you out of that much a day. [illustrated two articles on Venice written by Julia Cartwright for Tue Port- FOLIO, and Duveneck, who was there and whom I then saw for the first time, liked me—which most people do not—he liked me till his death. I was in Cincinnati just before that and tried to see him; he was about to die and said I was to remember him as I had known him, not as he was then. When I finished the Venice drawings and etchings, Ishowed them to Duveneck, and he thought them good, for a wonder, and in that happy city I happily wandered day and night, only turning up, if in the neighborhood, noon and evening at the Panada, where we all dined—Duveneck, Jobbins, Bunce, and ‘‘the boys.’’ Dear old Bunce, painting sunsets at sunrise and moonlights on cloudy days from his bro- ken-backed “‘gandler’’, with, after forty years, about forty words of Italian, many of them naughty words. In those hot spring days, he would come into the close, shadowy Panada, his pockets bulg- ing, and order a plate, a knife and fork and a quinto di Verona, and from one pocket pull out a roast potato, and a roll or some polenta, from another cooked fegato or fish, and from another cherries or strawberries. And he always complained at the Panada of the plate or the knife or { 1883 | REBUILDING THE CAMPANILE IQII - LITHOGRAPH DRAWN FROM NATURE: PUBLISHED BY THE VENICE EXHIBITION AS A POSTER TO ANNOUNCE THE OPENING OF THE BIENNIAL IN I9I2 Pi , IN VENICE WITH BUNCE AND DUVENECK AND THE BOYS the glass. We all used to clean them our- selves with our napkins and so into the habit did we get that once, later, when Duveneck came to London and stayed with us, and he went to dine with a duchess, he solemnly took up his knives and forks and spoons and wiped them on his napkin, breathed in his glasses and wiped them, and was going on with his plate when he no- ticed that the whole table was paralyzed; but he went on calm- ly, though if he had notexplained,proba- bly the butler would have been sacked. I do not think he was asked again. One evening Bunce hada spree of his own and ordered a bestecca. When it came it was overdone, so he or- dered another. It was toorare; hesent forathird. He wascharged for three. But after the affair was settled, he was never allowed to enter the Panada. His painting was as interesting as his per- sonality,andhewas, without others know- ing it, always doing good to some one in need of it. When Bunce had lunched and paid for his plate and wine, he went to Florian’s, and finding a shady seat, read Tue Times till it got cool enough to work. I WENT once with Bunce and some people to Padua, and as it was cold, he put on a lot of clothes and when, after the lovely voyage up the villa-lined Brenta, we reached the city, the people we were with hoped I would not insult the Giottos in FRANK DUVENECK -; PAINTING BY J. ROLSHOVEN : THE PORTRAIT GALLERY NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN 143 the Arena by giving my opinion of them. So I found my way about alone and bought nigger babies for luck at the shrine of St. Anthony, and looked at the Donatello and into the market, and then on to the Arena by myself, to really see the paint- ings and not be both- ered; and loafed at the big University Caife till the. rest turned up, filled with Giotto they had im- bibed from books but empty, all the same, forthey had only had time for rolls and coffee instead of their dear American break- fast before leaving Venice. Then we went to a nearby restau- rant and Bunce pro- ceeded to get rid of his clothes,and Idont know how many coats and sweaters he shed before he came down to his ordinary costume. It was almost like Charles Keene who, when asked to stay a week at a country house, took no bag but wore seven shirts, one of which he took off each day, borrowing a grip to bring them home in—and both were artists. One day a pretty girl, brought by her family, came to be painted by Duveneck, and first they gave him a dinner at Florian’s. And the next day the young lady began to sit; Duveneck had mixed up his sauce with bitumen and asphaltum all ready, and he went at her head and worked like fury, and when she got too tired to pose, as it was neat mezzo giorno, they all walked round to the Calcino, which was near his FROM THE DIPLOMA { 1883 | 144 studio, for lunch, and when they came back, the upper part of the young lady’s head had run down to the end of her nose likeaveil,only it wasnotlikea veil butlike one of those exaggerating mirrors that used to stand in shopwin- dowstomakefatmen thin and long females short;butitwasfunny. Ke we kept the Fourth of July as good Americans and hadaball game. There was a student—a Harvard man sent to study painting, ow- ing to Duvenecks suc- cessin Boston, hisone success outside his teaching, until I got him a special medal at San Francisco. This student had a talent for sleeping so great that no sooner did he sitdownwitha brush in his