LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 SAN DIEGO
 
 i/n***mii*>mXi> jjsiftm-
 
 THE LIFE AND ART 
 
 OF 
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 BY 
 KATHARINE METCALF ROOF 
 
 WITH LETTERS 
 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES, AND ILLUSTRATIVE MATERIAL 
 
 INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 ALICE GERSON CHASE 
 
 WITH REPRODUCTIONS OF THE ARTIST S WORKS 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 1917
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY CHARLES SCHIBNER'S SONS 
 PUBLISHED NOVEMBER, 1917
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 THE personal reminiscences of my husband which I 
 have been able to offer Miss Roof to add to her material 
 date from the time of his return from Munich. I went 
 with my older sisters to the academy exhibition of 1878, 
 where his picture Ready for the Ride was shown, and we 
 were all very anxious to meet the young painter after 
 seeing it. The canvas, it will be remembered, made quite 
 a sensation in art circles. When F. S. Church, already 
 a friend of the family, brought William M. Chase to the 
 house we were all very much excited over the event. 
 But out of all my memories of that early association 
 and Mr. Chase was a frequent visitor at our house I 
 can recall very few things that he ever told us of his 
 early life. I suppose there were two reasons for this. 
 In the first place, Mr. Chase had never at any time any 
 tendency to talk about himself. He disliked it extremely 
 and was always embarrassed when he found himself 
 the subject of conversation. The other reason is that 
 my husband was interested in art to such an extent 
 that other things really made very little impression 
 upon him. In his last illness his favorite amusement was
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 to review with me the European galleries, asking me to 
 recall what I thought the most interesting thing in each 
 canvas, and living over in his memory the pictures he 
 loved best. His sincere interest and pleasure in teaching 
 was all part of his strong feeling about art. 
 
 Miss Katharine Roof was at one time one of his pupils. 
 Mr. Chase always felt that she had the real and right 
 appreciation of art the principles and feeling of art, 
 not facts about it and an especially sympathetic un- 
 derstanding of his own work. Above all, she has what 
 he especially valued, the painter's standpoint, which is 
 the exact opposite of the literary attitude, toward art. 
 In his last illness, when the subject of his biography was 
 mentioned, Mr. Chase said more than once that he wished 
 she might write it, and I am glad indeed that his wish, 
 which was also my own, has been fulfilled. 
 
 ALICE GERSON CHASE. 
 
 [vi]
 
 * * * The author wishes to express her thanks to 
 Mrs. William M. Chase, who has furnished the majority 
 of the illustrations for this book as well as the letters in- 
 cluded in the text. She also acknowledges her indebted- 
 ness to Mr. Chase's mother, Mrs. David Hester Chase 
 and to his brother, George Chase; to the Misses Gerson, 
 Mrs. Candace Wheeler, Mrs. Rosina Emmett Sherwood, 
 Mrs. Dora Wheeler Keith, Miss Gladys Wiles, Miss 
 Annie Lang, Mr. Frank Duveneck, Mr. Frederick 
 Dielman, Mr. Carroll Beckwith, Mr. Alden Wier, Mr. 
 Irving Wiles, Mr. Will H. Low, Mr. Walter Palmer, 
 Mr. Henry Rittenberg, Mr. Walter Pach, Mr. W'illiam 
 Henry Shelton, Mr. Siddons Mowbray, Mr. W. J. Baer, 
 Mr. E. G. Kennedy, Mr. James Kelly, Mr. Howard 
 Chandler Christy, Mr. W. S. Macy, Mr. C. P. Townsley, 
 and all others who have assisted her in securing neces- 
 sary data.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 1 
 
 ii. NEW YORK: ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE 
 
 SEVENTIES 15 
 
 III. AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH . . 27 
 
 IV. VENETIAN DAYS 45 
 
 V. THE ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK . 54 
 
 VI. NEW FRIENDS AND A PERMANENT RELA- 
 TIONSHIP 65 
 
 VII. A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 76 
 
 VIII. LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO . . 84 
 
 ix. EUROPE REVISITED: SPAIN AND VELAS- 
 QUEZ 93 
 
 X. SPAIN AND HOLLAND WITH BLUM . . . 103 
 
 XI. IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER . . . . Ill 
 
 XII. CONCERNING THE CHASE-WHISTLER POR- 
 TRAITS 139 
 
 XIII. EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE . . 150 
 
 XIV. AN END AND A BEGINNING . . . ... 162 
 
 XV. SPAIN AND THE CHASE SCHOOL OF ART . 168 
 
 XVI. SHINNECOCK 175
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 XVII. MUNICH REVISITED 189 
 
 XVIII. A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND .... 204 
 
 XIX. LONDON AND MADRID 214 
 
 XX. THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE . . . . 223 
 
 XXI. A FAMILY EVENT AND SOME EUROPEAN 
 
 EPISODES 236 
 
 XXII. CALIFORNIA 246 
 
 XXIII. CHASE; THE MAN 253 
 
 XXIV. CHASE, THE ARTIST . . 275 
 
 XXV. CHASE, THE ARTIST (CONTINUED) . . . 294 
 
 XXVI. CHASE, THE TEACHER . . . . . . 309 
 
 XXVII. THE END 322 
 
 LOCATION OF CHASE*S PICTURES . . . 326 
 
 LIST OF MEDALS RECEIVED BY WILLIAM M. 
 
 CHASE 330 
 
 LETTERS AND SKETCHES BY CHASE AND HIS 
 
 FRIENDS . 331 
 
 INDEX 
 
 [x]
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 SELF-PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST PAINTED IN HIS 
 
 FIFTH AVENUE STUDIO FRONTISPIECE 
 
 FACING PAGE 
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE, ABOUT 1861 .... 6 
 
 CHASE AS A SAILOR ON THE "PORTSMOUTH," 1868 10 
 
 PORTRAIT OF CHASE BY HIS MASTER, J. O. EATON, 
 
 PAINTED IN NEW YORK IN 1870 .... 18 
 
 PHOTOGRAPH OF CHASE TAKEN IN ST. LOUIS ABOUT 
 
 1872 ............ 24 
 
 CHASE'S ORIGINAL SKETCH MADE FOR THE COLUMBUS 
 
 COMPETITION AT THE MUNICH ROYAL ACADEMY 38 
 
 THE SECOND COLUMBUS SKETCH MADE AFTER PI- 
 LOTY'S CRITICISM OF THE UNCONVENTIONAL 
 COMPOSITION 38 
 
 ONE OF THE PILOTY CHILDREN 40 
 
 READY FOR THE RIDE 54 
 
 CHASE DRESSED IN VAN DYCK COSTUME FOR A MAS- 
 QUERADE BALL, IN THE EARLY EIGHTIES . . 62 
 
 "PRIAM," A TILE CLUB SERVITOR 80 
 
 SUNLIGHT AND SHADOW 108 
 
 CHASE'S PORTRAIT OF WHISTLER, CHARACTERIZED 
 
 BY THE SUBJECT AS "A MONSTROUS LAMPOON" 114 
 
 WHISTLER, CHASE, AND MENPES . . . . . . 144 
 
 THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 154 
 
 [Xi]
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PACING PAGE 
 
 THE HALL AT SHINNECOCK 164 
 
 ALICE 166 
 
 CHASE IN HIS FIFTH AVENUE STUDIO .... 172 
 
 IDLE HOURS 176 
 
 CHASE'S MOTHER 186 
 
 PORTRAIT OF ROBERT BLUM BY CHASE .... 192 
 
 STILL LIFE FISH 228 
 
 THE LADY WITH THE WHITE SHAWL .... 232 
 
 A BELGIAN MELON . . 240 
 
 CHASE PAINTING FOR HIS CLASS AT CARMEL, CALI- 
 FORNIA 248 
 
 THE BLACK KIMONO 254 
 
 CHASE AND HIS WIFE 264 
 
 THE ARTIST'S WIFE AND CHILDREN AND THE FIRST 
 
 SON-IN-LAW 264 
 
 CHASE'S PORTRAIT OF HIS YOUNGEST SON, ROLAND 
 
 DANA CHASE 272 
 
 HIDE AND SEEK 278 
 
 THE RED BOX 282 
 
 MOTHER AND CHILD 284 
 
 PASTEL SKETCH OF THE ARTIST' S WIFE IN THE SHIN- 
 NECOCK STUDIO 292 
 
 DOROTHY AND HER SISTER . 306 
 
 PORTRAIT OF A. B. GWATHMEY 322 
 
 [ Xii ]
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 LETTERS AND SKETCHES BY CHASE AND HIS FRIENDS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 SILHOUETTES MADE BY CHASE, CHURCH, DIELMAN 
 AND SHIRLAW AT THE GERSONS' HOME ABOUT 
 
 1879 333 
 
 LETTER FROM F. S. CHURCH TO MISS GERSON, ABOUT 
 
 1879 334 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, 1881 .... 335 
 
 LETTER FROM CHASE TO ALICE GERSON, 1881 . . 336 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, SPAIN, 1882 . . 337 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM IN VENICE, 1885 .... 338 
 
 CARICATURES OF TWACHTMAN AND CHASE IN A 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, 1885 . . . 339 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE FROM VENICE, 1885 340 
 LETTER FROM TWACHTMAN TO CHASE FROM VENICE, 
 
 1885 341 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, VENICE, 1885 . . 342 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM IN VENICE TO CHASE IN NEW 
 
 YORK, ABOUT 1889 343 
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM BLUM TO 
 
 CHASE, ABOUT 1889 344 
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM BLUM TO 
 
 CHASE, ABOUT 1889 345 
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM BLUM TO 
 
 CHASE, ABOUT 1889 346 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, 1890 .... 347 
 LETTER FROM BLUM IX JAPAN TO CHASE, 1891 . 348 
 
 [ xiiij
 
 THE LIFE AND ART OF 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE
 
 CHAPTER I 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE was born in the 
 little town of Williamsburg, Franklin County, 
 Indiana, on November 1st, 1849. His father, David 
 Hester Chase, was a native of Indiana to which State 
 his father, William Chase's grandfather, had emigrated 
 from Kentucky. His mother, Sarah Swaim, was also born 
 in Indiana. The Chase family lived in Williamsburg 
 until William Chase was about twelve years old. 
 
 It would be difficult to imagine an environment more 
 remote from aesthetic suggestion than the small West- 
 ern town of that period. Art taste in the world at large 
 was at its lowest ebb. Such indications of a turning tide 
 as were working below the surface in the Old World had 
 caused no ripple in America. In these days when every 
 little foreign child of the tenements is taught to draw 
 in our public schools, when the elaborate nurturing 
 systems of education in this country, and especially in 
 the West, coax the most indifferent child into an at- 
 tempt at art expression, naturally the awakening to the 
 mere existence of beauty is often mistaken by child, 
 parent, and even teacher for a "talent for art," so that, 
 art schools are as numerous as dandelions, and as over-
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 crowded as the New York Subway. That being the 
 situation to-day, it is almost impossible for us to pic- 
 ture the bareness and limitation of such an environ- 
 ment as that in which the childhood and boyhood of 
 William Chase were passed. His early concepts of art 
 were gained from chromos, the crude, naive, preposter- 
 ous chromos that adorned the simple homes of the 
 period, and the illustrations of such books as found 
 their way into his circle, for the most part religious or 
 moral works illustrated by a few woodcuts equally 
 crude in design and reproduction. These the boy used 
 to copy not in his playtime, but in the hours dedi- 
 cated to "studying lessons." As far back as he can 
 remember he had the ambition, as he expressed it then, 
 "to make pictures for books." His attempts to draw 
 began very early, but he did not have any painting ma- 
 terials until he was twelve or fourteen, and then only 
 such colored pencils or water-color paints as are given to 
 children for playthings. 
 
 His mother tells an anecdote of his early childhood 
 which, while it has nothing to do with his art develop- 
 ment, shows that William Merritt Chase even at the 
 tender age of five years could plan how to obtain his 
 desires without doing violence to his conscience. 
 
 One morning while out on some errands, she left her 
 
 [2]
 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 little boy in the yard of a friend's house for a few mo- 
 ments. There was a small tree full of ripe pears within 
 the child's reach, and his mother before she left him 
 forbade him to pick any of the fruit. When she came 
 back she found that her young son had quite literally 
 obeyed her; he had not picked a single pear, but he had 
 eaten several directly from the tree, leaving the cores 
 still attached to the parent stem. 
 
 The oldest of seven children, Chase said he was dimly 
 conscious of being unlike his brothers and sisters. He 
 did not, however, isolate himself from them but played 
 all the usual boyish games, not lacking the normal Amer- 
 ican boy's enthusiasm for baseball. A fellow towns- 
 woman still recalls a peculiarly hideous baseball costume 
 he used to wear, which would seem to indicate that his 
 art instinct was not unhealthfully precocious. 
 
 In the school that he attended, the teacher had a 
 drawing class after school hours. Drawing lessons at 
 that time meant making copies in pencil from a drawing- 
 book, filled with outline pictures of domestic animals, 
 luxuriant trees, church-spires, and old oaken buckets. 
 In this guileless form of art, Chase's prowess soon far 
 outstripped his teacher's skill. Soon he began to draw 
 from life, people and things. He made profile por- 
 traits of the members of his family and his friends. 
 
 [8]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 " He had only to make a few marks and the thing was 
 done," his brother said, recalling his boyish wonder 
 over that mysterious gift. 
 
 Chase's schoolmates apparently did not hold the 
 young artist's talent in great regard, but reviewing those 
 days Chase never sentimentalized his lack of recogni- 
 tion. "I am not sure that it is a bad thing to go to a 
 school, as I did, where the boys threw things at me, 
 and asked if there was nothing else I could do," he said 
 once to his class. 
 
 His brother George tells an anecdote of the young 
 artist's first attempt at making a portrait. The two boys 
 had gone to visit an uncle living in a neighboring town. 
 William was about twelve years old at the time. His 
 fame as a draftsman had reached the little circle of 
 his uncle's friends, and when it was announced that 
 he would draw his cousin, all the neighbors came in 
 to watch the process. Very much as his large class of 
 pupils used to stand absorbed while Chase "painted for 
 the class," the boy's audience watched and marvelled. 
 The picture, his brother recalls, "looked just like the 
 child," which shows that before he had any instruction 
 William Chase could make a recognizable likeness. Then, 
 as in later years, he worked constantly. "He always left 
 a drawing wherever he went," his brother says. 
 
 [4] 
 
 -
 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 At another time the patriotic young artist painted 
 the portraits of all the Presidents of the United States, 
 using the woodcuts in an old history as a basis. He 
 used to refer to this collection with mingled amusement 
 and horror. "Covered the walls of my room with them. 
 . . . Terrible things!" No one could invest that epithet 
 with darker implications. To Chase bad art was the 
 world's profoundest tragedy. 
 
 Although his youth was not an unhappy one, all 
 through it the boy evidently had that vague sense of 
 being a misfit that is the sum of a child's awareness of 
 his innate essential differences. He wanted something 
 that his life did not give, and had moods of restlessness 
 and unformulated discontent. 
 
 A sensitive boy, he would never ask for a thing twice 
 no matter how much he wanted it; if he had been once 
 refused he could not speak of it again, whereas his more 
 buoyant brother would tease their stern father for the 
 thing he desired until he got it. Indeed, young William 
 Chase was on the verge of running away more than 
 once, only his affection for his mother kept him at home. 
 
 One of the grievances that he remembered from that 
 far-away time, was an occasion when his father had 
 promised to take him on a "buggy-ride," to the neigh- 
 boring town of Franklin. For some reason his brother 
 
 [5]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 George was seized with a violent longing to take that 
 particular drive, and drawing his older brother aside 
 he offered to give him his pony in exchange for the priv- 
 ilege of the trip to Franklin. Young William, able to see 
 at once that the pony would last longer than the pleasure 
 trip, readily agreed to stay home while George went to 
 Franklin with his father. Naturally, when the drive was 
 over, George regretted his impulsive offer and began 
 making efforts to recover the pony. The tale coming 
 to the father's ear, he made William, or Merritt, as he 
 was called in the family, give the pony back to its orig- 
 inal owner. Whether the boy felt that his superior 
 foresight entitled him to possession of the pony, or 
 whether he was simply unhappy at having to give it 
 up, its loss and the fact that his brother was not made 
 to live up to his part of the bargain rankled in his mem- 
 ory for long afterward. 
 
 When William Chase was twelve years of age, his 
 father moved to Indianapolis. The larger town broadened 
 the boy's horizon somewhat. He gained among other 
 things new ideas of entertainment. The moral code of 
 the Chase family forbade cards, dancing, and the theatre; 
 but in wicked Indianapolis William permitted himself 
 to be led astray. One day a boy called his attention to 
 the fact that a travelling theatrical company playing 
 
 [6]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE, ABOUT 1861.

 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 in the town had advertised its need of warriors for 
 "supers" in a so-called "classic drama." The boy con- 
 fided his intention of offering his services, as one could 
 then see the play for nothing. Young William decided 
 with some misgivings to accompany his friend. Both 
 boys were engaged, and so fitted out with a helmet too 
 large, a misfit tunic, and an embarrassingly long spear, 
 William Chase made his first and last appearance on 
 any stage. So successful was he, in spite of his agonized 
 fear that some friend would pierce through his heroic 
 disguise and report him to his parents, that he was 
 promoted to a speaking part of one line after a few days. 
 For a time he was held by the lure of the footlights, 
 then the fear of discovery conquered, and he gave up 
 his double life. 
 
 When Chase was about fifteen or sixteen his father, 
 who was a shoe-dealer, took him into his shop as a clerk. 
 But the boy spent so much time drawing on the wrapping- 
 paper, and paid so little attention to customers that 
 Chase pere, a good Methodist, began to regard his er- 
 ratic and useless son as a visitation of Providence. It 
 was evident that young William Chase did not have 
 his heart in the shoe business. He was likely to slip out 
 of the shop at the most crowded hour to look at the 
 works of art displayed in a neighboring shop-window. 
 
 [7]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Before these chromos, story-telling nictures, "Terrible 
 Things" to the understanding of later years, young 
 Chase used to stand enraptured; hoping, he said, that 
 some day he might be able to paint like that, yet fear- 
 ing that he could never attain to such heights of achieve- 
 ment. Chase of the hat, the stick, the spats, the white 
 carnation, Chase the master, standing enthralled be- 
 fore a chromo in an Indianapolis window ! A picture 
 in whose incongruities pathos and humor are mingled. 
 
 As he grew older, with a restlessness born of the fact 
 that he had not yet found the thing his nature demanded, 
 the boy decided that he would like to be a sailor, and 
 begged his father to let him enter the navy. When he 
 found that he was too old to be entered at Annapolis, 
 for he was then nineteen, he still clung to the idea of 
 going to sea. He consulted with another dissatisfied 
 spirit, a young clerk in his father's store, and they both 
 decided that if they could not start as middies, they 
 would begin as sailors, from which humble position their 
 virtues and talents would soon raise them to the ad- 
 miralty. "For Merritt always had the idea of being 
 somebody of importance in the world," his mother 
 said. 
 
 The father, glad to have his son interested in some- 
 thing more tangible and lucrative than art, gave his 
 
 [8]
 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 consent, and William and his friend boarded a train 
 for Annapolis. No doubt that desire to be a sailor was 
 but an expression of the imaginative impulse of the 
 boy born inland to whom the unseen ocean stood for 
 mystery, romance, escape what Lafcadio Hearn calls 
 the mesmerism of the sea for contact with the actual 
 life soon proved that he had no real liking for it. The 
 two boys were accepted and were placed on the school- 
 ship Portsmouth which was then starting on a three 
 months' cruise. But very soon after the ship had left 
 land William Chase found that he had made a sad mis- 
 take. 
 
 It is an interesting parallel between the lives of two 
 distinguished American painters, that both Chase and 
 Whistler should have started life in the service of their 
 country. In Whistler's case the misfit career was forced 
 upon him, and was continued for a longer period; but 
 Chase's desire to become a naval officer did not long 
 survive the hardships he found himself called upon to 
 endure at the foot of the ladder. 
 
 On the ship he was not very popular. One of the petty 
 officers disliked the absent-minded boy and made him 
 perform all the unpopular tasks. The sailors were rather 
 a rough lot and William Chase, an artist to the soul, 
 was thoroughly unhappy among them. He remembered 
 
 [9]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 one day as he sat apart that an officer stopped to speak 
 to him, and asked him how he happened to be there. 
 His only pleasure in those miserable days was watching 
 one of the officers paint pictures of the sea. 
 
 When the tale of the boy's suffering had been poured 
 into the parental ear, Chase's father, who was not un- 
 kind but only rather bewildered by his inexplicable son, 
 travelled in person to New York to obtain his son's dis- 
 charge. Indeed so moved was he by William's pathetic 
 story that, despite his puritanical idea of the proportion 
 that should be given to the pleasures of life, he made 
 an event of the emancipation, and not only bought his 
 son a new suit of clothes, but took both boys out to 
 dinner and the theatre a form of dissipation to which 
 the father had gradually made concessions. 
 
 William Chase returned for a time to the uncongenial 
 task of clerk in his father's shop, but the art impulse 
 still persisted and found its way to expression. At the 
 time that he returned from sea his father's new house 
 built on the outskirts of Indianapolis was just finished, 
 and the workmen's materials were still lying about. 
 Up to this time the young artist had never had the op- 
 portunity to use oil-paints, but when he found a number 
 of cans of house-paint standing in one of the empty 
 rooms an idea struck him and he took possession of 
 
 [10]
 
 CHASE AS A SAILOR ON THE "PORTSMOUTH," 1868.
 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 them. With these and the house-painter's brushes he 
 painted a portrait of the captain of the Portsmouth on 
 a large piece of sheet iron, also left behind by the work- 
 men. Nearly forty years later Chase, the arrived artist, 
 made unique and original experiments in the use of 
 house-paint, his first medium. But it is doubtful 
 if any success of his maturity, so rich in expression, 
 could compare with the joy of that first adventure in 
 paint. 
 
 Delighted with the possibilities of this new medium, 
 William Chase made a second experiment, and painted 
 next a picture of his father's calf. His manner of pos- 
 ing his subject was ingenious to say the least. He had 
 found, also among the house-builder's debris, a board 
 containing a particularly large knot-hole. Through this 
 hole, according to his plan, the calf's head was to be 
 thrust while his brother George, pressed into service, 
 was expected to hold the calf in pose from behind. 
 