hand than he slept, and Duveneck would push him off hischairand workon his study, and then the Harvard man would wake up and sign it and send it home. But he could pitch curves; he had been on the Nine. And, on the Fourth, we were to play the British painters who were there, and the Harvard man set up three wickets on a line between the creases and made curves round them. But there was a doubt- ing Britisher and he did not believe what he saw, so the Harvard man told him he would send him three balls he could not hit with a cricket bat, and he would bet him a dinner for the two teams that he would not. And the Briton asked for a high ball and it came low and then rose rl “ft Ww. GEDNEY BUNCE: FROM A PEN DRAWING BY WALTER SHIRLAW DONEAT THE TILECLUB CHAPTER XVI - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR over his head; and then for a low one and it came high till it reached him and dropped, and he missed that; and last for a medium one and it came to one side and then curved and took him in the tummy. Then he gaveup and we adjourned to Ja- camuzzi’s and later, at the Englishman’s expense, to the Little Horses and dined onscampi,vino bian- co and grasso del monte. Speaking of dining in Venice re- minds me that after the great dinner at the opening of one of the Biennial Exhibi- tions at the Fenice, yeats later when I was an official, Tito had just come back from Pittsburgh, where he thought he had learned to make cocktails.So he gota salad bowlatthesame Jacamuzzi’s,and filled it with vermouth and tamarindo and wine and brandyand gave it to Zorn and Stuck and the rest of us, and we were then carried round the Piazza by admirers, and the horses came down from St. Mark’sand danced with the bell ringers from the clock tower all around the place and the campanile bowed to us as we went home to bed. It was an immenso successo, almost as great as when the American sailors, to protect their officers, cleaned up the piazza and were all locked up for it. The British fleet which had bombarded Alexandria came to Venice that summer and painted the town red one night and were turned out the next morning, though [1883 } IN VENICE WITH BUNCE AND DUVENECK AND THE BOYS inthemeantime I saw almost Midshipman Easy’s sight, ‘three British admirals drunk in a wheelbarrow’ ’— only it was a gon- dola. And we would go on expeditions to Burano and Torcello and threaten never to come back, so fascinating were the sirens of those islands, and some did not fora while; and to the Lido to swim—the Venetians went there to see the only live horse in the city, which was a mule and drew a street car. And we worked too. I made some etchings then and the fol- lowing year, but the superior Goulding could not print them, or did not like them, and I did not etch again for years. So much did he discourage me, that, when I recom- menced, I did my own printing and have done so to this day. All artists who really etch pull their own proofs, for the printing ue SHEE eb MORNING ON THE RIVA SCHIAVONI - Pane Sr Be Rowe 145 of a plate is as vital to its success as draw- ing or biting it. But most etchers are not artists and their plates prove it, for if any method proves an artist’s powers of obser- vation, selection, drawing, it is etching. To-day also many painters, thinking to add to their incomes, manufacture etchings, and endless students, hoping to make a fortune quick, turn them out. Save in my class at the Art Students’ League, they are not taught to print, most know nothing about printing, and give their plates to profes- sional printers, who often know nothing of art, because, they say, they have no time to print, really because they cannot. But all great etchers have been great printers and had time to print and can print better than any mere printer. I stayed on till mid-July and then I started back north for Scotland. oy Sloe -ns0r of Vom ae Pipe RS te a ta cae pnt a oe ee a LPS fn zee eh ae joe ( ee a “| Se rs vA ene | SKETCH IN A LETTER FROM VENICE TO E + MISS ROBINS Bie | { 1883 } SIR EDMUND GOSSE - FROM THE PORTRAIT BY J. S. SARGENT + OWNED BY SIR EDMUND GOSSE CHAPTER XVII? BACK TO LONDON AND ON TO EDIN BURGH = TALES OF TWO CITIES AND OF TWO AUTHORS stopPeDin Londonand called at once on Edmund Gosse, who was repre- senting THe CeNtTuryY in Europe. [had a letter to him from Gilder, whom at that time I had scarce seen at THE CEN- tury office; and when I did see him he seemed always occupied with something besides me. I found Gosse in the old Board of Trade Buildings, a little space off White- hall, with a little statue of James II in it, behind the Banqueting Hall; or rather on the buildings, for his room was on the roof, with a little terrace, and when I called he was having his lunch and read- ing a foreign paper. He was translator to the Board of Trade and had to read foreign papers. He did not ask me to share his LONDON IN 1883 * ST. JAMES’S PALACE » WASH DRAWING ENGRAVED BY