 George consented, but found his position no sinecure, 
 as the bewildered calf struggled violently in his arms. 
 From time to time he urged the absorbed artist to 
 "hurry," but the young animal-painter's calm reply 
 was, "Just hold him a little longer," as he leaned back 
 and squinted critically at his work. And his brother, 
 feeling somehow compelled to comply, continued to hold
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 on until the artist laid down his brushes. This picture 
 is still in existence, and is the property of the painter's 
 assistant. 
 
 Another day Chase decided to make a plaster cast 
 of his mother, but being inexperienced in the art of cast- 
 making, he found himself unable to remove the hard- 
 ened plaster which stuck to the patient lady's eye- 
 brows. The frightened younger children stood about 
 while young William chipped away the plaster bit by 
 bit in the work of rescue. It is testimony to the maternal 
 devotion that Mrs. Chase, after this highly unpleasant 
 experience, consented to the operation again. That time 
 the craftsman had learned his lesson, and removed the 
 cast without accident. 
 
 In the new house, which was large and commodious, 
 William Chase had a room to himself which he used as 
 a studio, often pressing his brothers and sisters into 
 service as models. The attempt to reproduce what he 
 saw with his pencil had an unceasing fascination for 
 him, and at last, not many months after the Annapolis 
 fiasco, the father consented to take his son to "an artist," 
 and get his opinion about the advisability of having the 
 boy study drawing. 
 
 But the artist would have none of William Mer- 
 ritt Chase. Without hesitation he condemned him and 
 
 [12]
 
 CHILDHOOD AND BOYHOOD 
 
 prophesied that the boy could never hope to succeed in 
 his chosen career. 
 
 This discouragement while confirming the father's 
 worst fears, had the opposite effect upon the son. He 
 started in with even greater determination, bought his 
 first box of real painting materials, and began to experi- 
 ment with them. Eventually his father was persuaded 
 to take him to another artist. This man, Benjamin 
 Hayes, a person of a more advanced type, realized at 
 once that the boy had talent and gladly accepted him 
 as a pupil. 
 
 Chase made great strides now. One day he sold a 
 picture for ten dollars. That helped to convince his 
 father of the practical value of art. Soon after that 
 the young artist took a room outside for a studio. One 
 day, shortly after he had established himself in his new 
 quarters, a man came in with a black eye which he re- 
 quested the young artist to paint. This Chase did so 
 successfully, according to his brother, that his afflicted 
 client bestowed five dollars upon him in recognition of 
 his services. 
 
 Chase studied for several months with Benjamin 
 Hayes. Needless to state, art as studied at that period 
 was as far from the art-school curriculum of to-day as 
 a chenille mat in a farmhouse parlor is from a fine bit 
 
 [13]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 i 
 
 of Oriental embroidery. What William Chase learned 
 from his Indianapolis teacher could not, of course, have 
 amounted to much as art instruction, but it proved a 
 starting-point, for Hayes did Chase the immeasurable 
 service of convincing his parents that their son should 
 have an art education. Before long he declared that his 
 pupil had learned all that he could teach him, and sug- 
 gested that the young man should be sent to New York. 
 He gave him a letter to J. O. Eaton, and armed with 
 this introduction and a number of his finished canvases 
 Chase went to New York to study art in earnest. 
 
 This was in 1869. At that time William Chase was 
 exactly twenty years old. 
 
 [14]
 
 CHAPTER II 
 NEW YORK: ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 THE New York in which the young Western boy 
 found himself was a very different city from the 
 New York of to-day. In the early seventies New York 
 was still an American city. All the region above 
 Twenty-third Street, was "up-town," and horse-cars 
 jingled their deliberate way along the uncrowded streets. 
 In the afternoon the aristocratic New Yorker took a 
 discreet ride in a barouche in "The Park.'* Nurse-maids 
 pushed baby-carriages along the curving paths of the 
 city squares. Union Square was then a residence district. 
 The "brownstone front" represented the acme of ele- 
 gance. The red-brick houses with white pillared en- 
 trances in Washington Square and the neighboring 
 cross-streets were considered old-fashioned. There were 
 no specifically foreign quarters in those days. The pop- 
 ulation of the Bowery was mainly Irish, although the 
 Germans who began to emigrate to America in large 
 numbers about that time were settling there. 
 
 Although it must have seemed a teeming metropolis to 
 the boy from the small Western town, it would look like 
 a sleepy bit of the Old World to us to-day. Art was a 
 negligible term to the New Yorker of the seventies. The 
 
 [15]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 thing he knew by that name was a naive and lifeless 
 product. A better art, the outgrowth of eighteenth-cen- 
 tury English portraiture had preceded it, but at the 
 time William Chase first saw New York in 1869 the 
 darkness of the Victorian age lay upon the face of the 
 waters, and it seemed that they moved not. Some pic- 
 tures of the Diisseldorf School, the first continental art 
 works to be exported to America, were to be seen in 
 the shops of the dealers; but as a rule landscapes of the 
 Hudson River School adorned the walls of the wealthy 
 New Yorker, together with family portraits, poor copies 
 of Raphael, Guido Reni and Carlo Dolci brought home 
 from Italy, and steel-engravings of American historical 
 subjects. Leutze, a German painter who came to live in 
 America, had something to do with introducing Diissel- 
 dorf methods in this country. William Hunt had ac- 
 quainted Boston with the Barbizon painters, but Boston 
 and New York were far apart in those days, and while 
 many good Bostonians had followed where Hunt had 
 led, it was doubtful if he had succeeded at that time in 
 imparting any real recognition of the lesson of Corot, 
 Millet, Diaz, and Daubigny. George Fuller was one of 
 the few Americans of that generation to work out his own 
 salvation, but non-recognition of his original talent had 
 discouraged him into temporary abandonment of his art. 
 
 [16]
 
 ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 Broadly speaking, American art was first influenced 
 by the English painters, thence successively by the art 
 of Dtisseldorf, Munich, and Paris. Subsequently national 
 characteristics were lost in acceptance of the ideas un- 
 derlying modern art which have been drawn from various 
 sources. To-day we have schools and movements a new 
 one almost every week but it is a question if there is 
 any longer any special nationality in the art of the west- 
 ern world. The chronicler anxious to label and classify, 
 perhaps mistakes such external facts as characteristic 
 costume and landscape the thing which causes one to 
 know where a picture was painted for a national char- 
 acter in the art itself. 
 
 With the return of the so-called "younger painters" 
 to America from Paris and Munich, came the beginning 
 of that invasion of the new ideas which was to revolu- 
 tionize art, but as the pilgrimage of American students 
 to Munich did not really begin until 1870, it was not 
 until a year or two later that the first men returned to 
 America with the result of their studies. 
 
 The Munich influence seems to have somewhat pre- 
 ceded that of Paris, yet neither worked an immediate 
 and complete reform. Throughout the remainder of 
 the nineteenth century the pernicious ideal of pret- 
 tiness still lingered that quality which so infuriated 
 
 [17]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Chase and Whistler in the work of the Royal Academi- 
 cians of the Sir Frederick Leigh ton type "the bon- 
 bon-box sort of thing," Chase with infinite scorn used 
 to call it. Indeed, survivals of that black- walnut-furni- 
 ture period in art may still be found from time to time 
 upon our exhibition walls, despite impressionism, post- 
 impressionism, and futurism. At the time that Chase 
 came to New York in 1869, the ideal of academic paint- 
 ing remained unchallenged despite the example of a 
 few painters of more spontaneous talent like George 
 Fuller and Winslow Homer. The individuality of George 
 Inness' work, like Chase's, did not develop until he 
 came in contact with Continental art. 
 
 Upon reaching New York, Chase made his way at 
 once to the studio of J. 0. Eaton. Eaton was just about 
 to sail for Europe when the young man arrived. He de- 
 clined at first to have anything to do with his prospective 
 pupil, but when he saw the boy's work, he gave him the 
 key to his studio and told him to go in and use it until 
 he came back, so young Chase took possession of the 
 place. He also worked in the classes of the Academy of 
 Design. For almost two years he studied with Eaton, 
 the second year taking a studio of his own in the Young 
 Men's Christian Association building only two blocks 
 away from the Fourth Avenue Studio where he worked 
 
 [18]
 
 PORTRAIT OF (HASP: BY HIS MASTER, J. O. EATON, 
 PAINTED IN NEW YORK IN 1870
 
 ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 the last eight years of his life, and a short distance from 
 the house which was his home for over twenty years. 
 
 Eaton painted a portrait of Chase at this time which 
 is now in the possession of Chase's mother. It shows a 
 fine, not to say romantic, looking young man seen in 
 profile without the beard, with which all who knew him 
 in later years associate him. Although well-drawn, it is 
 of its period in the manner of painting, yet J. O. Eaton 
 ranked high in his day. Wyatt Eaton (who was not re- 
 lated to him) was another of his talented pupils, and 
 Mr. W. S. Macy, a fellow student of Chase's both in 
 New York and Munich, recalls interesting gatherings 
 in Eaton's studio where Chase and Bret Harte were 
 guests, also Sarah Jewett, a popular actress who was 
 then leading lady of the Union Square Stock Company. 
 It is probable that Edwin Abbey was also one of the 
 group, for James Kelly, the sculptor, remembers an in- 
 teresting drawing that Abbey made of Miss Jewett 
 about that time. 
 
 Studio life at that period was scarcely in its beginning. 
 The studio with a skylight was practically unknown. 
 The painters and students had rooms if possible with 
 a north light, but frequently without, in which they 
 painted landscapes indoors, portraits or "ideal heads" 
 without a model. A number of them lived in the beau- 
 
 [19]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 tiful old University building on Washington Square, 
 now destroyed, but associated for all time with the 
 name of Samuel Morse. Ivy-covered and lighted by dim 
 lamps in the side streets, it had a strong suggestion of 
 London. Booth's Theatre, at Sixth Avenue and Twenty- 
 third Street, harbored a number of artists, among them 
 George Inness. The Young Men's Christian Association 
 building at East Twenty-third Street, where Chase lived 
 and painted, the second studio building of New York, 
 was then new and full of artists. On the opposite corner 
 of Fourth Avenue and Twenty-third Street was the new 
 building of the Academy of Design, built in the style 
 of the Doges' Palace. This pioneer art institution, which 
 in its early days had known so many vicissitudes, had 
 progressed gradually up-town from its first ante-bellum 
 quarters in Bond Street to its fine new gray-stone build- 
 ing, and was finished and opened to students just about 
 the time that William Chase reached New York. 
 
 The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded that 
 year, and was located in West Fourteenth Street. Cooper 
 Union Art School had been in existence about ten years. 
 The Tenth Street Studio building, the first studio build- 
 ing to be erected in New York, was then about fourteen 
 years old. It must have been a familiar sight to the 
 young student with whose career it was afterward to 
 
 [20]
 
 ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 be so closely associated. At that time it was the strong- 
 hold of the Hudson River School, and yet even then 
 within its walls two men were freeing themselves from 
 the formalism of that Victorian art which is not art 
 at all Homer Martin and Winslow Homer. 
 
 "Art atmosphere" did not exist in New York in the 
 early seventies. That there were touches of innocent 
 Bohemianism we gather from certain chapters in Hop- 
 kinson Smith's "Oliver Horn," which deals with artists' 
 life in the sixties and seventies. But judging from the 
 testimony of the older painters who remember that 
 period, life then was as different as possible from that 
 of students and artists to-day. The painter of the Vic- 
 torian age was a decorous person, professorial rather 
 than artistic, yet not entirely devoid of characteristic 
 touches. Will Low remembers that "they wore soft 
 hats," and recalls the long locks of Beard, the animal- 
 painter, which hung to his shoulders. There seems reason 
 to believe that they wore velvet coats. 
 
 Models were almost unattainable in those days. The 
 undraped model, the model for the figure, did not exist 
 as such, although certain pictures and pieces of sculp- 
 ture done at that period proved that such models were 
 in some way obtainable. Usually the janitor of the build- 
 ing, or one of the children of the laundress, was pressed 
 
 [21]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 into service if a model was desired for what was called 
 the "life class," which corresponded to what is now 
 the portrait or illustration class. 
 
 A Philadelphia friend writing to Samuel Morse in 
 1813, when he was studying with Washington Allston 
 and Benjamin West in London, remarks: "Our Academy 
 of Fine Arts has begun the all-important study of the 
 live figure. Mr. Sully, Mr. Peale, Mr. Fairman, Mr. 
 King, and several others have devoted much attention 
 to this branch of the school, and I hope to see it in their 
 hands highly useful and improving." Nevertheless, the 
 regular professional model did not become an established 
 fact until a number of years afterward. 
 
 In 1871 Chase exhibited his first pictures, a portrait 
 and a still-life of Catawba grapes and blue plums. Rosina 
 Emmett Sherwood, who was one of Chase's first pupils at 
 the Tenth Street Studio, recalls that Chase in describing 
 his artistic efforts of those days, said that every grape 
 was highly polished and showed the reflections of sur- 
 rounding objects. The difference between that still-life 
 of 1871 and, say, The Belgian Melon, of Chase's later 
 years, would constitute a whole history of the develop- 
 ment of modern art. 
 
 Although Chase had not yet been able to formulate 
 or even vision the thing he was to create, all the while
 
 ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 there was a spark growing in the boy's soul that reached 
 out for something beyond, something better than the 
 dry and dead art that surrounded him. That devotion 
 and tha outreach toward an ever more complete ex- 
 pression that he carried to the end, was stirring within 
 him even in those days of Prussian blue and the camel's- 
 hair brush. 
 
 The pictures sold by popular American painters at 
 that time were mostly landscapes, and the works of 
 Wyant, Bierstadt, and other favorites of the period 
 brought prices that seem excellent even at this day. 
 Co-operation between the dealer and the native artist 
 scarcely existed then. The American painter disposed 
 of his works principally at the annual exhibitions. Less 
 frequently he sold them to the patron who went to his 
 studio. 
 
 There seems to have been little in the way of incident 
 to leave an impression on Chase's mind during these 
 years in New York. Although it was his first contact 
 with the world to which he belonged, he seemed to re- 
 member that period of his life as a time of opportunity 
 and hard work, opportunity achieved after long wait- 
 ing and heartache, and appreciated to the full measure 
 of its value. 
 
 It was characteristic of Chase that out of his own 
 
 [231
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 hard experience came not severity and intolerance, but 
 sympathy. He wanted things made easy for the art 
 student, not as they had been for him. It distressed him 
 to hear of struggles and obstacles. If he had had his 
 way the road to achievement would have been level 
 and smiling. He used often to refer to Sargent's career 
 (which had not been obstructed by poverty or lack of 
 parental understanding), not with envy, but with pleasure 
 in the thought that the beautiful thing did sometimes 
 happen. 
 
 Chase did not make himself felt in New York in 1871. 
 He was only a boy of twenty-two, and his painting did 
 not differ from that of the men about him. If it had he 
 would probably have been snubbed into oblivion as 
 George Fuller was. The hour had not yet struck. 
 
 After about two years in New York, he returned to 
 the West. His family had in the meantime moved to 
 St. Louis. 
 
 Just how deeply the sensitive boy had felt the con- 
 tempt in which his father held his gift may be imagined. 
 He knew that the art he revered and aspired to was 
 a great and beautiful thing; he knew that it was true, 
 and equally he realized that his father did not know it. 
 When he went home after his years of study in the East, 
 he said that the evening of his arrival his father asked 
 
 [24]
 
 PHOTOGRAPH OF CHASE TAKEN IN ST. LOUIS ABOUT 187*.
 
 o
 
 ART-STUDENT LIFE IN THE SEVENTIES 
 
 him to walk down-town with him, thus recognizing him 
 on equal terms as a grown-up man. As they walked along 
 the street his father hailed a friend: "Judge Brown, 
 I want you to meet my son the artist." My son the 
 artist! Chase never forgot the thrill he felt at those 
 words; pride he called it, but assuredly it was also some- 
 thing far deeper and finer, the son's joy in his father's 
 recognition of the art he h'ved to serve and express. 
 
 In St. Louis Chase shared the studio of James Wil- 
 liam Pattison. It was there that he saw the canvases of 
 one John Mulvaney,who had studied in Munich. Whether 
 extraordinary or not, they had something that the art 
 he had previously known did not have, and with that 
 perception he saw a new light. An idea took possession 
 of him the pilgrimage to Europe, a dim, imperfect vision 
 of the wonders of the Old World that awaited him. 
 
 Chase remained about a year in St. Louis painting pic- 
 tures, of which he sold a number. The subjects he painted 
 at that time were mostly flower and fruit studies, and 
 still life as it was then understood. Before long he at- 
 tracted the attention of some generous men of means, 
 who raised a sufficient sum of money among them to 
 send the boy to Europe to study. These men were Samuel 
 Dodd, S. A. Cole, Charles Parsons, and W. R. Hodges. 
 In return the young man was to paint a picture for each 
 
 [25]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 patron at the conclusion of his period of study, a condi- 
 tion of course gladly carried out. 
 
 Although the majority of men studying in Europe 
 at that period were in Paris, Chase, like Frederick Diel- 
 man, Walter Shirlaw, Frank Duveneck, and John Twacht- 
 man, elected to study in Munich. Doubtless in the 
 Western cities, containing as they then did many Ger- 
 mans and the children of German emigrants, Munich 
 seemed nearer than Paris. In any case, destiny carried 
 Chase to the Bavarian city, and there his real art life 
 may be said to have begun. 
 
 [26]
 
 CHAPTER III 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 CHASE reached Munich at the time when new ideas 
 were germinating. He entered the Munich Royal 
 Academy and was also a student in the studio of Karl 
 von Piloty, a painter of vast canvases, historical in sub- 
 ject, who was then believed to be a great master. But, 
 although he studied with Piloty and Kaulbach, it was 
 William Leibl, who represented in Munich what Couture 
 did in Paris, who influenced Chase and the other im- 
 pressionable young students in the seventies. 
 
 That, as has been said, was at the beginning of the 
 migration of American art students to Germany. Amer- 
 ican portrait-painters had gone to Europe to study from 
 the days of Sir Joshua Reynolds and Benjamin West, but 
 to England, not to the Continent. Before the Civil War, 
 Italy was the Mecca of sculptors and artists. Romantic 
 creations in marble as well as copies of Madonnas and 
 Magdalens were brought home in those days, and ac- 
 corded a respect which real art fails to inspire to-day. 
 These naive importations survived for many years in 
 decorous New York drawing-rooms. It is said that 
 much of this "statuary," as it was then called, was 
 subsequently presented to the Metropolitan Art Mu- 
 
 [27]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 seum, where it still stands in the twilight of its 
 cellars. 
 
 Doctor Charles Miller, a National Academician who 
 had gone to Munich in 1867, was practically the first 
 American painter to go to Munich. He returned to Amer- 
 ica in 1870, the year that Frank Duveneck arrived at 
 the Bavarian city. C. S. Reinhart, a Pennsylvania 
 painter and illustrator, went there about the same 
 time. 
 
 After the Franco-Prussian War a number of American 
 art students went to Paris and Munich, but the Munich 
 influence seems to have been felt in American art a little 
 before the French school made its impression. 
 
 There were about forty American students in Munich 
 at the time Chase went there, but soon the number was 
 increased to seventy. Frederick Dielman and William 
 Chase registered at the Royal Academy the same day. 
 The academy was a building that had been an old mon- 
 astery, divided off into stalls for the students. Duveneck, 
 who was in Munich when Chase arrived, but who went 
 away for a time shortly afterward, recalls the swiftness 
 of the young man's progress, for when Chase entered 
 the art school he went into the antique class like any 
 beginner, but when Duveneck returned a few months 
 later the young American student had become a celeb- 
 
 [28]
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 rity. Indeed, Chase and Currier were then considered 
 the most talented of the Munich students. 
 
 Walter Shirlaw, Chase's roommate, was another 
 American student whose gifts had received recognition. 
 Duveneck had already made his mark. His criticism 
 was of great value to Chase as it was later to Twacht- 
 man. Julius Rolshoven recalls that Duveneck, Shirlaw, 
 and Chase were nicknamed "the Father, Son, and Holy 
 Ghost" by the other students. 
 
 In Chase's portrait heads of that period it is interest- 
 ing to trace the Leibl influence. The strong, full technic, 
 the characteristic drag of the paint, with here and there 
 the light skill, the grace, that revealed the touch of 
 Chase. 
 
 Eventually that influence ceased to be apparent 
 in his work as Chase's own individual manner became 
 definitely formulated but he retained his admiration 
 for Leibl to the end of his career. 
 
 So much in those days was the young artist possessed 
 by his appreciation of the beauty of the sketch, of the 
 power of the unfinished thing to suggest what the finished 
 work so often lacks, that his fellow students used to be 
 afraid that he would never finish anything. At other 
 times, overwhelmed with the delicious quality of these 
 loose free sketches, they would beg him not to add an- 
 
 [29]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 other stroke to his canvas lest it lose its freshness and 
 magic. 
 
 Among the most interesting records of that period 
 are the canvases painted "from" the old masters. By 
 this method the student would first study the picture in 
 the gallery, then with a photograph for reference paint 
 his memory of the picture in his own studio, a much 
 freer and more valuable aid to his art education than 
 the literal copying of a canvas in the museum. 
 
 Chase and Walter Shirlaw lived together in rooms on 
 the Promenade Platz opposite the spot where the Baye- 
 rischer Hof now stands. Munich was a small city then, 
 still retaining its ancient walls, of which now only the 
 gates remain. 
 
 Munich was Chase's first experience of real student 
 life, the first actual contact with art atmosphere that 
 he had ever known. It is small wonder that he remem- 
 bered those days with so much sentiment and affection. 
 Student life in Miinchen, although not lacking in the 
 delightful absurdities characteristic of student life every- 
 where, seems to have been soberer than that of Paris. 
 "The best place to study is anywhere," Chase used to 
 remark afterward when his advice was asked. "I went 
 to Munich instead of Paris because I could saw wood 
 in Munich, instead of frittering in the Latin merry-go- 
 
 [30]
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 round." But that point of view doubtless represents the 
 result of after-reflection rather than a deliberate choice 
 at the time, since all of Europe, its art and life, was then 
 an unknown quantity to the young American student. 
 
 Those were the romantic days of King Ludwig in 
 Bavaria, the golden age when Wagner created a titanic 
 new world in music. Chase often saw the dark, pic- 
 turesque King drive past, his horses at a mad gallop. 
 But opera, cheap as it was at that time, was a little 
 beyond the means of the poor art student. Moreover, 
 Chase's interest in music, though genuine, was not pro- 
 found, so that that phase of German life which is con- 
 cerned with the history of modern music, the figures of 
 King Ludwig, Richard and Cosima Wagner, and the first 
 Wagnerian opera-singers, made little impression upon 
 him, although he often saw those beings who have now, 
 even while one of their number still survives, become 
 almost a legend. 
 