C.STATE ON WOOD lunch or order another for me, and I had no thought then of the endless Sunday- evening suppers in good company I should have with him and his family in later years, or the good lunches with good talk he would invite me to at his club or at the House of Lords, or the endless fights we should indulge in, for which I never could see any reason; but they all ended happily and we are at peace, and later too I have dined with him in Venice, where one summer day I found him wandering in the calli, for no intelligent person takes a gondola when he can walk in Venice. And he carried me off to a theater to see Goldoni and I went fast asleep, as I usu- ally do in a theater unless I find the seri- [1883 } 148 ous parts so amusing that I laugh and disgrace myself. And we would meet him in Paris where we stayed in the Hotel St. Romain, all sorts of English people turn- ing up in it—Colvin, Lady Ritchie, Ten- nyson, Fiona McLeod Sharp, and lots more, among them Gosse, even then be- ginning to be known in France. I remem- ber one afternoon an excursion to the Café de la Cascade in the Bois, and I think Beardsley and Bob Stevenson and Henry Harland went along, and there was pernod and little cakes. And a French peacock,who belonged to the place, strut- ted up and some one took a little cake and soaked it in the absinthe and gave it to the fowl who strutted off and flew up ina low tree, and began to wobble on the branch as the cake went down its long throat, and then, letting out a horrid scream, it fell over, hanging on to the branch with its claws and, suddenly spreading its tail, began to revolve like a pin wheel, screaming all the while, and a crowd gathered and the police came and the bird kept on screaming, and we left. I cannot recall that I wanted anything from Gosse as editor. But he wrote an article some years after on the Fitz-W11- liam Museum which I made drawings for, so he is not only among my friends but my authors. I never wasted much of my time or any one else's when I had work to do and I went on to see Andrew Lang that same day in London and lunched with him at the Oxford and Cambridge Club. I do not remember the lunch, but I do re- member that after it—as Lang was by way of being a sporting person—I ex- plained baseball to him. It was then a game, not a business for padded heroes and company promoters, to gull fool fans with. The real reason for lunching with Lang, between his morning with Theoc- ritus or Aucassin and his afternoon writ- CHAPTER XVII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR ing leaders for THz Dairy News, which were the delight of the town when they appeared—he even wrote one two years afterwards on us—was to talk over the article on Edinburgh for THz Century. So pleased was he with my baseball de- scription that he gave me, or thought he did, a letter of introduction to a friend in Edinburgh. But when I got back to the hotel, I found it was a private letter to this friend he had enclosed instead of the letter of introduction; in which he de- scribed my accent as wonderful as my description of baseball. Accent, indeed. If any one had a more perfect Oxford accent than Andrew Lang, with a bit of Scotch burr thrown in, I never heard it. And the squeaking scream in which he talked beat any Middle-West schoolma’am’s cackle. I sent the letter back to him, telling him I thought he had made a mistake, and I did not call on his friend. A year or two later, meeting him, he said he had com- pletely forgotten what I wrote him, but he had never forgiven me for writing it.When I told him it did not matter, he would not speak to me for another year. But he was most picturesque, and Sir ‘Billy’ Richmond's portrait of him is most like; in fact, so far as I know, it is the only decent thing Richmond, a superior per- son, ever did, but he ruined St. Paul’s, which reminds me that he painted Canon Barnett, and the painting was shown at Whitechapel—or was it Watts?—but no matter—merely a change of name, it was Watts really, and a Minor Canon, taking a crowd round the show one Sunday after- noon, explained the pictures to the poor people, ‘And here,”’ said he, ‘“is the por- trait of our great and good master Canon Barnett; and the good and great artist has not only painted his face, but his soul, as well.’’ And a voice from the people was heard, ‘“‘What a dirty black soul ’e do [1883 | ANDREW LANG + FROM THE PORTRAIT BY SIR W. B. RICHMOND »- OWNED BY THE FAMILY 150 CHAPTER XVII - THE ADVENTURES OF AN ILLUSTRATOR ‘ave.’’ Even Carlyle said the same thing of Watts’ painting of his shirt, remark- ing, ‘Mon, I’m in the hobbut of wurrin clean linnun’’ as he told Whistler. WENT down to Edinburgh and on the | way got an awful toothache—I remem- ber that distinctly—from rushing through too fast from hot Venice to damp London and cold Scotland; and I cured it by furious practice one night in a roller-skating rink, where I was in such fine form before the evening was over that I was offered ‘‘twelve pun’’ a week, Scotch, I suppose, as instructor. I also learned a lot about smoke and mist and steam and rain from Edinburgh Old Town, and what I learned is in THe Century article, and other articles I illustrated later. The Edinburgh shopkeepers and wynd dwellers were not nice, and I had misunderstandings with them when I sat down to draw in front of their shops and castles and refused to be moved on. So I put “‘Shoemaker’’ on a sign over a lawyer's door and “‘Writer to the Signet’’ on a pawnbroker's shop, and the owners of the signs wrote furious let- ters to THe Century about me when the article was published. That often hap- pened and Drake always sent me the in- dignant letters—but I rarely got any of praise. But as one could work, and I did that summer, long after the place had gone to bed and long before it was up, for it was never really dark, I got through, not with the picturesque, really magnificent city which I have returned to again and again, but with my article. Nor did I finish with Lang, for after it came out, we were —or he was—teconciled and I did with him others on St. Andrews—a stupid place, the University, a fine ruin, the golf links, a bore—North Berwick, and other of his beloved haunts, which I never would have chosen for myself to draw. Still there always is something interest- ing everywhere, even in a Middle-West Main Street town, if you can escape the Babbitts and find it. I used often to see Lang at Gosse’s, but I think the last time was at a tea party at Abbey’s, which I somehow got mixed up in, and, having my teacup in one hand, my top hat in the other, and wanting to be shaken hands with by some one, possibly Lang, I dumped the tea in my top hat—not that I meant to. But after that I avoided tea parties, and have as much as possible, to this day, though my performance gave quite a delightful interlude to the solemn function that afternoon. | Pa Edinburgh I came down—up, as they say in Scotland—not only to York- shire but to cycling, and flew about, be- tween there and Coventry, with Colonel Pope—who was “‘six foot one way, four foot t’uder, and weighed three hunnerd pound’’, and had to be helped on to his high wheel—and a man on an American Star. I hada nickel-plated show machine Pope lent me. He built the Columbia tall wheels and was an early millionaire mo- nopolist protectionist. We were a howling success. At Coventry I bought a fearful contraption in the shape of a sociable tri- cycle and rode it to Liverpool, wrote an articleabout that in THz Century, From Coventry to Chester on Wheels,’’ shipped the tricycle to Philadelphia, and entered in a race with two other competitors as soon as I got home. There were three of us in the race and there were three prizes, but, as I was lapped once or twice, the judges refused mine, and that ended my cycle racing and my first trip to Europe. HEN I went abroad I was a coming \ man in Philadelphia; when, nine months later I came back, I was almost forgotten in the City of Brotherly Love. Now I have left Iam asked to return, but if I did, the same thing would happen. [1883 | oe eee SS Ee MO IN OLD EDINBURGH - A WOOD ENGRAVING UNSIGNED OF A WASH DRAWING ILLUSTRATING LANG’S ARTICLE ON THE CITY PUBLISHED IN THE CENTURY -: DRAWN 1883 FROM NATURE CHAPTER XVIII: OUR CYCLING JOURNEYS IN ENG LAND AND ITALY - ROME AND VEDDER -: VENICE AGAIN RETURN TO LONDON AND BEGIN ENGLISH CATHEDRALS VAN SQV THE WAY WE DID EUROPE WHEN E. AND I WERE YOUNG » DRAWING MADE IN FRANCE FOR OUR SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY WHICH WE ALSO RODE WROTE AND ILLUSTRATED IN 1885 Lu the winter of 1883-1884 I ran round Philadelphia, trying to find my lost place in the town, but I have never found it, and that is why I, who loved the city more than any one else, finally left it. I was not at home in my own home—not wanted among my own people. I also became en- gaged, was married, and was given a com- mission to take us both to Europe. In the early summer of 1884 we started, and the Lelands, just before and for the same rea- son, BEE the mud and muck off their shoes and never returned. Only their ashes were sent back to the city, which ignored and forgot its great man who is known everywhere in Europe to-day. We stopped a while in London. Stephen Par- rish came over and joined us, and one day we lunched with Seymour Haden. Hop Smith was there, and Haden showed us his prints and told us how he came to etch ‘The Breakingupofthe Agamemnon.’ “‘I was going to a dinner at Greenwich, by the penny steamboat,”’ hesaid,*‘and when we got there, I saw the subject. I was in my evening clothes but I pulled the Pee out of my tail coat pocket and drew ’ “Hum,’’ said Smith, “‘and what size see do you carry in your ordinary coat pockets?’’ The plate is a foot long and weighs pounds. After this Parrish and I [1884 | Caer LY ae Sees ~=—-—. ww co co a \oO ral 4