 The students' tickets entitled their possessor to ad- 
 mission to the theatres, however, and this diversion 
 Chase greatly enjoyed, spending many evenings at the 
 Volkstheater. Incidentally, these bits of pasteboard in- 
 sured a certain immunity from arrest, although the offi- 
 cers would take the student's ticket number and utter 
 official words of warning when the record of punishable 
 
 [31]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 pranks had become too long. But Chase's interest in 
 those days, as always, was centred with great singleness 
 of purpose upon his art. He lived the usual life of a seri- 
 ous student, who is yet a normal human being, enjoying 
 the theatres and cafes, and association with the new 
 type of femininity affiliated with student life in Europe; 
 but from his essential purpose he never permitted him- 
 self to be in any way deflected. He never, Duveneck says, 
 indulged in student nonsense as much as the other boys. 
 From the beginning his time and thought were concen- 
 trated upon his work. 
 
 The Max Emmanuel Cafe was the one most frequented 
 by the students. The conduct of such places was as 
 simple in those days as that of the humblest and most 
 remote Gasihaus in Bavaria to-day. The men procured 
 their own beer, pretzels, and radishes, a few cents cover- 
 ing the cost of an entire evening's entertainment. In 
 these low, dark, panelled old rooms, so vivid a contrast 
 to the Western American architecture of the seventies, 
 the students sat about until all hours drinking beer, 
 telling stories, and discussing the living subject of art. 
 The stories Chase told of those days were of all sorts, 
 from the tale of the exhilarated student from Boston, 
 a roommate of his, who, in a spirit of alcoholic fan- 
 tasy, stole a Christmas tree from the sidewalk of the 
 
 [32]
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 Platz on Christmas eve, thus embroiling himself and his 
 roommates in a farcical encounter with the German 
 law on Christmas morning, to his rapt memories of the 
 first revelation of the art of the old masters. Chase 
 tells of going to the old Pinakotek to study the pictures 
 and running home like a child to put in practice the 
 lesson learned while it was still fresh in his mind. The 
 story is descriptive of a phase in the development of 
 the ambitious student eager to learn the lesson of the 
 old art. It was also peculiarly characteristic of Chase's 
 special type which, although individual, was perhaps 
 more derivative than inventive. 
 
 The students went to balls of all sorts, varying from 
 an informal students' carouse to the stately pageant of 
 the annual artists' ball, where all the guests wore period 
 costumes. These occasions ended only with daylight, 
 excursions into the suburbs after the close of the ball 
 being a frequent occurrence. 
 
 There were absurd memories too that Chase en- 
 joyed recalling, such as the trick played on the German 
 student who always told his friends how they looked. 
 They were ill or well, fat or thin, old or young. Finally, 
 the other students decided to break their companion of 
 this habit. That day every youth greeted the croaker 
 with consternation and a shake of the head: "My poor 
 
 [33]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 friend, how ill you look you should be in bed you 
 should see a doctor," etc., etc. When he had heard 
 these lugubrious suggestions from a dozen different 
 classmates, Chase said, the susceptible German youth 
 succumbed to suggestion, and went home to bed with 
 all the sensations of one dangerously ill, and summoned 
 a doctor. 
 
 Von Habermann, now one of the strong painters of 
 Germany, was one of Chase's fellow students in Munich. 
 Chase painted a brilliant and striking portrait of him 
 which has been often exhibited. He had a great admira- 
 tion for the ceremonious and courtly young baron. Ac- 
 customed as the Indiana boy had been to the simplest 
 forms of our less formal democracy, the graceful habit 
 of speech and manner of the aristocratic Bavarian im- 
 pressed him deeply, and he frankly set himself to imi- 
 tation. There was in Chase's type a natural taste for 
 the amenities. When he came back to New York after 
 his long contact with continental manners, he felt deeply 
 annoyed with the lack of courtesy of the man in the 
 street. One day, standing before the window of an art 
 shop in Union Square, a very large and unpolished person 
 trod heavily upon his foot. Chase turned upon him in 
 exasperation: "Do you realize, sir, that you have al- 
 most crushed my foot? In such circumstances the least 
 
 [34]
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 you can do is to apologize." The man looked at him in 
 surprise. "Well, if you are not a damned fool, you must 
 know that I didn't do it on purpose," was his rational 
 if ungraceful reply. Chase's wrath faded at once. "And, 
 of course, he was right," he said. 
 
 Mr. Henry Rittenberg, a pupil of Chase's who met 
 him by chance in Munich, on Chase's only other visit 
 there in 1903, recalls an anecdote his master told of a 
 still-life he painted in his student days when his class- 
 mates gathered about to advise him. Always susceptible 
 to a certain extent to influences, a quality that was part 
 of his broadness of mind on the subject of art, Chase 
 says he inclined his ear to advice from all directions. 
 :< That piece of brass isn't right; why don't you take it 
 out?" "I don't like that apple." ; 'That piece of copper 
 spoils your composition." Acting with great docility 
 upon all the advice he received, Chase said that pres- 
 ently he found his canvas quite empty and ready for a 
 fresh start. 
 
 Chase used to tell another story of a favorite prac- 
 tical joke of those days with Prussian blue which was 
 practised upon the crusty Hausmeister of the studio build- 
 ing who complained of the students and thus won their 
 enmity. Any one who has ever met this peculiarly vir- 
 ulent pigment knows that its potency is such that a 
 
 [ 35 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 single tube will practically last a lifetime, and its per- 
 vasive power is so great that a fragment let loose upon 
 the world will penetrate in all directions for an indefinite 
 period. In this case the students filled the Hausmeister's 
 keyhole with Prussian blue. The unsuspecting victim 
 having used the key in the dark, replaced it in his pocket 
 without suspicion. His life thereafter for many days was 
 poisoned by Prussian blue and his opinion of the Amer- 
 ican students was less flattering than ever. 
 
 A student of Chase's recalls his using this same means 
 of retaliation upon one of those tormenting street ur- 
 chins that crowd upon the painter's painting arm, breathe 
 in his ear, and stumble into his paint-box in continental 
 countries. When he had endured his annoy er as long as 
 he could, Chase with a pleasant smile gave the child 
 a tube of Prussian blue to play with, and, kind father 
 though he was, watched his victim running off with his 
 prize with chuckles of satisfaction. As the painters of 
 to-day practically never use this color, it is to be feared 
 that its presence in their paint-box is for purposes other 
 than those of art. 
 
 Once a number of American students were expelled 
 for smoking in the studio. Chase, Dielman, and a Boston 
 student with a haughty manner the same one, indeed, 
 who stole the Christmas tree went armed with an ex- 
 
 [36] 
 
 >
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 cellent cigar to Kaulbach, the head of the academy, to 
 ask him to reconsider his decision. According to Chase 
 and Dielman, the excellence of the cigar and the in- 
 domitable manner of the Bostonian accomplished a re- 
 versal of the edict. 
 
 Chase almost immediately attracted the attention of 
 his master. Piloty, although of the old grandiloquent 
 school, was evidently one who left his students open to 
 influences. Discussions concerning the old and new ideas 
 of art were rife in those days. Chase recalled one that 
 had an amusing result. He had been insisting that the 
 exact reproduction of nature had nothing in common 
 with art. (I remember well the harassed frown with 
 which he used to say to his students: "You have all 
 heard of the picture of the fruit which was so natural 
 that the birds flew down to peck at it? I do not need 
 to see that canvas to know that it was a Terrible Thing !") 
 Talking, no doubt, along some such line as this, another 
 student challenged Chase with the remark that whether 
 art or not, such painting represented skill of a sort, and 
 that Chase himself was doubtless unable to paint an 
 object so that it would deceive any one. As a result of 
 this friendly contention the student agreed that if Chase 
 could perform the feat, he would give all the students 
 a dinner. Chase accepted the challenge. 
 
 [37]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 The next day when Professor Raab arrived to criticise 
 his pupils, he turned, upon entering to hang his hat on 
 its usual peg on the wall. The hat before the eyes of the 
 waiting class fell to the ground. The professor picked 
 it up and tried again, thinking he had missed the nail; 
 but again his hat fell to the floor. When the same thing 
 had happened a third time, the old German looked in- 
 tently at the wall, then without a change of expression 
 laid his hat upon a chair, and began his criticism. After 
 his departure the class gathered to examine the highly 
 successful imitation of a nail painted upon the wall by 
 William Chase in place of the real peg of which he had 
 painstakingly removed all traces. That night the stu- 
 dents enjoyed an excellent dinner at their favorite 
 Kneipe. 
 
 It was the custom of the Royal Academy of Munich 
 to give out each year a subject for the prize competi- 
 tion. During Chase's last year the subject given was 
 some incident from the life of Christopher Columbus. 
 Most of the students submitted conventional composi- 
 tions. Chase, who loathed the idea of the historical sub- 
 ject, put off the evil day until the time was almost up. 
 He set to work then in the presence of a number of his 
 fellow students and painted his sketch with the figure 
 of Columbus placed with his back to the spectator, 
 
 [38]
 
 CRASH'S ORIGINAL SKETCH MADE FOR THE COLUMBUS COMPETITION AT THE 
 MUNICH ROYAL ACADEMY. 
 
 THE SECOND COLUMBUS SKETCH MADE AFTER PILOTY'S CRITICISM OF THE 
 UNCONVENTIONAL COMPOSITION.
 
 <>
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 which was the young painter's way of showing his con- 
 tempt for the academic. Despite this highly irregular 
 treatment of his theme, Chase was awarded the prize 
 by the jury, but old Piloty was furious when he discovered 
 it. How dared he, Herr Chase, thus represent the distin- 
 guished adventurer with his back to the public ! He 
 first raved, then implored his gifted pupil to make a 
 more dignified presentment. At last, Chase, most con- 
 cessive of human beings, promised to change his com- 
 position, and turn the figure of Columbus so that it 
 was in profile. Both of these pictures, as well as the 
 original ink-sketch, are the property of Mrs. Chase, and 
 are most interesting in their suggestion of a certain 
 touch and use of color that we have come to associate 
 with the mature Chase. 
 
 But the result of his amiability dismayed Chase. 
 Piloty, filled with enthusiasm, decided that the talented 
 young painter must treat his subject upon a canvas 
 thirty feet long. "And I myself will use my influence 
 to have it placed in the Capitol at Washington!" Piloty 
 declared. Chase was filled with consternation. His ready 
 wit came to his rescue, however. 
 
 "Alas, Herr Director," he faltered, "I am too poor 
 to buy a thirty-foot canvas." But Piloty was generous. 
 "That makes nothing," he declared. "I will provide 
 
 [39]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 you with the canvas and, yes, with the studio as 
 well!" 
 
 So the overwhelmed Chase found himself in posses- 
 sion of paints, canvas, and a studio, and no excuse for 
 not painting the loathed historical picture. He made a 
 feint of beginning, then went to his master with a new 
 excuse. 
 
 "It is not right, Herr Director," he said, "that I 
 should enter upon a work so great without proper prep- 
 aration. Surely, before completing this important pic- 
 ture, I should first go to Spain, so that I may be familiar 
 with the types I am to represent." 
 
 So at last Piloty, outwitted, yielded. The picture was 
 never painted. But before Chase left Munich Piloty 
 showed his appreciation of his revolutionary pupil's 
 talent by commissioning him to paint his five children, 
 an appreciation which, despite the different manner 
 and method of the older painter, was still a valuable 
 and valued tribute. These pictures after Piloty's death 
 became each the property of the child painted. One, 
 that of a son who has since died, now hangs in the Piloty 
 house in Munich. 
 
 Chase had a studio of his own in Munich, and it was 
 in this studio that he and Duveneck painted at the 
 same time The Turkish Page, and also his portrait of 
 
 [40]
 
 ONE OF THE PILOTY CHILDREN. 
 
 Painted in Munich about 1877.
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 Duveneck called The Smoker, done in 1875. Even in 
 those days Chase had begun collecting beautiful art 
 objects and furniture. It was through one of his pur- 
 chases that this fine portrait of Duveneck, which was 
 afterward unfortunately destroyed by fire, was painted. 
 Chase had bought an old chair that had fascinated him. 
 He exhibited it upon its arrival to Duveneck with his 
 enthusiasm. "Just look at it, man ! Isn't it a wonderful 
 thing, a beautiful thing?" And feeling that he must 
 paint it at once, he commanded his friend: "Here, sit 
 down there a minute, I want to see how it looks." Du- 
 veneck sat carelessly on the arm of the chair, his long 
 pipe in his hand. Liking the way it looked, Chase set 
 to work at once to paint it. "The chair, of course," Du- 
 veneck explained; "I was of no importance, merely an 
 accessory." So that is how the portrait, which received 
 honorable mention at the Salon in 1881 and in Munich 
 in 1883, came to be painted. 
 
 It was in 1875 also that Chase painted The Jester, 
 which was exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial in 
 1876. He used to tell a tale of the model for this study, 
 who was fond of imbibing anything of an alcoholic na- 
 ture that happened to be available. One day while the 
 painter was out of the room the model consumed a con- 
 siderable quantity of hair-tonic which Chase had put in 
 
 [41]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 a whiskey-bottle, with the result that the next day the 
 jester was not present at the studio. 
 
 The Dowager, exhibited at the Memorial Exhibition 
 at the Metropolitan Museum in February, 1917, and 
 also at the exhibition of the National Arts Club in 1910, 
 was painted a year earlier, in 1874. The splendid head 
 of Von Habermann already referred to was painted 
 in 1875 and about the same time The Old Cavalier, 
 The Apprentice Boy, and The Broken Jug. This last was 
 exhibited at the National Academy in 1877. The Boy 
 Feeding a Cockatoo, painted about that time, was done 
 from the same model as The Turkish Page. Ready for the 
 Ride, painted in 1877, was exhibited at the National 
 Academy in 1878. This picture, now the property of the 
 Union League Club, was one of Chase's first experi- 
 ments in painting the face in full light. 
 
 The Munich artists painted out-of-doors to some ex- 
 tent, but most landscapes, in the traditional way of the 
 period, were painted in the studio from notes made in 
 their sketch-books. The Frenchmen were the first to paint 
 in the open as students do to-day; therefore, the land- 
 scapes of Chase, Currier, and others in that Munich 
 period were often done indoors. Even the interesting 
 Venetian pictures painted by Chase and Twachtman in 
 1878 have the darkness and tone of the interior sub- 
 
 [42] 
 
 <>
 
 AN AMERICAN STUDENT IN MUNICH 
 
 ject, for the painter of that school did not see light or 
 atmosphere. A morning landscape was as dark as a night 
 subject. Gradually emancipating himself from the ex- 
 treme of this influence, but retaining its lesson of tone 
 quality and brush technic, Chase continued to paint 
 in a manner very definitely adapted from the old mas- 
 ters, whose art had illumined his mind through his study 
 of the Munich galleries. At that time he was most en- 
 thusiastic about Van Dyck, who was well represented 
 in the old Pinakotek, and that admiration is apparent 
 in many of his portrait heads of that period. 
 
 The art that bore the stamp of the painter's own in- 
 dividuality came later, as under the various influences 
 that played upon him, he evolved the distinctive thing 
 we call a Chase manner or subject. 
 
 Duveneck still recalls with vividness the interesting 
 effects Chase contrived in his studio by posing a model 
 in a frame in the semblance of some famous canvas of 
 the great masters. Those were his first experiments in 
 the old-master tableaux with which he afterward famil- 
 iarized New York. 
 
 Chase left his mark upon student life in Munich. It 
 was he who inaugurated the custom of having a student 
 dinner about every two weeks, when photographs of 
 old and modern masters were hung upon the walls, 
 
 [43]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 and one of the students chosen to talk about the art 
 and work of the painter or painters represented. The 
 American Art Club in Munich was the outgrowth of 
 these meetings. At one Thanksgiving dinner given by 
 the students of this club, Mark Twain, who was passing 
 through Germany at the time, was a guest. 
 
 In the spirit of those days, indescribably conveyed 
 in the words of the men who lived through them, one 
 is conscious, as in the picture of Paris shown in Du 
 Maurier's "Trilby" of that free and beautiful thing, the 
 joy of creative youth. Whether successful or not, the 
 student of that time was the farthest possible remove 
 from the self-conscious posturing type that we find so 
 often to-day in New York and Paris. For that was before 
 the day of the dilettante, and the amateur was usually 
 one perforce through lack of gift or application, rather 
 than because his attitude toward art was trivial and 
 insincere. They were artists in spirit at least in those 
 days, not actors. 
 
 Chase won a number of medals during his years in 
 Munich, and his position as a brilliant young painter 
 became fully established. Before he left he was invited 
 to become an instructor at the academy, an honor he 
 deeply appreciated but declined. To this day he is well 
 known and honorably remembered in the Bavarian city. 
 
 [44] 
 

 
 CHAPTER IV 
 VENETIAN DAYS 
 
 IN 1877 Chase went from Munich to Venice, where 
 he spent about nine months in company with Du- 
 veneck and Twachtman. The three painters lived to- 
 gether in the simplest and most economical fashion. 
 Indeed their stay was prolonged to a greater length 
 than they had originally intended because they lacked 
 the funds necessary for the act of departure. But the 
 Venice period was one full of interest, and as they painted 
 outdoors together the art of the associated painters grew 
 steadily stronger and more individual. 
 
 Mrs. Bronson, the sister of Richard Watson Gilder 
 who at that time was living with her family in Venice, 
 proved a good friend to the young men and it was 
 through her kind offices that they were eventually 
 helped out of their financial embarrassment, for Chase 
 became very ill with some sort of Italian fever. The 
 money of all three gave out, and their situation was 
 quite desperate. Duveneck nursed the invalid as best 
 he could, taking all the night duty, for Twachtman, he 
 still remembers, could not stay awake, and at last Chase 
 began slowly to get better. 
 
 It was during this illness, which had drawn heavily 
 
 [45]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 upon their slender resources, that the men, reduced to 
 absolute penury, were obliged to borrow of a compara- 
 tive stranger. Chase, who actually needed food, had asked 
 for soup. Duveneck went out under the spur of this 
 necessity, and with great reluctance asked a young 
 Englishman he knew slightly to lend him five francs. 
 The money was lent (and subsequently returned) but 
 the situation remained desperate. Duveneck says that 
 they all acquired a distaste for beans at that time, for 
 being the cheapest food obtainable, and fortunately 
 nourishing, they bought a large quantity and lived al- 
 most exclusively upon beans for a long period. Finally 
 Chase recovered, although his friends had despaired of 
 his life, and he had, indeed, come very near the border- 
 land. At the eleventh hour nelp came Mrs. Bronson 
 secured a portrait order for Duveneck. 
 
 Duveneck was high up on a ladder in one of the gal- 
 leries making a copy when a card was brought to him. 
 He was never more excited in his life, he says, than when, 
 after having reluctantly descended the ladder, he found 
 that his caller had come to order a portrait. He was 
 still further overcome at the excellent price offered, 
 "for at that moment," said Duveneck, "if he had but 
 known it, he could have had it for five dollars ! " 
 
 Chase's collecting impulse received a tremendous im- 
 
 [46]
 
 VENETIAN DAYS 
 
 petus in Venice, for there beautiful old things were to 
 be had for the traditional song. Mr. Macy, who was 
 also in Venice at the time, tells how the dealers would 
 take the painters into a room literally stacked with old 
 pictures and tell them they could have anything in it 
 for five dollars. Needless to state, despite the condition 
 of his finances, Chase availed himself of these oppor- 
 tunities to acquire a number of valuable things, includ- 
 ing pictures, among them some still-life studies, as well 
 as brasses, old furniture and picture-frames. Those which 
 he could not pay for he left behind to be aftetward 
 sent to America. 
 
 Chase's well-known picture The Fish-Market was 
 painted during his stay in Venice, also The Antiquary's 
 Shop, subjects which, strong in the lure of obvious pic- 
 turesqueness, lay at his very door. In them, however, 
 there is no attempt to paint light or atmosphere. That 
 lesson Chase learned later from the French and Dutch 
 masters. The Antiquary's Shop is an interesting study in 
 tone, a rich and harmonious color composition, that is 
 all. Chase also did a number of still-life studies at this 
 time. While these were all much darker than his later 
 still-life painting, yet they are beautiful examples of 
 tone painting, and not by any means monochromic 
 studies, for he has made varied and interesting use 
 
 [47]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of such notes of strong color as are furnished by a red 
 lobster and rich-hued bits of drapery. The fine still- 
 life containing his monkey Jocko was painted at this 
 period, as it was at this time that in picturesque fashion 
 he acquired Jocko. 
 
 Wandering one day along the water-front Chase 
 paused to watch a paintable group of Spanish sailors, 
 and as he did so he noticed with them a forlorn little 
 monkey. His quick sympathy aroused by the appear- 
 ance of the little animal, which looked particularly 
 desolate in its gay garments, he entered into negotia- 
 tions with the sailors, with the result that the monkey 
 changed owners. The Spaniards, thinking the foreigner 
 did not realize that he was entitled also to Jocko's ward- 
 robe, ran shrieking after him, holding up the diminutive 
 garments. It was almost impossible to persuade them 
 that their customer did not want them. They plainly 
 considered him a reckless spendthrift. 
 
 Chase took the monkey back to his studio, arranged 
 an Italian canopied bed for his new pet and fed it gen- 
 erously. But it seemed to him that Jocko moped. Think- 
 ing that perhaps the monkey craved simian companion- 
 ship, he fared forth and purchased another extremely 
 small monkey named Jim as a companion for Jocko, 
 but the ungrateful Jocko turned his back upon the new 
 
 [481
 
 VENETIAN DAYS 
 
 arrival. At last Chase, fearing that Jocko might hurt 
 the smaller animal, decided to remove the undesired 
 Jim, but when he attempted to carry Jim away Jocko 
 intervened suddenly and violently, insisting, so to speak, 
 that Jim remain. After this the two monkeys became 
 great friends. One day Chase returned to the studio to 
 find them both missing. Going out to search for them 
 he was met by an irate signora, who complained that the 
 monkeys of the Americano were in her fig-tree stealing 
 her ripe figs. Arriving at the spot, Chase discovered the 
 devoted Jocko at the top of the tree swiftly gathering 
 figs and handing them over to Jim. 
 
 Another day Chase came home to find Jocko gone. 
 While walking about the narrow streets by the side 
 canals looking for him he noticed a gesticulating crowd 
 gathered at the corner of the Accademia di Belle Arti 
 with faces turned upward. Stopping to discover the cause 
 of the excitement, Chase looked up also, and there, lightly 
 attached to the topmost pinnacle of the lightning-rod, 
 he saw an undisturbed monkey at ease, apparently en- 
 joying the view. For some reason this state of affairs 
 seemed to be contrary to law and order, for two carabi- 
 nieri were wildly demanding that the monkey be taken 
 down at once. When the officials found out that the 
 Americano was Jocko's owner they became quite vio- 
 
 [49]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 lently insistent. "Take him down. Subito, subito! It is 
 not possible for him to remain there. You must take him 
 down." Just how the details of Jock's descent were to 
 be accomplished was not clear. 
 
 Jocko, however, survived this and many other ad- 
 ventures; but an experimental mood that seized upon 
 him once in his master's absence proved fatal. It hap- 
 pened while Chase was away from Venice on a trip. In 
 exploring the gondolier's pocket Jocko came upon a 
 handful of matches which he unwisely consumed but 
 failed to digest. Combustion of a sort must have occurred 
 within, and Jocko died. Chase's friends, much disturbed 
 that this tragedy should have occurred while he was 
 away, felt that all possible attention must be bestowed 
 upon Jocko's last rites. Hunting among the painter's 
 belongings, they took a piece of brocade that he espe- 
 cially valued for Jocko's shroud, and wrapping the dead 
 monkey in it, put him in the canal and let the tide carry 
 him away. When Chase returned his grief for his lost 
 pet was mixed with consternation at the discovery that 
 his devoted friends had bereft him at the same time of 
 his Venetian brocade. When he left Venice to return to 
 America he gave the bereaved Jim to Mrs. Bronson. 
 
 While in Venice, Chase received an offer from the 
 newly founded Art League in New York to teach there. 
 
 [50]
 
 VENETIAN DAYS 
 
 It is amusing to realize now, familiar as we are with 
 Chase's extraordinary career as a teacher, that he had 
 grave doubts of his ability to teach and, had it not been 
 for Duveneck's urging him to try it, would probably 
 not have accepted the offer which had such important 
 consequences. 
 
 Long before he had made plans for returning to 
 America the dream of having a beautiful studio pos- 
 sessed him, for once, while buying something in Venice 
 with Macy he said to his friend: "I intend to have the 
 finest studio in New York." 
 
 Duveneck's portrait money carried the three painters 
 back to Munich where Chase gathered together his 
 belongings. Before he left, his fellow painters, inspired 
 by Duveneck, planned a farewell celebration for him 
 at Polling, a little Bavarian town where the students 
 often went to paint and where Chase had once organized 
 a Fourth of July celebration. 
 
 At Polling the students worked in a deserted monas- 
 tery for which they paid a small rent, using the monks' 
 cells for studios and utilizing the picturesquely cos- 
 tumed peasants for models. The lower part of the mon- 
 astery had been turned into a cattle-stable, and of the 
 material it offered they also availed themselves, paint- 
 ing the cattle and sheep. It was there that Walter Shir- 
 
 [51]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 law painted his Sheep Shearing, a canvas that attracted 
 considerable attention at the time. 
 
 In those days Polling lay beyond the terminal of the 
 railway, and certain red tape had to be gone through 
 with in arranging this festivity which was designed and 
 successfully carried out as a surprise to Chase. Permis- 
 sion had to be obtained from the Mayor of Weilheim, 
 the town to be passed through before the merrymakers 
 could proceed on their way. 
 
 The students had built a sort of throne covered with 
 studio stuffs, draperies, rugs, skins, and brass plates and 
 placed it on an ox-cart. In order not to be too flatteringly 
 saccharine, a large caricature of Chase made by one of 
 his friends was placed above the seat he was to occupy. 
 The white Bavarian oxen harnessed with the quaint 
 picturesque brass bands across their foreheads were 
 decorated with garlands, as they would have been for 
 a peasant wedding. 
 
 When Chase descended from the train at Weilheim 
 whither he had been lured upon some pretext, he was 
 overwhelmed when he found himself set upon by a 
 shrieking mob of friends and lifted to the throne, and 
 thus seated aloft (under the caricature of himself) he 
 was slowly drawn along the road to Polling amidst the 
 acclamations of the populace Bavarian peasants in 
 
 [52]
 
 VENETIAN DAYS 
 
 costume in a manner truly operatic. "As luck would 
 have it," said Mr. Duveneck, enjoying with the unc- 
 tion of a boy the memory of that little joke, "Chase 
 had worn the very hat represented in the caricature, 
 which was so good that it was recognized all along 
 the way ! " 
 
 On the back of the cart was a keg of beer from which 
 the guest of honor as well as his entertainers refreshed 
 themselves. To the accompaniment of cattle horns, Ty- 
 rolese mountain horns, and copper kitchen-ware beaten 
 with a spoon, a veritable pandemonium, they proceeded 
 on their way. When they entered the little town the 
 men took the oxen from the traces and drew the cart 
 themselves up to the door of the inn. Here Chase was 
 wafted to earth and into the low panelled tap-room, 
 where the festivities continued until a late hour. A thor- 
 oughly decorous account of this frankly uproarious oc- 
 casion, written by one of the participators and printed 
 in an American paper at the time, described the night 
 as "pleasantly spent in mirth and song." A piece of 
 parchment covered with seals, coins, and ribbons con- 
 taining the names of the men who were present at that 
 celebration hung for many years in the Tenth Street 
 studio. 
 
 [53]
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 WHEN Chase returned to America in 1878, the 
 hour had struck for the passing of the old, and 
 the coming of the new art. The canvases of the younger 
 men exhibited at the academy, which would have been 
 ignored and laughed at in the zenith of the Hudson River 
 School, came now at the psychological moment when 
 the time was ripe for their recognition and influence. 
 
 The art exhibition of the Philadelphia Centennial in 
 1876, had given American artists a new outlook. The 
 Barbizon painters were quite generally known now, al- 
 though America had not yet heard the name of Manet. 
 The young men who had been sending their pictures 
 home to the academy were beginning to return from 
 Paris and Munich; prosperity followed the Civil War, 
 and change was in the air. 
 
 Chase's fame, as has been said, had preceded him. 
 His Jester exhibited at the Centennial had been widely 
 commented upon; The Broken Jug, exhibited in 1877, 
 was bought by a National Academician, Doctor Charles 
 Miller, who still owns it; and in 1878, shortly before his 
 return, Ready for the Ride was exhibited at the academy 
 and created a sensation. The preceding year the So- 
 
 [54]
 
 READY FOR THE RIDE. 
 
 Exhibited at the National Academy in 1878 just before Chase's return to America from Munich. 
 Property of the Union League Club.
 
 ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 ciety of American Artists, called at first the American 
 Art Association, had been organized, the first meeting 
 taking place at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Wat- 
 son Gilder in their famous East Fifteenth Street house. 
 The Art Students' League was then in Fourteenth Street. 
 The Metropolitan Museum had just moved into its new 
 quarters on the edge of Central Park; in short, the new 
 life had begun. 
 
 But New York itself had not greatly changed. It went 
 its placid way unmoved. The presence of the young 
 American painter in a Munich student's hat, accom- 
 panied by a picturesque hound or two, did not cause 
 much comment on lower Fifth Avenue. Yet Chase was 
 a natural creator of bizarre effects. He provided New 
 York with spectacles that would have set much journal- 
 istic talk and advertising in motion in these days. When 
 his colored servant, Daniel, wearing a red fez, stood 
 outside the entrance of the Tenth Street Studio, while 
 the Russian hound, a conspicuous exotic in the seven- 
 ties, gambolled about the street, and two brilliant-hued 
 macaws and a white cockatoo perched upon the iron 
 railing of the building, the resulting effect was certainly 
 not similar to that of the rest of the quiet street, yet it 
 was .passed over with an indulgent smile by the passer- 
 by of that era. 
 
 [55]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 On the steamer returning to America, Chase dis- 
 covered that Carroll Beckwith, whom he had met in 
 Munich, was also a passenger. That meeting was the be- 
 ginning of their long friendship. Shirlaw and Dielman had 
 already returned from Munich, and the men resumed 
 their old companionship in New York. 
 
 Chase accomplished his dream when shortly after 
 his arrival in America he acquired his Tenth Street 
 Studio. This building, now so associated with his name, 
 was built as early as 1857, and was the first real studio 
 building in New York. Chase at first occupied a small 
 studio, but later managed to secure a large room which 
 had previously been used for exhibition purposes. This 
 latter was the room known to fame as Chase's Tenth 
 Street Studio, although he retained the smaller studio 
 and had an upper room as well. Doctor Charles Miller, 
 M.A., rhapsodically describes Chase's appearance upon 
 the scene: "Mr. Chase upon returning to New York 
 virtually took the town by storm, capturing its chief 
 artistic citadel, and the exhibition gallery of the Tenth 
 Street Studio building became the sanctum sanctorum 
 of the aesthetic fraternity, affording midst painting, 
 statuary, music, flowers, and flamingoes, etc., symposia 
 most unique and felicitous, never to be forgotten by 
 charmed participants, notably a banquet with F. Hop- 
 
 [56]
 
 ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 kinson Smith as toastmaster, animated by the sparkling 
 wit of Homer Martin, Beckwith, Reinhart, Shirlaw, 
 Minor, and Sartain." 
 
 The flamingo, be it explained, was stuffed and not a 
 part of the studio aviary. 
 
 Chase was also a member of the Art Club, of which 
 Doctor Miller was president. Beckwith, Shirlaw, Dielman, 
 Saint Gaudens, Frank Millet, Reinhart, F. S. Church, 
 and Swain Gifford were among its members. It met at 
 The Studio, a chop-house on Sixth Avenue, where many 
 of the artists dined quite regularly. It would have been 
 interesting to be an eavesdropper at that dinner-table. 
 Doctor Miller still has a portfolio of interesting pencil- 
 drawings, both portraits and caricatures, that the men 
 made of each other at these meetings of the Art Club. 
 During its five years of existence the club held exhibi- 
 tions of work by its members, and collected funds to 
 send an exhibit of American painters to the Interna- 
 tional Exhibition at Munich in 1883, an enterprise in 
 which Chase was especially interested, and which was 
 important because it was the first time that American 
 painters had been collectively represented in an inter- 
 national exhibition. 
 
 Walter Palmer, who met Chase soon after his arrival 
 in New York, and who was a neighbor of his in the Tenth 
 
 [57]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Street building, remembers another dining-place where 
 art was discussed nightly a little restaurant in the base- 
 ment at Broadway and Eighteenth Street, where he, 
 Chase, Shirlaw, and Church used to dine together. For 
 these revolutionary young painters literally lived art 
 in those days. It may well be that in some further future 
 the story of that time will take on the atmosphere of a 
 legend. 
 
 Among Chase's first pupils at The League were Ir- 
 ving Wiles, Edward A. Bell and Edith Prellwitz. A year 
 or two later, Mrs. Sherwood (then Rosina Emmett) 
 and Mrs. Keith (then Dora Wheeler) were private pupils 
 in the Tenth Street Studio. Chase often used to take his 
 dogs to The League a pleasant little run from Tenth 
 Street where they created something of a sensation 
 in the classroom. 
 
 Irving Wiles distinctly remembers his first criticism, 
 which is interesting because it is an example of the 
 thing Chase meant to American students at that time. 
 Trained in the careful methods of the academic art 
 school of that period, Wiles said he looked with scorn 
 that first day upon the charcoal-drawings of the students 
 about him. To his eye they seemed rough and careless, 
 so he took out his little hard crayon, whittled it to the 
 finest possible point, and began to show what careful 
 
 [58]
 
 ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 and accurate work he could do. What was his surprise, 
 when Chase came along to criticise, to see him look 
 with disapproval upon his work. "No, that isn't the 
 idea," said Chase. "Give me your charcoal. Something 
 more like this," and he proceeded to draw, only with in- 
 finitely more skill, in the rough and unfinished manner 
 of his pupils. After this Wiles said he did not let his 
 master see any more of his work until he had mastered 
 the trick. But at his next criticism he believes that 
 Chase did not recognize him as the careful manipulator 
 of the pointed crayon. 
 
 Chase became a member of the new Society of Amer- 
 ican Artists, and soon made himself so much felt in the 
 organization that little more than a year after his return 
 home he was elected its president. 
 
 Those were days of organization and new movements. 
 With the Art League and the Society of American Ar- 
 tists in operation, and young artists returning in in- 
 creasing numbers from Europe, more studios were re- 
 quired, models were in demand and not to be had for 
 the asking, for models were an art property not greatly 
 needed in the preceding period. The first and for a long 
 time the only model in New York was one Henrietta, 
 a Jewish woman who lived to be very old, and was for 
 many years a well-known figure in the studios. With the 
 
 [59]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 organization of plans to procure models, orphan asylums 
 and homes for old ladies and old men were scoured, also 
 the tenement sections in which the Italian immigrants 
 were settling. 
 
 The Sherwood Studios were built about a year later 
 by Carroll Beckwith's uncle, on land that had depre- 
 ciated in value because of the newly erected elevated 
 road, an enterprise suggested by Beckwith, who was 
 unable to find a suitable studio. But in spite of the erec- 
 tion of the Sherwood, it was a long time before Fifty- 
 seventh Street became an actual art centre. For many 
 years after that the life in the studios was still below 
 Twenty-third Street. 
 
 In many cases photograph-galleries had been taken 
 over by the artists, and all along Broadway, from Prince 
 Street up to Twenty-third, many an old building had 
 an artist or two housed in its garret. The old Vienna 
 bakery building, next to Grace Church, on Broadway, 
 was one that remained dedicated to this use for many 
 years. Some of the cheap flats in the neighborhood of 
 South Washington Square were also used by artists 
 then as they were for many years afterward. Thomas 
 Janvier's amusing "Color Studies," a collection of stories 
 of the artists' colony of that time in the region south 
 and west of Washington Square known as Greenwich 
 
 [60]
 
 ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 Village, give an interesting picture of the period despite 
 their invariable fairy-tale endings. 
 
 It was in every sense a transition period. The dusty 
 art of the past decades was crumbling. The old aca- 
 demicians used to meet at Martinelli's, a little Italian 
 restaurant on Third Avenue near Tenth Street, where 
 they exchanged reminiscences of their European travels. 
 Third Avenue was a much less squalid neighborhood 
 then, a place of junk-shops and dime museums; a few 
 Italians had now added themselves to the Irish and 
 German residents of the neighborhood, but English 
 was still the language of the Bowery. 
 
 The academicians of those days seemed rather dry 
 and conventional beings to the revolutionary younger 
 men. Some of them were sympathetic with the new 
 ideas, but the majority had little or no understanding 
 of the thing that is the very life principle of art. Their 
 attitude toward it was gentlemanly and scholarly. 
 They had gentlemanly, rather dull dinners at the time 
 of the annual exhibitions, and upon occasion something 
 that they called "a spread," in which beer was the wildest 
 form of dissipation. They seemed to have enjoyed them- 
 selves very much in a correct and gentlemanly fashion 
 without the faintest suspicion that they were living the 
 vie de Boheme. They belonged to a moribund organiza- 
 
 [61]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 tion called the Palette Club. With the younger men 
 who met at the Art Club or in each other's studios the 
 talk was nonsensical or practical and constructive, 
 rather than reminiscent. Their dreams became our 
 actualities. 
 
 For recognition outside their own circle did not come 
 at once. Chase was a great deal talked about, but the 
 critics so-called of that period dealt severely with 
 his work. Accustomed to photographic accuracy and 
 prettiness, they of course had no understanding of the 
 art of suggestion. Their eyes were filled with the dry 
 dust of the Victorian School, and could not see the new 
 beauty before their eyes. Doubtless it was because of 
 that long conflict with Philistinism that as long as he 
 lived Chase never expected any one but the artist to 
 understand art. He never entirely realized that even 
 the layman's standards have changed with the years, 
 and that many people who know nothing of the technical 
 side of painting have learned that Ruskin was a mis- 
 leading light. 
 
 If the kind of Bohemianism now characteristic of 
 certain art circles happily did not exist in those days of 
 the American Renaissance, a species of artistic indigence 
 prevailed that is unknown now. For although New York 
 is filled to overflowing with art students to-day, many 
 of them are the children of foreigners whose fortunes 
 
 [62]
 
 CHASE DRESSED IX VAX DYCK COSTUME FOR A MASQUERADE BALL, IX THE 
 EARLY EIGHTIES.
 
 ARTISTIC AWAKENING IN NEW YORK 
 
 have prospered in the New World, and who are able to 
 provide comfortably for their sons and daughters through 
 their student days and those of their novitiate. But 
 such was not the case in the day of the "real American" 
 artist. Many of them were gentlemen's sons, but from 
 whatever environment, their parents were usually people 
 of moderate means. The few men of humble foreign 
 parentage among them came from poor homes, for in 
 those days hand labor was not well paid as it is to-day 
 so that from whatever class, the majority of the painters 
 of that period had bitter struggles with real poverty. 
 With a superb disregard of practicality, however, they 
 lived on nothing a week, paying the landlord, the butcher, 
 and the tailor with pictures. Restaurants and boarding- 
 house walls were extensively decorated in exchange for 
 meals. There are tales surviving from those days of 
 shirt-fronts renovated with Chinese white, of coal- 
 boxes used as beds, and a general condition among many 
 of art's disciples nothing less than squalid. 
 
 Their improvidence may not have been greater than 
 that of the artist of any and all time; perhaps it was 
 only that it presented a greater contrast to the habits 
 and customs of that generation, but the irregularities 
 of artist life seem to have created an astonishment 
 in the breast of the well-regulated American of the early 
 eighties that they do not inspire to-day. An article 
 
 [63]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 that appeared in Scribner's Magazine at that period 
 comments with consternation upon the fact that the 
 proceeds of an artist's order were squandered in advance 
 on a banquet of rejoicing before the work for which the 
 money was paid was begun. 
 
 There were not many ways in those days for the poor 
 artist to eke out his income. One source of revenue to 
 the landscape-painters was known as shanghaiing. A 
 sort of continuous landscape was painted on a long strip 
 and cut off anywhere to make a picture. The impoverished 
 painter did these by the yard, and sold them for twelve 
 dollars a dozen. 
 
 Chase's life, however, was never conducted along 
 these lines. With nothing but his salary at The League 
 to be depended upon for a certain income, he took his 
 large studio, and there, surrounded by much beauty, 
 he started his artistic career in America in the grand 
 manner. This scheme of grace and dignity he main- 
 tained without concession to the last, for Chase would 
 not accept small quarters or poverty. If he was a spend- 
 thrift it was because he had so little sense of the limita- 
 tions and comparative uses of money; and lacking the 
 restraining consciousness that comes of practical realiza- 
 tion of values, he had to a great extent what he de- 
 manded of life until the end. 
 
 [64] 
 
 **
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 NEW FRIENDS AND A PERMANENT RELATIONSHIP 
 
 A DAY or two after his arrival in America, Chase, 
 armed with an informal introduction from Shir- 
 law, went to call on F. S. Church, a painter of decora- 
 tive panels in which nymph-like young women are fan- 
 tastically companioned with polar bears and rabbits. 
 Besides being a man of original gifts Church was an 
 amusing and delightful companion. The two men be- 
 came friends at once, and their association in those days 
 of gay impecuniosity was one colored with much enter- 
 taining nonsense. In addition to the pleasant com- 
 panionship it was a friendship with consequences, for 
 it was Church who introduced Chase to his wife, at 
 that time a very young girl, and Church was afterward 
 the godfather of his first child. 
 
 One of the professional enterprises in which the two 
 painters were associated was the organization of a series 
 of exhibitions at the Art League, primarily for the bene- 
 fit of the students. Even that simple move was initiatory, 
 as before the Society of American Artists came into 
 existence the yearly exhibits of the National Academy 
 and the Water-Color Society were practically the only 
 exhibitions of the year. 
 
 [65]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Simpler than the life of the present generation, one 
 wonders if the young artists of the eighties did not ex- 
 perience more real pleasure in their comparatively meagre 
 entertainments than is found in the more sophisticated 
 diversions of to-day. "For there were not," Church says 
 in recalling it, "so many things to do in those days. We 
 used to walk along the Bowery. Sometimes we went into 
 the dime museums, which were comparatively dignified^ 
 institutions then. Chase was the first to call my attention 
 to the fine old ironwork about the steps and entrances of 
 the old houses." 
 
 Frequently, of course, Chase made purchases. An 
 affectionate term of opprobrium which Church be- 
 stowed upon him as a result of his collecting proclivities 
 was "Tomato-Can Collector." When the men could 
 afford it they went to Tony Pastor's or to the theatre. 
 They had a number of convivial meeting-places, the 
 Morton House and a German place below Fifteenth 
 Street on Broadway, which was in fact a saloon, but a 
 resort having a different sort of patronage from the 
 present-day New York barroom. Church's studio was 
 at Thirteenth Street and Broadway only a few blocks 
 away; and when they were not dining at The Studio or 
 the basement restaurant referred to by Walter Palmer, 
 the two men usually took their evening meal together. 
 
 [66]
 
 NEW FRIENDS 
 
 It was at this Fifteenth Street place that Church re- 
 marked solemnly to Chase one night, "those two men 
 over there must be going to the devil fast, we see them 
 here every time we come," a remark Chase was fond of 
 quoting. 
 
 Church who for economical reasons wanted to break 
 himself of smoking, said to Chase one day: "I'll give 
 you twenty-five dollars the first time you catch me 
 smoking a cigar." On their way to dinner that night, 
 Church inquired: "How much will I have to pay you if 
 I smoke a cigarette?" "Fifty cents," Chase humanely 
 decided. 
 
 Church smoked his cigarette and gave Chase his half- 
 dollar. It was a cold, stormy night. After dinner as they 
 walked up Broadway to the theatre a small, wretched- 
 looking newsboy came up begging them to buy a paper. 
 The sympathetic Chase gave Church's half-dollar to the 
 little Italian, who promptly threw his entire bundle of 
 papers into the gutter and ran off. In such fashion as 
 this did the artistic temperament deal with things. 
 
 The young painters lived a happy, improvident life 
 together, borrowing and lending, apparently without 
 keeping very strict accounts, a genuine communism of 
 art and youth. There is a story of Chase's meeting 
 Bleecker Mitchell, a brother artist, on the street one 
 
 [67]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 day. Chase was in a hurry and walking quickly. Mitchell 
 tried to stop him. "Oh, Chase, Chase, wait a minute!" 
 "What is it?" Chase called back. "About that fifteen 
 dollars," Mitchell called after him. "All right, all right," 
 Chase replied on the wing, "I'll give it to you next week." 
 "No, no!" shrieked Mitchell across the widening space, 
 "/ owe it to you!" 
 
 Speaking of the value and inspiration of Chase's 
 criticism, Church recalled the occasion when Chase en- 
 tered his studio as he was about finishing his etching 
 called Silence. Coming up beside him, Chase gave a 
 quick glance at his work, then said: "Stop right there." 
 Church of course accepted the suggestion. "And it 
 was," he added with appreciation, "the best etching 
 I ever did." 
 
 Through an elderly Austrian baron, a friend of Mrs. 
 Chase's father, who did heraldic illuminating and had 
 a room in the same building, Church had met the Gerson 
 family. The next link in the chain was Church's intro- 
 duction of Chase to the Gerson household. 
 
 Mr. Gerson, himself a delightful and witty person 
 with much esprit, had three attractive daughters and 
 a musically talented son. To his home came many of 
 the young artists of the day, among them Walter Shir- 
 law, Frederick Dielman, F. S. Church, Napoleon Sarony, 
 
 [68]
 
 NEW FRIENDS 
 
 and James Kelly, and a little later Sarah Cowell Le- 
 Moyne and Robert Blum; also that singular and now 
 almost forgotten product of the Western mountains, 
 Joaquin Miller. Mr. Gerson was intelligently interested 
 in art in general, and subsequently his son-in-law's art 
 in particular. He was a native of Germany, although not 
 racially Teutonic, and his wife, an American on the 
 maternal side, had an interesting French strain in her 
 blood, for her grandfather, Doctor Paul Barbe Bremond, 
 was court physician to Napoleon I, and a cousin of the 
 Empress Josephine. At the time that Chase met the 
 Gersons, the eldest daughter, a young girl of seventeen 
 or eighteen, had been left head of the family by her 
 mother's death. 
 
 When the Gerson girls saw Chase's picture Ready for 
 the Ride, at the National Academy, they felt a great 
 desire to meet the talented young painter. Not having 
 seen the young women, however, Chase at first declined 
 the invitations of his brother artists to accompany them 
 to the Gerson home. Finally, one evening he went, and 
 there saw for the first time his future wife, a small, dark, 
 picturesque young girl who looked like a child. That 
 evening, before he left, he asked the eldest sister if Miss 
 Alice (known to her family and intimates as "Toady") 
 would pose for him. 
 
 [69]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 From the first, William Chase was a hero to young 
 Alice Gerson. A sculptor friend of those days said: "When 
 she was a little girl she sat on a stool beside him and held 
 his finger. When she was older she sat with her arm around 
 his dog." 
 
 Mrs. Chase denies the authenticity of the first pic- 
 ture, although she admits a sentiment concerning the 
 dog which Chase left with her during one of his summer 
 absences in Europe. 
 
 Both of the paintable younger girls had often posed 
 for Church, who has made such fanciful and charming 
 use of girls and children in his pictures. Indeed both 
 Alice and Virginia Gerson, and especially Alice, fre- 
 quently did this service for the painters who were their 
 friends, sometimes because the men were too "hard up" 
 to pay for a professional model, sometimes because the 
 artist felt that no one else could serve his purpose so well. 
 
 The painters spent many pleasant evenings at the 
 Gerson home. While Mr. Gerson and the baron played 
 cards in one room, the younger people sat together 
 amusing themselves in various spontaneous ways in 
 another. The men made silhouettes of each other and 
 of the girls, sometimes they drew fantastic pictures in 
 their cigar ashes on a sheet of paper. Sometimes they 
 went in groups to the theatre together. Often Church, 
 
 [70]
 
 NEW FRIENDS 
 
 Chase, and the "Gerson girls" went on passes that had 
 been presented to the popular Church. Church's letters 
 announcing the presentation or purchase of seats were 
 invariably illustrated. Upon one occasion, when Miss 
 Gerson was away in the summer Church wrote to her 
 telling of an excursion they had made to a neighboring 
 ice-cream saloon. This letter, written from the Gersons' 
 house, shows Alice and Virginia Gerson and the writer 
 adorned with wings, but Chase, since it was Church's 
 hypothesis that he was a hated rival, is represented 
 with hoofs and horns. 
 
 "DEAR Miss MINNIE: 
 
 "We have just returned from the ice-cream saloon. 
 Had seven dishes apiece. Chase ordered only one dish. 
 I got the others. Wasn't he mean? The sea-lion is well 
 and the young elephant is still posing. Toady is grinning. 
 The weather is very warm. We are thinking of getting 
 a big dish of cream over here, and all getting into it to 
 
 keep cool. Good-by. 
 
 "L. L. C. FREDDY." 
 
 The initials stand for "Long-Legged Crane," Church's 
 self-applied nickname. The allusion to the unequal divi- 
 sion of expense, needless to state, was made in that 
 
 [71]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 vein of mock abuse which characterized the remarks 
 Church and Chase made to and about each other. Both 
 men were generous to the verge of bankruptcy. 
 
 Church was very fond of young Alice Gerson who 
 often posed for him. In one of his letters to her his sup- 
 posed jealousy of Chase was couched in these terms: 
 "Anyway I know a dog that can lick thunder out of old 
 Chase's Fly." 
 
 The life that these young people led together had the 
 informal charm of the artist's life. All three of the girls 
 used to go to Chase's studio in Tenth Street, often taking 
 their needlework with them. Sometimes they posed, 
 sometimes the older sister or brother would play on a 
 little organ in the gallery. Frequently, their father went 
 with them. Chase soon grew to feel that he belonged 
 to the Gerson family. When he wanted to buy a black 
 silk dress for his mother, he went to Minnie Gerson as 
 to his sister, asking her if as a great favor she would 
 accompany him to the shop to help him make the pur- 
 chase. As an evidence of his thoughtful affection, Miss 
 Gerson remembers how he insisted upon purchasing 
 every smallest detail of the costume from the lining to 
 the buttons. 
 
 There were many informal gatherings at the Gersons' 
 house, and the painters often stayed to dinner or sup- 
 
 [72]
 
 NEW FRIENDS 
 
 per. Minnie Gerson remembers Chase's delight in a 
 bouquet she had on the table one evening, a combina- 
 tion of different little fine flowers, pink, white, blue, and 
 yellow, in a blue jar. Chase declared it was like the bou- 
 quets in Alfred Stevens's pictures and begged her always 
 to have one like it on the table. 
 
 When Chase's mother and sisters came on from the 
 West he invited the Gerson family to dine with them 
 the night of their arrival at the Casino restaurant in 
 Central Park, where they used often to dine outdoors 
 on summer evenings. 
 
 The sisters recall one occasion when strolling home 
 with Chase, Shirlaw, and Church along the path bor- 
 dering one of the park lakes after one of their al fresco 
 repasts, that Chase, burlesquing a state of despair over 
 some pretended neglect, ran to the edge of the lake as 
 if to throw himself in, and it being a combination of 
 dusk and nearly moonlight mistook a reflection for the 
 solid earth, and promptly and unexpectedly disappeared 
 beneath the surface of the lake, to the horror of 
 all. 
 
 Presently his head appeared, and he soon climbed 
 up beside his companions, dripping with mud and water 
 and speechless with laughter. Even at that early period 
 Chase was fastidious in his dress, and reckoned some- 
 
 173]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 thing of a dandy. He took his clothes seriously and was 
 always immaculate in appearance, so that the picture 
 he presented seemed funnier to his companions than if 
 one of the others had been the victim. Chase soon realized 
 that he was in a predicament, for Tenth Street was at 
 least fifty blocks away. At the Fifty-eighth Street station 
 of the elevated road the guard firmly refused the stream- 
 ing passenger. The conductor of the surface-car was 
 equally unsympathetic. It was early summer and the 
 evening was a trifle cool. At last the painter faced the 
 fact that he must walk home to Tenth Street, a treat 
 to gamins and idlers. His friends, who had courageously 
 supported him in his futile attempts to board cars, 
 abandoned him to his fate. Virginia Gerson recalls that 
 in spite of this disaster he reappeared at their house 
 not so very long after they had reached home them- 
 selves, looking as immaculate as if he had never known 
 contact with the oozy bottom of the lake. 
 
 When the Gersons moved to an old house in Hacken- 
 sack for a year or two, their friends faithfully followed 
 them. Sometimes the girls rowed down the river to meet 
 
 them, sometimes the men walked the two miles from 
 
 i 
 
 the station to the Gersons' home. The necessity to 
 take a leisurely suburban journey did not in any way 
 interrupt the pleasant companionship. 
 
 [74]
 
 NEW FRIENDS 
 
 All through the six years of association preceding his 
 marriage Chase's friendship and affection for the Ger- 
 sons grew, and to the last his wife's family were to him 
 as his own. 
 
 [75]
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 
 
 SOON after Chase's return to America the Tile Club 
 asked him to become a member. This famous club, 
 which lasted for about eight years, was originally limited 
 to twelve members, and was composed of some of the 
 most distinguished artists in America. Augustus Saint 
 Gaudens, Edwin Abbey, Elihu Vedder, Arthur Quart- 
 ley, Swain Gifford, Alden Weir, Hopkinson Smith, C. S. 
 Reinhart, Frank Millet, Frederick Dielman, Alfred 
 Parsons, John Twachtman, Stanford White and Napo- 
 leon Sarony were among its members. Edward Strahan 
 and W. M. Laffan of the New York Sun were the club 
 scribes. Later, some musicians were admitted. 
 
 The members all had amusing nicknames. Chase be- 
 cause of the large amount of work that he turned out 
 was called Briareus; Abbey, The Chestnut; Hopkinson 
 Smith, The Owl; Saint Gaudens, The Saint; Elihu Vedder, 
 The Pagan; Alden Weir, Cadmium; Frederick Dielman, 
 because he came from Baltimore, was nicknamed The 
 Terrapin. 
 
 The Tile Club was started in the studio of Walter 
 Paris, in Union Square. Its first meetings were held 
 there or in Quartley's studio. Later on it had picturesque 
 
 [76]
 
 A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 
 
 quarters in Tenth Street, the entrance to which, judging 
 from descriptions, must have been almost as circuitous 
 as that to Alice's rabbit-hole. 
 
 The club was organized before Chase's return from 
 Munich. It had its origin in the chance suggestion 
 of one of the men that the painters should indulge in 
 some form of the decorative craze that was then raging 
 in England and America. The meetings were held once 
 a week. A different member furnished the tiles and the 
 supper each night, and afterward became the owner 
 of the baked and decorated tiles. Pipes, beer, and cheese 
 usually constituted the evening's entertainment, although 
 such delicacies as sardines were also offered. 
 
 It was the custom of the Tile Club to take a pleasure 
 journey en masse each summer, and so it happened that 
 Chase spent part of his first summer in America with 
 his fellow club members on their famous canal-boat trip 
 up the Hudson River and through the Erie Canal. The 
 idea is said to have been Hopkinson Smith's. The finan- 
 cial condition of most of the club members was ex- 
 tremely precarious. Several of them admitted cheerfully 
 that they did not know how they would get through 
 the summer. Then why, suggested Hopkinson Smith, 
 should not the amiable Scribner, first aid to American 
 artists, finance their trip? The literary members would 
 
 [77]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 write the tale of the pilgrimage, the artists would illus- 
 trate it, and Scribner would pay a lump sum for the 
 whole which would be justly divided. 
 
 No sooner said than done. Scribner agreed to pay a 
 goodly price for the article, and the Tile Club set about 
 to plan its communistic enterprise with much enthu- 
 siasm. After a diligent search of the wharves and the 
 rejection of innumerable coal-sodden barges, and others 
 reminiscent of the occupation of mules, a suitable boat 
 was found and engaged for three weeks at the price of 
 seven dollars a week. Its name was the John C. Earl. 
 Chase's famous colored man Daniel, according to his 
 own version "Dannel," was to be their cook, and Chase's 
 Tenth Street Studio trappings were loaned without stint 
 to decorate the cabin of the boat, not to speak of the 
 mules. Napoleon Sarony also lent a number of rugs and 
 draperies. The partitions of the canal-boat were knocked 
 out so as to make one large salon. Cots converted into 
 Oriental divans by day furnished beds by night. There 
 were two pianos for purposes of music, professional or 
 amateur. 
 
 When they were about to sail, it was discovered that 
 a second server had been provided by Daniel, an amiable, 
 preposterously lazy negro to whom they all became 
 much attached, and whom they christened Deuteronomy. 
 
 [78] 
 
 -
 
 A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 
 
 Daniel won the admiration of all by his perfect African 
 breeding, exhibiting no surprise of any kind at his first 
 sight of the richly decorated canal-boat, as if canal- 
 boats were always tricked out with ancient brocades, 
 Oriental rugs, and pianos. Daniel had been a slave, and 
 confided to Mr. Dielman: "Yes, sah, I'se from Balti- 
 more, too. I'se one of de Ringolds," thus allying himself 
 with the aristocracy of Baltimore. 
 
 They sailed away toward evening, Knauth, Luneberg, 
 and Beard, the musical members, playing and singing, 
 banners flying, Japanese lanterns lighted, and Sarony's 
 gorgeous rug which covered the deck trailing in the 
 water. The "Gerson girls" stood on the old Tenth Street 
 pier, and waved them farewell. When their lights were 
 almost invisible the echo of their music came back over 
 the water. 
 
 Life on the canal-boat as it drifted up the Hudson 
 was simple in the extreme. Water for ablutions was 
 drawn up from the river in buckets. Some of the men 
 sketched while others watched and criticised. They 
 told stories, talked art, and discussed with sarcasm the 
 Hudson River School of painters, and "The Griffin" 
 (Swain Gifford) is recorded as saying that most of the 
 backwardness of American art was due to those worthy 
 Victorians, since they had chosen material which because 
 
 [79]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of its grandeur and sublimity was not suitable for pur- 
 poses of art: "Therefore," concluded The Griffin, " sim- 
 plicity has evaded us all." 
 
 As they progressed on their journey it was decided 
 that Daniel must have another assistant, as Deuteronomy 
 was practically useless. No one seems to have suggested 
 parting with the amiable drone, but at Troy one of the 
 men went ashore and returned with a slim and smiling 
 young man whom they at once christened Priam. Priam 
 not only proved satisfactory for the term of the trip, but 
 found art atmosphere so congenial that he remained in 
 employment in artistic circles for many years afterward, 
 serving as factotum and model. Chase made a sketch 
 of Priam which was used as one of the illustrations for 
 the magazine article. 
 
 When the party reached the Erie Canal, their mules, 
 decorated with Spanish bridles, their Japanese lanterns 
 and Oriental hangings created great excitement among 
 the populace. When the excited children upon the banks 
 became too vociferous, Laffan, by previous arrangement 
 with the willing Twachtman, ran out upon the deck 
 crying, "Run for your lives, The Twachtman is loose!" 
 whereat the invisible Twachtman uttered frightful groans, 
 and rattled an old piece of chain he had found in the 
 hold. 
 
 [80]
 
 "PRIAM," A TILE CLUB SERVITOR. 
 
 One of Chase's few illustrations, made for the story of the club's canal- 
 boat pilgrimage published in Scribner's Monthly, 1879.
 
 A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 
 
 One day, moored under a group of willow-trees, some 
 one called attention to the beautiful Japanesque design 
 made on their awning by the shadow of the willow leaves, 
 and straightway Chase and Sarony set to work to trace 
 it on the white cloth where it remained a testimony to 
 the decorative value of Nature. While Chase and Sarony 
 were painting, Dielman sketched them at work. In such 
 fashion the Tile Club passed its days. 
 
 Their meals were ample but simple, usually consist- 
 ing, with small additions, of a single dish. When it was 
 time for this piece de resistance to be started Hopkinson 
 Smith would call out, "Put 'em in, Dannel," and Daniel 
 would call back: "In dey go, sah!" 
 
 At another excursion, in 1880, when Chase was pres- 
 ent, the Tile Club took possession of an old wreck at 
 Sandy Hook. As the floor of the cabin was almost rotted 
 away it presented drawbacks even as a temporary resi- 
 dence. Hopkinson Smith, who prided himself upon his 
 great practicality, as soon as he arrived upon the scene, 
 briskly proceeded to take measurements, and ordered 
 several thousand feet of boards for repairs. The boards 
 arrived promptly, were paid for, and lay upon the shore. 
 They were never used. But they were long remembered, 
 for one night when the surf was high they began unob- 
 trusively to float away on the tide. Some one discovered 
 
 [81]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the fact and sounded the alarm. Wrathfully the men 
 arose and dressed, and spent an exceedingly damp and 
 active night in rescuing their property. 
 
 The Tile Club went on a number of pleasure excur- 
 sions to the Long Island coast for a day or two or longer. 
 It was at one of their dinners at the beginning of the 
 summer, a rather late and joyous occasion, that the sub- 
 ject of the sea-serpent was discussed, with the result 
 that each agreed to paint his conception of the monster 
 upon his first excursion to the seacoast. Chase, as usual, 
 was prompt to carry out the plan. The result, an interest- 
 ing bit of color (although as a conception of a sea-ser- 
 pent its mildness would inspire scorn in the school of 
 Stuck), he presented with irrelevant generosity to that 
 grand dame of the artistic world, Mrs. Candace Wheeler. 
 This canvas, signed "Briareus," still hangs upon the 
 walls of Mrs. Wheeler's summer-home on Long Island, 
 where Chase was a frequent guest. 
 
 At Christmas, 1882, the Tile Club artists illustrated 
 a sort of supplement to the Harper publications called 
 Harper's Christmas. Chase, who never permitted him- 
 self to be forced into illustration, made a charcoal draw- 
 ing of a burgomaster for reproduction in this publica- 
 tion, which is still in the possession of one of the Harper 
 family. In the strength and crispness of its technic it 
 
 [82]
 
 A TILE CLUB PILGRIMAGE 
 
 furnishes a striking contrast to the tame illustration of 
 that period. 
 
 C. S. Reinhart, Arthur Quartley, Edwin Abbey, 
 Frederick Dielman, and all the other artist members 
 contributed to this supplement. Although an artistic 
 success, it was unfortunately not one financially, so the 
 experiment was never repeated. 
 
 An interesting picture of the Tile Club and of the life 
 of the painters of that period is shown in Hopkinson 
 Smith's novel "Oliver Horn," in which the club is de- 
 scribed under the name of The Stone Mugs, and the ap- 
 pearance of Madame Blavatsky at one of their evenings 
 is amusingly told. The painter Munson is a fictional 
 presentment of Chase, although the episode in which 
 Munson is supposed to match foils with Richard Horn 
 (Hopkinson Smith's father) had no real foundation in 
 fact. 
 
 To the painters recently returned from Europe the 
 Tile Club furnished the artistic atmosphere to which 
 they had grown accustomed in Munich and Paris, and 
 of which at that time they felt the lack in America. It 
 served its purpose and passed, remaining to this day 
 to the men who were part of it a light-hearted memory 
 of happy comradeship. 
 
 [83]
 
 CHAPTER Vin 
 LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 
 
 FOR a time in the summer of 1880 Chase was at 
 Lake George, where he apparently enjoyed him- 
 self, not forgetting his friends the Gersons, however. 
 
 "I think of you all very often and wish that you were 
 all here to enjoy with me " [he wrote to young Alice 
 Gerson while there]. "The darlingest little boat here is 
 named Alice. I have a row in her every day and think 
 of you. The handsomest yacht on the lake is named 
 Minnie. By the way I dreamed of Minnie last night. 
 I dreamed that I took her to the theatre and lost her. 
 I was in an awful state I can tell you. ... I suppose 
 you are moved by this time, and are already fixed up. 
 
 Do you see as much of old as usual ? Mr. the 
 
 gentleman I am stopping with here has a very hand- 
 some daughter. We are having great larks together and 
 we often go out rowing. I have told her a great deal about 
 you. There is also a young lady visiting her who is most 
 charming. The only thing left to be wished for on my 
 part is that you were with me. Please don't forget your 
 Will (I mean myself). Be a good girl and I was going 
 to say keep off the bannister" [the railing of an upper 
 
 [ 84]
 
 LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 
 
 balcony upon which the young girl used to sitj, "but 
 I remember you are not living there any more. I would 
 be awfully pleased to hear from you. 
 
 "Yours most devotedly, 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 "P. S. Have lots to tell you when I get home. Give 
 my very kindest regards to your sisters. 
 
 "Ever yours, 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 "I sent a message by Church to you. Ask him for it 
 
 if he hasn't delivered it. 
 
 "AGAIN YOUR WILL." 
 
 It was in the fall of that year that Chase was elected 
 President of the Society of American Artists, a position 
 he held for one year. He continued to teach at The League 
 and in his own studio. 
 
 Rosina Emmett and Dora Wheeler were pupils in his 
 Tenth Street Studio. Soon afterward Chase took several 
 others. "And you could always tell when the dear man 
 had had our monthly cheque," said Mrs. Keith, "for 
 some new and beautiful object always appeared in the 
 studio immediately afterward." 
 
 He painted a number of fine portraits at that time, 
 
 [85]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 among them the excellent one of General Watson Webb 
 During that winter Chase and Robert Blum met and 
 became friends. Chase was a great advantage to the 
 talented young man, who was then comparatively un- 
 known in New York, while Chase was already one of 
 the prominent figures in the artistic world. 
 
 Chase's Saturday receptions had become quite famous. 
 Long before his day the Tenth Street Studios had been 
 thrown open to the public on Saturdays, but Chase 
 made the ceremony an event. Many of the younger 
 painters recall their first glimpse of that studio as the 
 entrance into a new world. 
 
 Chase entertained practically all the painters of the 
 period there, as well as an occasional writer and a few 
 professionally non-classifiable guests. Napoleon Sarony 
 was one of his friends of that time. A fashionable photog- 
 rapher and would-be artist, Sarony photographed all 
 the celebrities that came to New York in his little studio 
 on Union Square, and was himself a most picturesque 
 figure. According to William Henry Shelton, Sarony 
 "delighted to show himself on Broadway in a calfskin 
 waistcoat, hairy side out, an astrakan cap, and his 
 trousers tucked into cavalry-boots; accompanied by 
 his wife in a costume by Worth. . . . When Sarony was 
 flush he bought pictures and bric-a-brac furiously." 
 
 [86]
 
 LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 
 
 Upon which ground Chase must have found him con- 
 genial ! His place, Mr. Shelton remarks, "became a sort 
 of dumping-ground of dealers in unsalable idols, tattered 
 tapestries and indigent crocodiles." Sarony's rooms 
 were frequented by all the Tile Club men, among them 
 Chase in his famous hat, accompanied by his almost 
 equally famous Russian greyhound, which, if not the 
 first Russian greyhound to be seen in New York, was 
 at least the first one to become a marked character of 
 the boulevards. Indeed, in those days of his bachelor- 
 hood there seems always to have been a dog in Chase's 
 life, usually an English or Russian hound. If he did 
 not collect dogs at least his supply seems to have been 
 greater than his need, because he gave one to his friend 
 Robert Blum, and another to Carroll Beckwith. Walter 
 Palmer remembers an occasion when one of these de- 
 voted hounds was almost lost. 
 
 I quote the story as Mr. Palmer told it in a letter. 
 "Chase would board a horse-car, and the dog seeing him 
 get on it would follow the car until Chase alighted and 
 attracted his attention. But one day, alighting at Tenth 
 Street and Sixth Avenue, he forgot to call his dog and 
 looked down the street just as car and dog were going 
 around a distant corner. He bethought him of the just- 
 opened elevated railroad, and hurried to take a down- 
 
 [87]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 town train. Reaching the corner where the Sixth Avenue 
 horse-cars end their trip, he asked the starter if he had 
 seen anything of a greyhound following a car. 'Oh, yes/ 
 said the man, 'he came down behind the car and has 
 gone back with it.' Chase rushed back and caught an 
 elevated train up-town, and reached Tenth Street again 
 just in time to intercept the car and the dog." 
 
 Daniel was in possession of the studio. Negro-like, 
 he identified himself at once with his master's interests. 
 "We have finished a portrait to-day," he would remark 
 in answer to inquiries about the painter's activities. 
 Daniel took on the phrases of art with great facility, 
 transposing them with that indescribably expressive 
 twist of paraphrase characteristic of the African mind. 
 Mrs. Sherwood remembers how he referred to "still 
 life" as "still lights," and Mrs. Keith recalls the oc- 
 casion when she confided in despair to Daniel that she 
 had dropped paint on one of Mr. Chase's best rugs, and 
 how Daniel reassured her "Dat's all right, miss, I get 
 it all out with a little pneumonia!" 
 
 The old negro regarded himself as Chase's special 
 guardian, and reproved him in most proprietary fashion 
 when he failed to take care of himself. On a rainy day if 
 Chase forgot his overshoes Daniel would scold him with 
 his soft African familiarity as if he had brought him 
 
 [881
 
 LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 
 
 up. "How's dat now, Massa Chase? Yo' go out without 
 yore scandals. How many times Dannel tell yo' not to 
 do dat ? Ef yo' catch cold and die doan yo' hole Dannel 
 responsible." 
 
 Daniel took the greatest pleasure and pride in Chase's 
 Saturday receptions. One day he observed that the 
 painter had turned an interesting new study that he 
 had just finished face to the wall instead of putting it 
 on exhibition, and inquired solicitously: "Why, Massa 
 Chase, aren't yo' going to show dat negative?" 
 
 Mrs. Sherwood says that one day Daniel brought to 
 the studio a very dark and very unsavory-looking negro 
 that he had met in the street, and offered him to Chase 
 as a model. Afterward Mr. Chase said to him, "Daniel, 
 why did you suppose that I would like to paint that 
 man?" "Well, sah," said Daniel, "I pass him in de 
 street; I see he was a foreigner, an' I knew you like 
 paintin' foreigners, so I brung him in." It seemed that 
 the man was a sailor and had been born in Africa. 
 
 There were certain melancholy occasions when Daniel 
 by some mischance landed himself in jail. One of these 
 made a particular impression on Chase's memory be- 
 cause it was the occasion of some colored ball, and Daniel 
 had appeared in the guise of an eighteenth-century cour- 
 tier clad in white satin, most magnificent to behold, 
 
 [89]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 and had proudly exhibited himself to his master before 
 he left for the ball. But Daniel did not return the next 
 day or the next. The third day Chase was summoned 
 to the Jefferson Market Police Court to bail out his 
 servitor. There in a cell in painful contrast to his start- 
 ing forth, sat a crumpled, damaged Daniel still in white 
 satin, a sight which seemed to particularly impress the 
 sensitive eye of his master. In time, however, Chase 
 grew accustomed to these temporary absences. One day 
 he received a desperate appeal from the missing Daniel, 
 again temporarily deprived of his liberty, couched in 
 these words: "Dear Mr. Chase, You an' Jesus am de 
 only friends I got. For God's sake send me some chewin' 
 tobacco." Daniel remained as guardian of the studio 
 for several years, caring for his master's paint-brushes, 
 his dogs, the red macaw and the green macaw, the savage 
 white cockatoo, and all the other studio properties. 
 
 Chase, who delighted in all the little ways of his pets, 
 used to tell how one of the macaws would fall asleep 
 trying to perch with .one foot crossed on the other, after 
 which attempt he would nearly lose his balance, then 
 half awake rebuke himself: "Look out, look out." This 
 bird, who was quite a fluent conversationalist, taught the 
 other one to talk. He also used to play tricks on Daniel. 
 Chase says that one day when he was in the upper room 
 
 [90]
 
 LIFE IN THE TENTH STREET STUDIO 
 
 he was startled to hear himself calling Daniel, a short, 
 peremptory call that he recognized at once as his own. 
 Daniel came running in from the other studio. "Yes, 
 sah, yes, sah, here I is." But when he got in the room 
 from which the voice had come his master was not there; 
 as the negro stood looking about in bewilderment the 
 seemingly diabolic bird burst into cackles of laughter. 
 Chase saw Daniel go up to the cage, shaking his fist at 
 the parrot. "'Yo' mis'able no-count bird, some day I 
 wring yore neck !" 
 
 At last Chase was obliged to part with Daniel because 
 of the African's imperfect sense of property rights. A 
 friend of Chase's, a photographer, decided to take him 
 despite the warning of his former employer, but the 
 day came when he was very much embarrassed to learn 
 that one of his sitters had missed a wallet containing 
 quite a large sum of money. Daniel, who had taken the 
 visitor's coat in charge, was questioned, and stoutly 
 denied all knowledge of the matter. It was discovered, 
 however, that the pocketbook had disappeared through 
 Daniel's collusion with another negro to whom he had 
 dropped it out of the window. The manner in which 
 Daniel was led into self-betrayal always delighted Chase. 
 Taking his old servant in hand himself, he said gravely: 
 "Daniel, this gentleman's wallet contained one hundred 
 
 [91]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 and fifty dollars, and it must be found." Daniel's eyes 
 began to roll. 
 
 "Is dat so, sah? Is dat so! One hunred fifty dollahs? 
 You just wait till I get hold of dat niggah ! He give me 
 ten dollahs. He say he give me hah*, he tell me dere was 
 only twenty dollahs in dat purse !" 
 
 Daniel was succeeded by Theodore, another sym- 
 pathetic African somewhat less picturesque, but of 
 more methodical habits, who fell heir to the red fez and 
 remained with Chase until he gave up the Tenth Street 
 Studio. 
 
 [92]
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 EUROPE REVISITED: SPAIN AND VELASQUEZ 
 
 EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-ONE 
 was the year of Chase's first return trip to 
 Europe. Carroll Beckwith who had spent the summer 
 before in Spain, talked of the Velasquez in the Prado, 
 of the sights and colors of Spain, till Chase could bear 
 it no longer, and when June brought release from teach- 
 ing he took passage on the Belgenland with Beckwith, 
 Blum, Herbert Denman, A. A. Anderson, and a decora- 
 tor named Lawrence. 
 
 After a few days out, Mr. Beckwith's diary relates, 
 Chase, very much bored with the enforced inactivity, 
 proposed decorating the ladies' cabin. Beckwith, not 
 being quite as good a sailor as Chase, and evidently from 
 the record of his diary rather impressed with an at- 
 tractive young woman on board, was not at all enthu- 
 siastic about the suggestion. But the energetic Chase 
 fairly dragged his fellow painters into the project. The 
 captain, needless to state, was delighted at having his 
 ship decorated by modern masters. The ladies' cabin 
 became a showroom while the pictures were allowed 
 to remain, but not long afterward the panels were cut 
 
 [931
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 out and, it is said, were set up in the home of one of the 
 owners of the line. 
 
 Chase spent most of his time in Spain that summer, 
 but he stopped for a short time in Paris, and an event 
 of considerable importance to American art occurred 
 during his stay there. 
 
 One day as he was strolling along the Boulevard he 
 chanced to meet Alden Weir. Weir had gone over to 
 purchase pictures for a wealthy New Yorker without 
 any recompense save the collector's promise that the 
 pictures should afterward be presented or left to the 
 Metropolitan Museum. As soon as Chase heard his 
 friend's errand he exclaimed: "Come with me right away 
 to Durand-Ruel's. They have two wonderful Manets 
 there. You must have them." Weir went with Chase 
 at once, and that is how the Metropolitan Museum 
 came into possession of the Boy with tJie Sword and the 
 Girl with the Parrot. 
 
 Weir tells of going to Manet's studio not long after 
 that. Manet received him while he was painting from 
 a model. The American painter asked the price of two 
 landscapes in the studio and was told that they were 
 a thousand francs apiece, which price he instantly agreed 
 to. Manet left the room a minute and the model ex- 
 claimed: "Oh, Monsieur, why did you not wait? 7 could 
 
 [94]
 
 EUROPE REVISITED 
 
 have bought those pictures for you for two hundred 
 francs." An incident, Weir remarked, which showed 
 the valuation placed upon Manet's work by his coun- 
 trymen at that time. 
 
 It was during this trip to Paris that Chase met the 
 Belgian artist Alfred Stevens whose art he admired so 
 profoundly although that enthusiam seems to have 
 had no direct influence upon his own work. Stevens 
 gave the highest praise to Chase's beautiful portrait of 
 Duveneck in the Salon, but he made a comment that 
 proved to be a turning-point in Chase's art develop- 
 ment: "But why do you try to make your canvases look 
 as if they had been painted by the old masters ? " 
 
 From that hour, Chase says, he sought to express his 
 own individuality in his art. 
 
 In July of this year there is an interesting letter from 
 Blum in Venice to Chase in Spain. The late Gedney 
 Bunce, who spent so much of his time in Venice and 
 who died a few days after Chase, was there also. Blum 
 after speaking of his own inability to get to work refers 
 to his brother artist : "Bunce simply exists and leisurely 
 watches his opportunity to tell you how the Venetians 
 lie and cheat. . . . He has had a falling out with his 
 gondolier. . . . The other day somebody said that 
 Tilden had spoken of himself as discovering Venice. 
 
 [95]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Bunce leaned back in his chair and said: 'Oh, yes, he 
 may have discovered it, but I am the George Washington 
 of it.' " 
 From Madrid meantime Chase writes to Alice Ger- 
 
 s 
 
 son, but not of Madrid: 
 
 "I began to think that some of my friends at home 
 had forgotten me altogether. I am awfully sorry and 
 wish I knew what I could do to remedy the misfortune. 
 Perhaps my friends have found someone else who pleases 
 them better than I do and that is the reason why I do 
 not receive any letter from them. I have a great deal 
 that I might tell my friends about. But then I begin 
 to question if they would care to hear it. ... There is 
 just time for one letter to reach me if it is written imme- 
 diately. Recommend me to your charming sisters and 
 believe me to be one of your most ardent admirers, 
 
 WILL." 
 
 "Do please write and tell me everything that has 
 taken place since I left. " W." 
 
 Chase does not seem to have painted much upon this 
 trip, although his study of the Velasquez in the museum 
 and the closer contact with Spanish art possible in the 
 
 [96]
 
 EUROPE REVISITED 
 
 country had a very direct influence upon his painting, 
 as is evidenced in a number of his pictures of that period, 
 of which A Spanish Lady, exhibited at the Memorial 
 Exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum, is an example. 
 
 One of Chase's first experiences in Spain might be 
 called the duel of the dog. It has a piquant combina- 
 tion of farce and melodrama. 
 
 Although a peaceable person, Chase had in his nature 
 a great capacity for righteous indignation. When he 
 perceived a wrong he desired to see it righted. Yet his 
 psychological processes were such that the results of 
 his acts not infrequently presented a marked contrast 
 to his eminently praiseworthy intentions. 
 
 He had heard a great deal of the cruelty of the Span- 
 iard to animals, stories to which the painful sights of 
 maltreated horses and donkeys usual in Latin coun- 
 tries had given corroboration, and had become quite 
 wrought up on the subject. One of the tales that had 
 particularly inflamed him was a statement that the 
 Spaniards were in the habit of giving a small quantity 
 of poison to dogs, not sufficient to kill, in order to amuse 
 themselves with the sight of the animals' suffering. 
 Whether true or not, the story made a great impression 
 upon the artist's mind. One day as he was passing a 
 house in Madrid a dog frothing at the mouth and con- 
 
 [97]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 torted in apparent agony tumbled out of a doorway 
 accompanied by a pursuing crowd of men. The painter's 
 humane indignation being instantly aroused at this horrid 
 proof of the truth of the tale, he acted swiftly. Mercy 
 demanded that the animal be put out of its misery at 
 once. He raised his cane, and with strong and unerring 
 aim brought its head down upon the animal's skull, 
 promptly ending its supposed sufferings forever. But 
 the result was a mob, much tumult, and an angry and 
 threatening babel of voices in an unknown tongue. 
 
 Upon the sea of this picturesque but not reassuring 
 mob, Chase was borne along the narrow street until 
 they chanced upon a circus tent. At its door stood a 
 ticket-man who was able to act as interpreter, and then 
 it was revealed that the dog had been suffering merely 
 from a common fit, and however he may or may not 
 have been treated in life, he was now, it seemed, pas- 
 sionately mourned by his outraged master, whose grief 
 demanded that the murderer fight a duel with him on 
 the spot. .A sort of truce was patched up, and the painter 
 was allowed to go home; but that afternoon he received 
 an invitation to visit a certain cafe in the evening in 
 order to discuss the matter further. It became evident 
 that the idea of vengeance still possessed the mind of 
 the bereaved dog-owner. 
 
 [98] *
 
 EUROPE REVISITED 
 
 Now Chase was a crack shot. He accepted the invita- 
 tion to the cafe, and while they sat about in clouds of 
 smoke, to the accompaniment of guitars he amiably 
 amused his audience with exhibitions of his skill, such 
 as cutting a thread with a shot, shooting a tiny tack 
 suspended from a moving string, and splitting a card 
 placed edgewise in a crack in the wall. And as the enthu- 
 siasm of his audience waxed greater, from the tail of 
 his eye he saw his enemy shrivel against the wall. It 
 was clear that he had lost all desire for a contest of 
 arms with the painter. Chase heard no more of the duel 
 of the dog. But that was not the only occasion upon 
 which his humanity made him a marked character in 
 Spain. 
 
 Irving Wiles, who met the painter in Madrid in 1905, 
 remembers Chase's description of a donkey that he 
 made famous throughout Madrid that same summer. 
 Chase decided that he needed a donkey to carry his 
 painting materials and purchases, but when it was brought 
 for his inspection he was filled with consternation at 
 the sight of the wretchedly thin little animal. He or- 
 dered at once that a large measure of oats should be fed 
 to his donkey daily. "Oats to a donkey!" exclaimed 
 the donkey -herd in horror, and argued the matter, not 
 believing his ears. Chase insisted, and at last the don- 
 
 [99]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 key's keeper agreed, but evidently only to pacify the 
 erratic American. For the donkey remained thin, and 
 Chase noticing the fact, wrathfully accused the keeper 
 of starving his donkey. This time he made threats that 
 were convincing and the little beast became famous 
 as the first donkey in Spain to be fed with oats. He grew 
 fat and sleek. Tricked out with a decorated harness 
 highly polished and ornamented with tassels and bows, 
 he became one of the sights of Madrid. The inhabitants 
 stood still when he passed to look at the fat donkey in 
 the brass harness, the property of a mad American artist 
 who suffered from the delusion that donkeys should be 
 fed with oats. 
 
 Despite his sympathy for animals, which seemed so 
 eccentric to the Spanish mind, Chase developed a great 
 enthusiasm for the bull-fight. Indeed, perhaps through 
 his adoration of Velasquez, Spain was one of the coun- 
 tries that laid a spell upon his imagination which drew 
 him repeatedly back again. That trip in 1881 was the 
 first of many pilgrimages to be made there over a period 
 covering a quarter of a century. 
 
 Not only was the effect of Spain and the Prado upon 
 Chase's art noticeable the following winter, it seemed 
 also to give added inspiration to his teaching. At The 
 League, where his invigorating influence had already 
 
 [100]
 
 EUROPE REVISITED 
 
 begun to show results, his class that year did especially 
 strong work. Chase did not allow his students to putter 
 or relax. Instead of spending a week or more on one study 
 they were given an hour in which to paint a head; they 
 were told not to keep their studies, but to paint them 
 out and use the canvas for a fresh start commonplaces 
 of the art school now, these ideas, but Chase was the 
 revolutionist who first set them in motion. 
 
 "Take off your coats!" he exclaimed one day as he 
 entered the class where the men were placidly working. 
 "Roll up your sleeves and swear at your work !" 
 
 Another time, as he came into the portrait class to 
 criticise, he caught sight of a young woman from Bos- 
 ton, a pupil of William Hunt's who had a very good 
 opinion of her gifts and methods. She was standing be- 
 fore her canvas on which she had been working carefully 
 all week with her palette-knife in her hand. "That's 
 right, scrape it out," said Chase as if he had supposed 
 that to be her intention. 
 
 "But, Mr. Chase, I was going to keep it," she faltered. 
 
 "Keep it!" repeated Chase, with affected incredulity. 
 "Then at least take it away where the other students 
 can't see it and be influenced by it." 
 
 That was not the infinitely kind and tolerant Chase 
 of later years, but it was not the time for tolerance. It 
 
 [101]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 was necessary to break through the dead methods of the 
 reigning academic school with sharp and vigorous strokes, 
 and the Chase of that day did not hesitate to do it. Yet, 
 then as always, all that he had or could command was 
 at the service of art. Daniel travelled constantly from the 
 Tenth Street Studio to The League with loads of still- 
 life material draperies, Venetian glass, pieces of copper 
 and brass, and bric-a-brac. No matter how valuable the 
 things were they were lent without stint to students or 
 other painters. To the composition class at The League, 
 held by his friend Shirlaw, he also sent the treasures of 
 his studio in order that beautiful arrangements in still 
 life might be set before the students as examples. 
 
 Indeed, it would be difficult to make a complete record 
 of all that William Chase meant to American artists and 
 art students at that momentous period. 
 
 [ 102]
 
 CHAPTER X 
 SPAIN AND HOLLAND WITH BLUM 
 
 THE next summer Chase went back to Spain. De- 
 positing his dog Fly with Alice Gerson and his 
 macaws with Mrs. Candace Wheeler, he took passage 
 with Beckwith and Blum. The dog, despite recurrent 
 demands for a constitutional, proved a comparatively 
 easy charge, but the macaws were something of a care 
 to their temporary owner, as one had a trick of pecking 
 the ring from its ankle and flying to the top of the tallest 
 tree, from which at the peril of his life one of the men 
 on the place had to rescue it. 
 
 Arthur Quartley, Ferdinand Lungren and Frederick 
 Vinton were also of the party. They sailed on the Red 
 Star liner Pennland, for the Red Star Line encouraged 
 artists to make use of it by giving them special rates. 
 
 Clarence Beul, of the old Scribner's Monthly, went 
 with the painters to write the story of the voyage. This 
 time they decorated the captain's room, the painters 
 drawing lots for their portion. The centre panel went 
 to Chase. There he made a portrait of the captain, ar- 
 ranging the figure so that a push-button in the panel 
 seemed to be the end of his marine glass. 
 
 The painters also amused themselves making kites 
 
 [103]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of canvas which they sent off from the deck, using 
 up all the spare rope on the ship. Blum entertained 
 himself by making caricatures of every one, himself 
 included, an art in which he was embarrassingly ex- 
 pert. 
 
 Indeed, Blum's impulse to caricature was irresistible. 
 Often in Paris at a cafe Chase would discover his friend 
 at work at a neighboring table. One day while Blum 
 was thus enjoying himself at Chase's expense, Chase 
 rose and went out into the street. A minute afterward 
 Blum heard his voice and, looking up, saw Chase in com- 
 pany with a man, one of the most exaggerated types of 
 the Boulevard. Ceremoniously he introduced this individ- 
 ual to Blum and invited him to seat himself at Blum's 
 table. "This gentleman wishes to make a sketch of 
 you," he said and withdrew, leaving Blum to find his 
 way out of the situation. 
 
 After leaving Paris, Chase, Vinton and Blum went 
 on to Spain together. Chase having persuaded Blum to 
 go to Madrid, was unable to get him out of it, for Blum 
 declared that nothing that Spain could offer could pos- 
 sibly be as wonderful as Madrid. Finally, Chase induced 
 his friend to go to Toledo just for the day. He received 
 a telegram from Blum soon after his arrival, requesting 
 to have his clothes and paints sent on to Toledo at once, 
 
 [ 104]
 
 SPAIN AND HOLLAND WITH BLUM 
 
 as nothing would induce him to leave that wonderful 
 place. 
 
 A few days later Blum wrote from Toledo to Chase 
 in Madrid: 
 
 "DEAR CHASE, 
 
 "The above picture" [an artist surrounded by in- 
 terested children] "can perhaps express better than 
 pages the state of mental serenity enjoyed in this old 
 place. I think I will include Vinton in the above state- 
 ment (perhaps more so). We are nicely fixed in a house 
 with a patio, and Vinton for once was pleased for two 
 consecutive minutes, exclaiming: 'Ah, now, that's the 
 sort of thing I like ! ' He keeps on making dire and sun- 
 dry threats to speak Spanish to the natives, hoping and 
 wishing with blood-curdling ferocity to have the whole 
 Spanish nation by the throat so as to kill it once for all. 
 He has an extreme love and fondness for the beggars, of 
 which he is full to his eyes when he passes them. 
 
 "... They have about seven cats and two or three 
 birds including one of those Spanish quails, to the de- 
 light of Vinton. I suppose it would be considered a very 
 good singer for it keeps on long after dark. Late last 
 night I heard Vinton, in a dream I suppose, mutter 
 something about preferring quail on toast. 
 
 [105]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "You ought to come down. How did you enjoy yes- 
 terday's bullfight? Let me hear from you soon. 
 
 "Yours sincerely, 
 
 "ROBERT BLUM." 
 "I suppose Vinton sends his regards." 
 
 Blum remained in Spain longer than Chase did. When 
 he finally returned to Madrid, Chase had gone on to 
 France and Holland. Blum wrote to his friend directly 
 after his arrival: 
 
 "DEAR CHASE: 
 
 "Here I am seated in Vinton's room, time Monday 
 7:30 A. M. I left Toledo yesterday. It really felt like 
 coming home to get here once more. I expected every 
 now and then to have you pop out of some dusky corner, 
 in fact so strong ran my imaginations on this point that 
 getting up this morning and hearing someone in our old 
 room contentedly yawning, I said to myself, 'I'll just 
 give him a rouser.' It was some time before I could re- 
 sist the terrible temptation and believe that things were 
 not as they once were. I have had an awfully good time 
 of course. I speak Spanish now like a native. I will only 
 state as a proof of this assertion that whenever I open 
 my mouth to speak the natives flock to gather in their 
 
 [106]
 
 SPAIN AND HOLLAND WITH BLUM 
 
 stock of knowledge and get the correct pronunciation. 
 . . . Just looking up from writing I observed a broken 
 pane in the window. Did Vinton have to pay for it? 
 How did you enjoy your visit to Boldini ? Much, I war- 
 rant. I look forward with a good deal of pleasure to 
 joining you soon. With heartiest wishes for your en- 
 joyment of Holland, believe me, 
 
 "Your sincere friend, 
 
 "ROBERT BLUM." 
 
 Chase collected a vast amount of bric-a-brac, stuffs, 
 curios and pictures in Spain, only a small portion 
 of which he took back with him on that trip, al- 
 though later he got together a good deal of it and had 
 it sent to America. Blum, who was too much influenced 
 by Japanese art to care for profusion in decoration, used 
 to say, "Some day you will come to seeing it that way, 
 too, and give up bric-a-brac," but Chase never did. 
 
 That winter a new organization called the Society of 
 American Painters in Pastel, of which Robert Blum 
 was the talented but unpractical president, carried on 
 an interesting if irregular existence. It had at least three 
 exhibitions, not held at any stated time, in which some 
 distinctive work was shown. The members were Blum, 
 Chase, Wiles, Blashfield, Beckwith, La Farge, Twacht- 
 
 [107]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 man, Weir, Walter Palmer, H. B. and F. C. Jones. Out- 
 side painters were sometimes invited to send pictures 
 to these exhibitions. The last one, which was held in 
 1889, attracted a great deal of attention among critics 
 and artists. 
 
 In 1883 Chase went to Europe in company with 
 Frederick Freer of Boston, again on the Penrdand. They 
 met Siddons Mowbray on board. Mowbray says that 
 Chase insisted upon a repetition of the decorative feat. 
 This time it was the smoking-room that was honored. 
 Chase drew a panel containing a barometer, a difficulty 
 he got around by painting a clown lying on his back 
 juggling with the barometer with his feet. In another 
 panel he painted a Spaniard in a large hat. 
 
 Either on this trip or the one taken the following 
 year, Chase again visited Madrid, and in 1884 he spent 
 quite a long time in Holland with Blum at Zandvoort, 
 where Blum took a little house. It was in the yard of 
 this house that the picture for which Blum posed called 
 variously The Tiff, Tlie Outdoor Breakfast, and Sunlight 
 and Shadow was painted. Under this last name it was 
 exhibited at the exhibition preceding the sale of Chase's 
 pictures in May, 1917. 
 
 When Chase had a class in Haarlem in 1903 he went 
 to Zandvoort to see the people from whom Blum had 
 
 [108]
 
 .2 
 
 Q 
 
 23 
 
 33 S 
 M 
 
 3
 
 SPAIN AND HOLLAND WITH BLUM 
 
 rented his little house. And again in 1912 when he had 
 his class at Bruges he looked them up. A pupil who 
 went with him that time describes how he hunted through 
 the little streets by the canal until he found the familiar 
 green door. The minute he entered he was recognized 
 by the family. The little girl that he and Blum had 
 painted was a married woman with well-grown children, 
 but she remembered him. The old grandmother, then 
 eighty years old, gave a cry of joy at the sight of him 
 and throwing her arms around his neck, kissed him. 
 Chase was touched to the heart at finding himself thus 
 held in remembrance by these simple people. 
 
 During the summer of 1884 Chase painted a number 
 of canvases with the figure in the open. They are on 
 the whole heavier in color than his later outdoor paint- 
 ing and lack the simplification and distinction in ar- 
 rangement that he afterward achieved. They are per- 
 haps more interesting as examples of a stage in his 
 development than in themselves as pictures. 
 
 Before returning to America Chase purchased the 
 beautiful white Russian hound Katti which he used in 
 several pictures, notably the pastel of one of his sisters 
 shown in the sale exhibition in May, 1917. 
 
 The dog, a fastidious and aristocratic person, spent 
 the following summer with Chase's parents, where he 
 
 [109]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 was the most considered member of the family. They 
 found him rather a trying guest as he refused to eat 
 anything but beefsteak, and they were in constant fear 
 of losing him. He survived, however, to be painted by 
 Chase and caricatured by Church and Blum for several 
 summers. 
 
 [ 110
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FIVE 
 was the year of Chase's memorable meeting with 
 Whistler. He had planned a trip to Holland and Spain 
 after a brief stop in London, but his presentation of 
 a letter of introduction to Whistler considerably 
 altered the course of his plans. Chase's recollections 
 of that meeting, recorded by a writer for The Century 
 and published in that magazine in June, 1910, run as 
 follows : 
 
 "A friend of Whistler's gave me a letter, a * strong- 
 pun ' letter, and armed with this I hastened to Whis- 
 tler's studio in King Street, determined not to beard the 
 lion in his den, but at least to salute him. 
 
 "I rapped and waited. Most callers waited at Whis- 
 tler's door in those days, and few were admitted. 
 
 "Suddenly the door was opened, guardedly, however, 
 and a dapper little man appeared on the threshold and 
 eyed me keenly. 
 
 "'You're Chase,' said he quickly, 'are you not?' 
 
 "My carefully prepared words took sudden flight, 
 and left me standing in utter confusion. 'Yes,' I said 
 guiltily. 'How did you know?' 
 
 [mi
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 '"Oh, the boys have told me about you. Come in.' 
 He tossed the proffered letter, unopened upon a chair, 
 linked his arm affectionately within mine, and led the 
 way to his studio. Our camaraderie began at once. For 
 some reason he dubbed me * colonel/ and in a moment 
 we were chatting like old friends." 
 
 In a letter to Alice Gerson, written a few days after- 
 ward, Chase refers to this meeting: 
 
 "I'll most likely remain some days longer than I ex- 
 pected. Whistler has begun a full length portrait of me, 
 and I will stay to enable him to finish it. He's the most 
 amusing fellow I have ever met. London is in the height 
 of the season now and everything is gay and lovely. . . 
 My friend Mr. Dodd is still with me" (Mr. Samuel Dodd 
 of St. Louis, one of the men who had assisted in sending 
 Chase to Munich to study), "and I find him the same jolly 
 old companion I found him in the beginning. I'll enclose a 
 tin-type we had taken the other night by electric light. 
 After I get through here I will take a boat direct for Hol- 
 land. Mr. Whistler talks of going with me. I hope he will." 
 
 But as we read farther in the article describing those 
 days, we note a certain modification of Chase's en- 
 thusiasm : 
 
 "Few hosts were ever as charming as Whistler could 
 be; few men were as fascinating to know for a brief
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 time. For a day I was literally overwhelmed with his 
 attentions; for a week and more he was constantly a 
 most agreeable, thoughtful, delightful companion. 
 
 "It had been my intention to hasten on to Madrid; 
 but he would have none of it. * Don't hurry,' he said 
 calmly and with that sublime egotism he often ex- 
 pressed: 'there are many of my paintings here which 
 you ought to see.' 
 
 "He had an exhibition in Bond Street at the time, 
 and we spent some days there together, viewing his 
 wonderful nocturnes. Occasionally he would speak of 
 some painting of his hung in a private home. 'You go 
 and see it,' he urged; 'I can't.' He could not, I found. 
 His biting tongue, his constant quarreling, had made 
 him persona non grata in many London homes." 
 
 "At the end of a fortnight he was quarreling with me. 
 It was impossible, I believe, for any man to live long in 
 harmony with him. After a brief discussion one day, 
 he chose to make it brief, he said flatly, 'My dear 
 Colonel, I'm not arguing with you; I'm telling you!' 
 It was one of his favorite phrases. This was simply in- 
 dicative of his general attitude: it was Whistler or noth- 
 ing in all things great and small. 
 
 "I felt Madrid calling me again and determined to 
 be off; but he, noting my preparations, was instantly 
 
 [H3]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT 
 
 the charming, affectionate host. 'Don't go,' he urged. 
 'Stay, and we'll paint portraits of each other.' As usual, 
 Whistler had his way." 
 
 Chase writes again a month later to Alice Gerson 
 and a decided change in his view-point is perceptible: 
 
 "I really begin to feel that I never will get away from 
 here. I'm getting on well with my portrait of Whistler 
 which promises to be the best thing I've done. He is 
 most finished with my portrait. I will bring both por- 
 traits home with me. Mr. Whistler goes to Holland with 
 me next week. Great goodness, just think of my getting 
 to Holland so late. I have only about three weeks left 
 me to work in. I have not had a letter from you in two 
 weeks. What is the matter? . . Mr. Dodd left me last 
 night and I feel quite lonesome without him." 
 
 Chase's comments on his hotel strike oddly upon the 
 ear of the traveller of to-day: 
 
 "The Metropole is the finest hotel in London (was 
 finished this Spring). I know of nothing so fine at home. 
 All the great swells come here, a great many Americans 
 among them. Last night I recognized DeWitt Talmage 
 (Brooklyn's famous preacher) sitting with some people 
 in one of the grand parlors. I dine every evening in full 
 dress as one is expected to do, have almost worn my 
 suit out. I have a great deal to tell you about friend 
 
 [114]
 
 from a photograph copyright by Curtii & Cameron 
 
 CHASE'S PORTRAIT OF WHISTLER, CHARACTERIZED BY THE 
 SUBJECT AS "A MONSTROUS LAMPOON."
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 Whistler when I get home. Things " (he adds darkly) 
 "that I think are better said than written. He con- 
 tinues to be a constant source of amusement. . . . You 
 said in your last letter that Minnie and Jennie thought 
 of going to the city for a while. Did they go? Please 
 give them my love. I hope I shall hear from you soon. 
 
 "Yours, "WiLL." 
 
 Chase's account of the painting of the portraits con- 
 tinues amusingly: 
 
 "He had his way with respect to the portraits too, 
 I discovered. It was arranged that whichever was specially 
 in the mood was to paint while the other posed. Whistler, 
 I speedily found, was always 'specially in the mood/ 
 and as a consequence I began posing at once and con- 
 tinued to pose. He proved to be a veritable tyrant, paint- 
 ing every day on into the twilight, while my limbs ached 
 with weariness and my head swam dizzily. 'Don't move ! 
 Don't move!' he would scream whenever I started to 
 rest a twitching muscle, or, 'Not yet! Not yet!' when 
 my protests became indignant. 
 
 "At length I resorted to subterfuges. He rarely re- 
 membered his dinner engagements; so I took pains to 
 keep the dates in mind, and when it was time to stop, 
 to remind him of them. 
 
 [115]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "'What?' he would invariably reply. 'Interrupt doing 
 a beautiful thing like this for a vulgar dinner!" 
 
 While Chase was in London, Blum, Ulrich, and Du- 
 veneck were in Venice. Blum writes to Chase from there 
 commenting upon his meeting with Whistler, not for- 
 getting to include one of his favorite jokes, the assump- 
 tion that the entirely Anglo-Saxon Chase was a He- 
 brew, and that his particularly regular nose was Hebraic 
 in contour. The fact that Blum himself was a Hebrew 
 adds an odd turn to his jest. 
 
 "I was tickled to hear that you met Whistler in such 
 a splendid fashion and more so at your luck in having 
 your 'picter tuk.' By the way tell him to SPARE THE 
 NOSE. I hope you will find a good summer's work await- 
 ing you in Zandvoort and be sure to act kindly by the 
 natives. DON'T GET MAD. I understand that this sum- 
 mer JEWS will not be allowed on the beach. 
 
 "P. S. I shall stay all summer and most likely all 
 through the winter. Ulrich has commenced a stunning 
 thing of the glass blowers. He sends regards. 
 
 "Yours, "Bos." 
 
 "Write soon. 
 "Happy thought 
 
 write sooner. Rico is in town. Lives 
 
 next door to us." 
 [116]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 Chase, however wrathful at the moment, never really 
 lost his sense of humor where Whistler was concerned. 
 His reminiscences of that summer continue with enter- 
 taining anecdote and occasional analysis: 
 
 "At one home he arrived at a dinner party at least 
 two hours late. * How extraordinary ! ' he exclaimed, glar- 
 ing fiercely at the gaping guests and the hostess. 'Really, 
 I should think you could have waited a bit. Why, you're 
 just like a lot of pigs with your eating.' 
 
 "When the portrait was finished he stood off and 
 admired his work. * Beautiful !' he exclaimed. * Beautiful !' 
 I was in no mood at the time for the retort courteous. 
 'At least, Whistler,' said I, 'there's nothing mean or 
 modest about you.' 
 
 "He grinned. 'Nothing mean and modest,' he cor- 
 rected. 'I like that better. Nothing mean and modest. 
 What a splendid epitaph that would make for me. Stop 
 a moment; I must put that down,' and he reached hastily 
 for his note-book. 
 
 "He was forever jotting down his sayings. No more 
 faithful Boswell of himself ever lived. What prompted 
 him? Was it his abnormal conceit, or only the deter- 
 mination that at least when he passed away he should 
 be understood and appreciated? Undoubtedly both. His 
 was a bitter struggle, remember. The critics were con- 
 
 [117]
 
 stantly scorning him, and a good measure of the harsh 
 judgment and galling neglect he suffered came from 
 his own countrymen. 
 
 "As for his conceit, it was self-evident. At times he 
 was most childish about it. 'What a lot you'll have to 
 tell about me, Colonel, when you go back!' he said one 
 day. 
 
 "'No,' I replied; 'for you've done nothing, said noth- 
 ing, new. You're the greatest disappointment of my life.' 
 
 "How terrible you are!' he exclaimed. 'You are 
 watching me!' 
 
 "It was good to get even with him in repartee. It was 
 rarely possible; he was as quick as a flash with his wit, 
 and stronger than others sometimes in a brutal and un- 
 fair way. It was his delight to pick up an innocent re- 
 mark and turn it back upon the speaker, or else twist 
 it about so as to make his adversary appear ridiculous. 
 This he did with his severest critic, the art editor of the 
 London Times, taking from his articles a single sentence 
 and, by isolating it, making it seem nonsensical in every 
 way. 
 
 "The studio was frequented much by a literary light 
 of those days who, it was generally known, fed upon 
 Whistler's epigrams, and retailed them as his own. Ev- 
 erybody knows the painter's famous repartee at the ex- 
 
 [118]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 pense of this man. 'Oh, Whistler,' he sighed one day, 
 after a particularly brilliant sally from the latter, 'why 
 didn't I say that?' 
 
 "Never mind,' said Whistler, stingingly; 'you will.' 
 
 "There was a steady stream of creditors at the King 
 Street studio in those days. Whistler made no effort to 
 conceal the fact that he was deeply in debt. One day 
 as we were busily and silently working there came a 
 loud, businesslike rap at the door. Whistler listened at- 
 tentively as one might to a key of music. 
 
 "'Psst!' said he, 'that's one and ten.' 
 
 "Within half an hour there was another rap, not 
 quite so loud. 
 
 '"Two and six,' said Whistler. 'Psst!' 
 r 'What on earth do you mean?' I asked after a time. 
 
 "'One pound, ten shillings; two pounds, six shillings. 
 Vulgar tradesmen with their bills, Colonel. They want 
 payment. Ah, well ! ' he sighed with an exaggerated air 
 of sadness and returned to his canvas. 
 
 "Then came another knock, a most gentle, insinuat- 
 ing rap. 
 
 "Dear me,' said Whistler, 'that must be all of twenty ! 
 Poor fellow, I really must do something for him ! So sorry 
 I'm not in.' 
 
 "I could not take the situation so placidly, and seized
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 eagerly the first opportunity of financial aid that pre- 
 sented itself. A rich American, sojourning in London, 
 asked me what he should purchase and take back with 
 him from the metropolis in the way of art. 
 
 "'By all means get a set of Whistler's etchings. Un- 
 questionably he will make for you a selection. I'll speak 
 to him,' I told him, and hurried back with the good 
 news. 
 
 "Whistler was delighted, and for a day worked busily, 
 overhauling and sorting his proofs. The selection was 
 a splendid one, and called for a substantial payment. 
 It was arranged that Whistler should meet the pur- 
 chaser at a bank in Queen Street the following morning 
 and receive his check. 
 
 "Most men, under the circumstances would have 
 thought of little else; but by the next morning Whistler 
 had wholly forgotten his engagement. He had begun a 
 new canvas, and was completely absorbed in it. For a 
 while I expostulated in vain. 
 
 "'Come, Whistler,' I said finally, 'you have been 
 away from America so long that you don't appreciate 
 the value of time to the traveler, particularly the Amer- 
 ican traveler. You must not keep the man waiting.' 
 
 "'Very well,' said he, laying down his brushes with 
 a sigh. 'Now we'll go.' 

 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 "'Why we?' I replied. 'I don't want to go/ I pro- 
 tested firmly. To tell the truth, I was looking forward 
 with a great deal of comfort to a morning all to myself. 
 
 "Oh, but you must,' he said calmly, bringing my coat 
 and hat; and presently we stood in front of the house 
 signaling a cab. 
 
 "One came up readily enough, but, after one scru- 
 tinizing look upon the * cabby's' part, drove swiftly by; 
 another went through the same strange proceeding. I 
 looked questioningly at Whistler this odd circum- 
 stance had happened before when we were together 
 but Whistler was calmly signaling. At length a cabby 
 took us in. 
 
 "Whistler always carried as a walking-stick a long, 
 slender wand, a sort of a mahlstick, nearly three quarters 
 his own height. We were no sooner seated than he began 
 poking his stick at the horse's hind-quarters. The animal 
 reared, plunged wildly, and started down the street at 
 a breakneck gallop, while the astonished cabby swore 
 freely and tugged desperately at the reins. Whistler 
 looked calmly ahead, and kept poking. 
 
 "Butcher-boys and grocer-boys made wild leaps for 
 safety; outraged cabbies whipped their horses out of 
 the way just in time, burly draymen bawled curses after 
 us, and still we went merrily on. Little wonder, thought 
 
 [121]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 I, in the midst of my amazement and resentment, that 
 Whistler never gets the same cab twice. 
 
 "Suddenly he began waving his cane and screaming 
 ' Whoa ! ' He took the astonished cabby severely to task 
 for driving so fast upon the public highway, and ordered 
 him back to a corner we had just passed. 
 
 "Here a greengrocer's shop, with its orderly and 
 colorful array of fruits and vegetables, had caught Whist- 
 ler's eye as we whirled by. He surveyed it critically now 
 from two different positions, the cabby meekly obeying 
 his orders, under the belief, I presume, that it was policy 
 to humor an insane person. 
 
 "Isn't it beautiful!' exclaimed Whistler. He pointed 
 his long cane at one corner. *I believe I'll have that 
 crate of oranges moved over there against that back- 
 ground of green. Yes, that's better,' he added con- 
 tentedly. 
 
 "We drove on to the bank, where we found the Amer- 
 ican pacing up and down in no pleasant frame of mind; 
 but Whistler soon had him pacified, and we left him 
 waving and smiling adieus at us. 
 
 "The incident at the greengrocer's shop reads like 
 an arrant affectation. It was not, however. Whistler, as 
 usual, was merely most natural. The following morning 
 he posted his easel at the corner and painted the shop. 
 
 [
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 "Whistler's unconventionality was consistently main- 
 tained. It was part of his pose, of course. He knew that 
 it puzzled people and made him talked about. Once at 
 a dinner-party at which I was present he appeared with- 
 out a tie. As soon as I noticed the omission I hurried up 
 to him. 'Oh, Whistler/ I exclaimed in a warning under- 
 tone, 'you've forgotten something your tie, man, your 
 tie!' 
 
 "Stuff and nonsense!' he retorted. 'Would you 
 spoil fine linen these lines,' he pointed to his collar 
 and shirt-front, 'this harmony, with a flimsy bit of 
 lawn ? ' 
 
 "It was his custom when drowsy to go deliberately 
 to sleep, no matter where or what the circumstances 
 might be. At one dinner-party his gentle snore suddenly 
 aroused his neighbor, who nudged him violently with 
 his elbow. 'I say, Whistler,' he protested excitedly, "'you 
 must not sleep here ! ' 
 
 "Leave me alone!' snapped Whistler. Tve said all 
 I wanted to. I've no interest at all in what you and 
 your friends have to say.' 
 
 "One evening he was my guest at dinner at a hotel; 
 Edwin A. Abbey was also there. Right after dinner 
 Whistler went calmly to sleep ; on the way to the theatre 
 he enjoyed another nap in the cab, and he slumbered 
 
 [ 123]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 peacefully through the greater part of the play. The 
 next morning he blandly asked me: 'What did Abbey 
 have to say last night? Anything worth while?' 
 
 ''There were two distinct sides to Whistler, each one 
 of which he made famous. He succeeded as few ever 
 have in creating two distinct and striking personali- 
 ties, almost as unlike as the storied Dr. Jekyll and Mr. 
 Hyde. One was Whistler in public the fop, the cynic, 
 the brilliant, flippant, vain, and careless idler; the other 
 was Whistler of the studio the earnest, tireless, sombre 
 worker, a very slave to his art, a bitter foe to all pre- 
 tense and sham, an embodiment of simplicity almost 
 to the point of diffidence, an incarnation of earnestness 
 and sincerity of purpose. 
 
 "The Whistler of Cheyne Walk was a dainty, sprightly 
 little man, immaculate in spotless linen and perfect- 
 fitting broadcloth. He wore yellow gloves and carried 
 his wand poised lightly in his hand. He seemed inor- 
 dinately proud of his small feet and slender waist; his 
 slight imperial and black mustache were carefully waxed ; 
 his monocle was indispensable. 
 
 "For all who crossed his path he was ready with 
 cutting speech. That apparently was his business in 
 life to amuse himself at the expense of others; and in 
 this form of entertainment he spared no one's feelings 
 
 [124]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 and stopped at no extremes. He took no one and nothing 
 seriously; he was sublimely egotistical, and seemed to 
 delight in parading his conceit. He was trivial, careless, 
 brilliantly and smilingly disagreeable. 
 
 "Now view Whistler behind the scenes. He had pre- 
 pared his outward blandishments with the skill and 
 patience of an accomplished actor. For hours he had 
 stood before a mirror, with curling-irons in hand, train- 
 ing carefully his hair, in particular that famous white 
 lock, fussing and primping like a woman. He was putting 
 on his mask. A most clever mask it was, most cleverly 
 sustained. Very few who knew him only in public ever 
 saw behind it, and then they saw only the man's attitude, 
 which said: 'You've never taken me seriously; why 
 should I be serious with you? You have never spared 
 my feelings; why should I spare yours? You are cease- 
 lessly sending your darts of scorn and criticism at me; 
 now, I am returning them.' And so he did in full 
 measure. 
 
 "This was merely Whistler at play. The real, genuine 
 Whistler had been at work since early morning, work- 
 ing like a fiend and, in truth, looking like a fiend as 
 he worked. The monocle of the night before had been 
 laid aside for an unsightly pair of iron spectacles, so 
 heavy that they were clumsily wrapped with cloth where 
 
 [125]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 they rested on his nose. His hair was uncombed; he was 
 carelessly dressed. 
 
 "Some student admirers from Venice called at the 
 studio one day and found the real Whistler at work. 
 They had seen him previously on the piazza, carefully 
 groomed for the occasion. Now they stood speechless 
 with surprise. At length their spokesman exclaimed 
 artlessly, 'Why, Mr. Whistler, whatever has happened 
 to you ! ' 
 
 "What do you mean?' he demanded. 
 'You you seem so different,' said the young man. 
 
 "Oh/ said Whistler, 'I leave all gimcracks outside 
 the door.' 
 
 "Among those who knew him well, Whistler made 
 no pretense at concealing the fact that his public life 
 was a deliberate pose. At home he doffed his mask com- 
 pletely. Why, then, the question naturally arises, should 
 he bring home with him his quarrelsome spirit? Why 
 did he choose also to war with his friends? 
 
 "I have spoken of his ceaseless, earnest toil. He was 
 the greatest putterer I have ever known. He had been 
 a poor student, and had little schooling in art. In con- 
 sequence, he had to dig diligently for everything he got. 
 It must measure up, too, to his'high, self -elected stand- 
 ards. So, whatever it was, a harmony of color or of con- 

 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 tour, it was necessarily best when he got it. In con- 
 sequence, there is not a mediocre touch in all his work; 
 neither is there any semblance of the academic. It is 
 all absolutely original and thoroughly distinctive. His 
 art is the unaffected expression of his convictions and 
 impressions of the world about him, and these impres- 
 sions were worth recording. 
 
 "Of detail and construction he knew little and cared 
 less. He would produce a great portrait; you might know 
 that, but you could not feel certain that he would get 
 his subject upon his feet. Inanimate objects a boat, 
 a building he chose to depict not as they actually were, 
 but as they appeared to him. 
 
 "Many of Whistler's well-known sayings and doings 
 have been misinterpreted, sometimes to his credit, some- 
 times not. His answer to the lady who coupled him with 
 Velasquez as the world's two greatest painters 'Why 
 drag in Velasquez?' has been generally taken as a 
 striking evidence of either outrageous conceit or down- 
 right flippancy. As a matter of fact it was neither. 'Did 
 you ever really mean this, Whistler?' I asked him one 
 day. 
 
 "'No; of course not,' he replied seriously. 'You don't 
 suppose I couple myself with Velasquez, do you ? I simply 
 wanted to take her down a bit, that's all.' It was simply 
 
 [ 127]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 his way of checking flattery so fulsome as to be irritat- 
 ing." 
 
 Whistler never spared his Satanic wit where the Phi- 
 listine was concerned. Chase always enjoyed retailing 
 that question of his about the supposedly beautiful 
 homes of the newly rich in America. "But isn't there 
 always some damned little thing on the mantel that 
 gives the whole thing away?" 
 
 Chase also recalled that light and characteristic bit 
 of vengeance wreaked upon the architect of the Tite 
 Street house by Whistler. 
 
 "This was the house which the architect E. R. God- 
 win built for him, and which was seized for his debts. 
 When Whistler moved out, he left this inscription upon 
 the walls: 'Except the Lord build the house, they labor 
 in vain who build it. E. R. Godwin built this one.' 
 
 "While the bailiff was in possession, Whistler seized 
 the opportunity to invite several of his friends to an 
 elaborate luncheon at which the bailiff officiated as 
 butler. His subversion of the situation in this way is 
 generally cited as an evidence of his remarkable powers 
 of persuasion. I am not discounting this faculty of his 
 in any way. The man's power was wonderful; he could 
 be, if he chose, a very octopus, wrapping one with subtle 
 but forceful tentacles of suavity, agreeableness, at- 
 
 [128]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 tractiveness. But a London bailiff was not of the fine 
 caliber to be responsive to Whistler's cajolery. The fact 
 of the matter is, I verily believe, that he simply tipped 
 the man to delay proceedings and act meanwhile in the 
 capacity of a servant. In other words, he deliberately 
 plotted the whole affair for purposes of show. 
 
 "I might cite in confirmation the following instance, 
 the facts of which I know to be true. Once he invited 
 a distinguished American artist whom he had met casually 
 during the day to dine with him that evening. Arrived 
 at his club, Whistler left his guest waiting outside in 
 the cab while he went in to ascertain if they 'had any- 
 thing decent to eat.' He appeared shortly with a grimace 
 of disgust. 'Nothing worth while here,' he said. 'We'll 
 try another.' The second club was also lacking in 
 an attractive menu; nothing in it appealed to his fas- 
 tidious palate, he averred. 'Oh, well,' he said finally, 
 with an air of resignation, 'we'll go home and try pot- 
 luck.' 
 
 "Arrived at his house, he ushered his guest carelessly 
 into the dining-room, where a sumptuous repast was 
 served upon a table brilliantly lighted and most ar- 
 tistically decorated. Of course Whistler had had all these 
 elaborate preparations made in advance. 
 
 "Sir John Millais met him outside his studio one 
 
 [129]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 day, and after a brief conversation said cordially: 'Jimmy, 
 why don't you paint more pictures ? Put out more can- 
 vases.' 
 
 "Whistler, with a meaning look and carefully placed 
 emphasis, replied: *I know better.' 
 
 "The fool!' he muttered as he came into the studio. 
 'He spreads himself on canvas on every possible occa- 
 sion and, do you know, he called me "Jimmy"! Mind 
 you, I don't know the fellow well at all ! " 
 
 The rapier of Whistler's wit was always ready for the 
 academician be he never so harmless. Chase was fond 
 of repeating Whistler's remark to the gushing young 
 woman who sat next to him at dinner bent upon eulogy 
 of Sir Frederick Leigh ton "You know he is such a 
 clever man an astronomer, a sculptor, a linguist, an 
 orator " At which point Whistler interrupted with 
 
 false enthusiasm: "Oh, yes, and you know he paints, 
 . nr . > 
 
 Chase believed that Whistler's discourtesies were 
 deliberately affected; "even his epigrams were occasion- 
 ally prepared in advance, and stored up in memory to 
 be ready for a suitable occasion. His spontaneous re- 
 torts were his best. 
 
 "A well-meaning friend came to him enthusiastically 
 one day to tell him of a pretty spot near London that 
 
 [130]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 would be just the place for him to sojourn in and paint. 
 'I'm sure you'll like it,' he said confidently. 
 
 " My dear fellow/ said Whistler, 'the very fact that 
 you like it is proof that it's nothing for me.' However, 
 he did go there, and was greatly pleased with his sur- 
 roundings. He arrived safe himself, but his canvases 
 were delayed in transit, and for one full afternoon he 
 trotted back and forth between the hotel and the station, 
 fretting and threatening, making life miserable for the 
 railway guards and for every one else about him. As 
 usual, he was the centre of commotion. 'Look out, Whist- 
 ler,' I warned him, 'or they'll find out who you are.' 
 He scowled at me in return. 
 
 "Seeing that I knew him, the station-master came 
 up to me. 'Who is that quarrelsome little man?' he 
 asked with an aggressive look. 'He's really most dis- 
 agreeable.' 
 
 "'Whistler,' I replied apathetically, 'the celebrated 
 artist.' 
 
 "'Oh,' said he, changing his expression instantly to 
 one of deep humility and solicitude. He approached 
 Whistler with profuse apologies. 'I'm very sorry, sir, 
 about your canvases,' he said. 'Are they so very val- 
 uable?' 
 
 "'Not yet,' screamed Whistler; 'not yet.' 
 
 [131]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "Another of his well-known spontaneous retorts was 
 his reply to the English miss, a pupil of his, who greeted 
 him effusively one morning with: 'Oh, Mr. Whistler, 
 coming in on the train this morning the country-side 
 was shrouded with a beautiful, soft haze; and everywhere 
 I looked I seemed to see in the landscape one of your 
 charming paintings. 5 
 
 " 'Yes, yes,' said Whistler, with exaggerated pom- 
 posity; 'nature's creeping up ! She's creeping up !' 
 
 "As my stay in London drew near its end, our quarrel- 
 ing increased, try as I would to avoid it. 'Don't ! Don't !' 
 I cried out in desperation one day. 'At least let me 
 carry away a pleasant last impression of you.' 
 
 "His answer I have always remembered, since it in- 
 dicated, if only indirectly, that he thought of me as a 
 friend. 'You don't seem to understand,' he grumbled. 
 'It is commonplace, not to say vulgar, to quarrel with 
 your enemies. Quarrel with your friends,' he advised 
 fiercely; 'that's the thing to do. Now be good.' 
 
 ''After all, Colonel,' said he one day, 'the only real 
 objection I have to you is that you teach. You're just 
 like all these others this vulgar crowd.' He waved his 
 hand at the others present. The occasion was one of 
 his 'Sunday breakfasts.' 
 
 "It was on my lips to reply, 'Why, you teach too, 
 
 [ 132]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 in your own way, and your own ideals.' Later he be- 
 came a professed teacher, opening an atelier in the rue 
 du Bac, Paris. Two former students of mine entered 
 his school, and when questioned by Whistler as to their 
 previous teacher gave my name. 'Ah,' said he, graciously, 
 'you could not have done better.' A third student 
 replied that he had had no teacher at all. 'H-m-m,' 
 said Whistler, loudly, 'you really could not have done 
 better/ 
 
 "Another student of mine who had become an enthu- 
 siastic impressionist began a study doing a purple, pea- 
 green, and orange kind of thing. 'Mercy!' screamed 
 Whistler, as his eyes fell upon the canvas. 'Whatever 
 are you trying to do ? ' 
 
 ; 'Painting nature,' she replied calmly, 'as I see it. 
 Am I not right? Should not one paint nature as one 
 sees it ? ' 
 
 "'Yes, yes,' said Whistler, 'so long as you do not 
 see it as you paint it.' 
 
 "My stay in London had been so protracted that I 
 determined to go directly back to America, taking the 
 boat at Antwerp. 'Come to Holland with me,' I suggested 
 to Whistler. 
 
 : 'Perhaps,' he replied. 'What inducements have you?' 
 'The old masters,' I suggested. 'You've seen them 
 
 [133]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 often; but, then, it's different with you. You'll take 
 delight in seeing them over and over again.' 
 
 'You're right,' said he, 'sometimes you are. But they'll 
 keep. What else?' 
 
 'Our delightful companionship,' I suggested. It 
 was difficult not to be vindictive. 'Should we not pro- 
 long it?' 
 
 : 'Oh, you'll keep, too,' he answered lightly. 
 
 'Well, there's the international exhibit at Antwerp 
 new pictures by Bastien-Lepage, Stevens, and others 
 which you ought to see.' 
 
 "At the last moment he decided to go, and we hastily 
 booked our passage. It was too late to secure a state- 
 room together, a hardship to which I was resigned. The 
 night was stormy, and knowing how bad a sailor Whis- 
 tler was, I hastened to his state-room in the morning to 
 look him up. He was gone, and in his place I found an 
 Englishman who wore an expression of deeply wounded 
 dignity. 'I say,' said he, in an aggrieved tone, 'are you 
 not a friend of that little antediluvian who occupied 
 the berth above me last night? Do you know, sir, that 
 he had his foot in my face every five minutes all night 
 long. I say, you know; he really must be somebody to 
 behave in such an extraordinary fashion. Who is he?' 
 "I told him. 'Oh,' he replied, and tbere was a wealth 
 
 [134]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 of understanding in his tone. 'I wonder,' he asked eagerly, 
 'if I could meet him.' 
 
 "Neither Whistler nor I was in the best of humor 
 at breakfast, and driving out from the hotel, I deter- 
 mined, if possible, to go through the exhibit alone. Ar- 
 rived at the gallery, I decided firmly upon this course. 
 He had already adopted the exasperating habit he had 
 of shifting to my shoulders the entire responsibility for 
 the enjoyment of our trip. 'Now,' said he, looking sneer- 
 ingly about the gallery, * where are your Bastiens?' 
 
 " 'There's one,' I replied, 'over there his portrait of 
 his brother. But, if you please, I prefer to see it alone.' 
 
 : 'Eh!' he cried. 'What's this? You ask me to come 
 over here with you, and then you adopt this attitude ?' 
 
 " 'Yes,' said I, 'for I don't mind telling you I'll 
 pay you this compliment you have the ability to say 
 in a single word that which I don't care to hear about 
 these pictures.' 
 
 " 'Come, then, you must hear that word !' he snapped. 
 He dragged me up before the portrait, and shot out his 
 finger accusingly at it. 'School !' he hissed. Later, stand- 
 ing before a painting by Stevens, an admirable piece of 
 work, he pointed his skinny little finger at a bit of de- 
 tail away up in one corner of the canvas, and said, 'There ! 
 One might not mind to have done that!' 
 
 [135]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "The end of a most unhappy day found us in a rail- 
 way-carriage traveling on to Amsterdam, huddled up 
 in opposite corners, and glaring fiercely at each other. 
 In the same compartment sat two Germans who kept 
 up steadily a loud and joyous conversation. To me it 
 was most interesting and in no way annoying; but Whis- 
 tler, who affected a dislike for Germans, was fidgeting 
 with evident irritation. 
 
 * Colonel/ he began presently in a shrill, rasping 
 voice, 'the good Lord made one serious mistake.' 
 
 'What is it now?' I snapped. 
 
 'When He made Germans.' 
 
 "I have lived six years of my life in Germany, and I 
 am fond of the Germans. 
 
 1 'It's a great pity, Whistler,' I replied, 'that you 
 don't understand German. It would profit you greatly 
 to listen to the talk.' 
 
 "He grinned spitefully at this, and, turning, answered 
 me fluently and at some length in German ! And now he 
 became very voluble, earnestly seeking for new topics of 
 conversation, and diligently expressing his views in 
 German. A gadfly could not have been more persistently 
 and maliciously annoying. Human nature could stand it 
 no longer, and at length I revolted. I was deadly in ear- 
 nest when I said: 'Whistler, I will not^go on to Amster- 
 
 [136]
 
 IN LONDON WITH WHISTLER 
 
 dam with you. Frankly, I don't care to be responsible for 
 what might happen. The next station is Haarlem, and 
 one of us must get out there. If you wish to, I can direct 
 you to a good hotel where they'll put you up with a 
 
 good room and bath; or I'll get out ' 
 
 'Yes, Colonel,' said he sweetly, in German; 'you get 
 out.' And so I did, with a feeling of utmost relief and 
 thorough contentment. As the train moved out of the 
 Haarlem station and left me standing knee-deep in my 
 luggage on the platform, he poked his head out of the 
 window and screamed back, still in German: 'A pleasant 
 night to you, Colonel ! To-morrow to-morrow you'll 
 find out that what I said about the Germans is true.' 
 
 "I saw Whistler only once after this on the following 
 day, in Amsterdam. At the hotel in Haarlem I found the 
 cards of some young artists from Brussels who were ex- 
 pecting my arrival. They were ardent young revolution- 
 ists in art, and when they learned that Whistler the 
 great Whistler was in Amsterdam, only twenty miles 
 away, their voices arose in loud acclaim. Could they be 
 presented to him? Would I perform the ceremony? My 
 resentment, as usual, had cooled somewhat overnight 
 and I agreed. 
 
 "At his Amsterdam hotel Whistler kept us waiting for 
 a full half-hour. I said nothing to disturb their devotion, 
 
 [ 1371
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 but I knew well what the great Whistler was doing. He 
 was standing before a mirror, curling-irons in hand, add- 
 ing endless touches to his hair, white lock, and mustache, 
 or ironing out wrinkles in his face. 
 
 "Ah, he came at last with mincing step and monocle 
 set the dainty, dapper Whistler of Cheyne Walk, 
 Whistler with all his 'gimcracks' on, Whistler on parade, 
 the flippant, enigmatical, cynical, caustic Whistler of the 
 world. And as he stood before his hero-worshipers and 
 heard their murmur of irrepressible adoration, he half 
 averted his face toward me and behind his handkerchief 
 passed me a deliberate, meaning wink ! 
 
 "Yes, there were two distinct Whistlers, but there was 
 only one genuine one Whistler the tireless, slavish 
 worker, ceaselessly puttering, endlessly striving to add 
 to art the beautiful harmonies, the rare interpretations 
 that his wonderful imagination pictured for him; Whistler 
 the great artist, in other words, for that was his real self, 
 which will live in all its glory when the man's eccentric- 
 ities are utterly forgotten." 
 
 [138]
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 CONCERNING THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 THE fate of Whistler's portrait of Chase is still 
 shrouded in mystery. It has been said that Whistler 
 destroyed it, which is probable if he was not satisfied 
 with his work, but not otherwise. Chase insisted upon 
 taking his portrait of Whistler back to America with 
 him, wisely foreseeing that if he did not do so he might 
 never regain possession of it, but he was never able to 
 get hold of his own. Whistler, as shown in the letter 
 quoted below, returned the sum that Chase had paid 
 for it. 
 
 Evidently Whistler did not regard Chase's present- 
 ment of him as flattering, for in "The Gentle Art of Mak- 
 ing Enemies" he remarks characteristically: "How dared 
 he (Chase) do this wicked thing and I who was charming 
 made him beautiful on canvas, the Masher of the Ave- 
 nues!" 
 
 Upon the subject of the portraits Chase had the fol- 
 lowing letter from Whistler before he left London. It 
 is interesting because, in addition to its characteristic 
 flavor, it shows a certain serious vein of appreciation of 
 Chase's kindliness: 
 
 [139]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "Mr VERY DEAR CHASE, 
 
 "You are by this time of course convinced that I have 
 sponged with my wonted facility all traces of the past few 
 weeks from my memory, and that the colonel and his 
 kindliness and good companionship have all ceased to 
 exist for me ! 
 
 "No ! Noo NOO Your stay here was charming for 
 me and it is with a sort of self-reproach that I think of 
 the impression of intolerance and disputatiousness you 
 must carry as characteristic of my own gentle self which 
 also I suppose it will be hopeless for me to attempt to 
 efface by even the mildest behavior when I return your 
 visit in New York. Our little trip to Holland was charm- 
 ing and I only wish I could have stayed longer. Indeed 
 if I had but gone with you to the gallery in Haarlem I 
 might have done something toward rehabilitating myself 
 in your eyes for I had meant to be quite sweet about 
 the pictures as after all * there is nothing mean or modest 
 about me' My dear Chase this is really quite perfect ! 
 I have never been so daintily appreciated and I shall in- 
 sist upon the insertion of this resume of Whistler's rare 
 qualities in the biography of that great painter a century 
 or two hence. 
 
 "Meanwhile our two pictures. By the way the world 
 will have to wait, for yet a little whije longer. You see 
 
 [140]
 
 THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 colonel we rather handicapped each other I fancy and 
 neither master is really quite fit for public presentation 
 as he stands on canvas at this moment. So we must re- 
 serve them, screening them from the eye of jealous mor- 
 tals on both sides of the Atlantic until they burst upon 
 the painters in the swagger of completeness. 
 
 "This is a disappointment, though only a temporary 
 one, to me most certainly so far as your portrait goes for 
 I should have liked you to have taken it over with you 
 and shown it on your arrival. But in these matters I 
 never deceive myself and I saw at once on my return 
 from abroad that the work is not in its perfect condition 
 and Whistler cannot allow any canvas stamped with the 
 butterfly to leave his studio until he is thoroughly satis- 
 fied with it himself. Therefore my dear Colonel I shall 
 keep the picture here and bring it over with me to finish 
 in your studio where again I will prove to you that my 
 long suffering is equal to your own as I stand in my turn 
 till you finish the 'pendant* my artless self. Under the 
 circumstances I send you back the thirty pounds you 
 had given me on your portrait trust me it is better so 
 it would only make me nervous and unhappy were I 
 to keep it before my work pleased me. While I shall be 
 delighted to take it from you over there when I have 
 done well 'as it is my wont.' 
 
 [141]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "I am also awfully sorry that 'the boys' in New York 
 are not to see your impression of Whistler with his wand 
 before I come myself but what will you ! The center of 
 thought is the stomach and we were too far from well 
 poisoned!! 
 
 "And now I must thank you again for the delicacy 
 and good feeling you have shown about the other pic- 
 tures at Graves It was so nice and kind of you to leave 
 it entirely to me to think out whereas any one else 
 might have taken the occasion of the pictures being for 
 the time out of my possession to obtain them simply 
 
 without consulting me at all. 
 
 i 
 
 "You will quite sympathize with me I am sure when 
 I find upon reflection that I would like to get back those 
 things for myself. This I really always hoped to do- 
 but lately I was so absorbed by your picture that I could 
 not think well of anything else. However now if you 
 will when I come to America I will try and bring you 
 something else that you will like quite as well indeed 
 better. 
 
 "Meanwhile again I return the money forty pounds. 
 
 "I have consulted my bankers who think that the 
 best way of convoying to you the sum of money is letters 
 of credit on some bank in New York. I told them you 
 would not wish a lot of Dutch metal upon which you 
 
 [
 
 THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 would lose so they have given me for you a letter of 
 credit for seventy pounds. This I enclose. 
 
 "Also the paper from the American consul freeing you 
 of all duty on account of the etchings. 
 
 "For Heaven's sake my dear Colonel write me at once 
 to say that you have received all this safely or I shall 
 writhe in uncertainty. 
 
 "Bon voyage my dear Chase. Write me word of your 
 safe arrival in the delightful country you say the other 
 one is and expect me soon. 
 
 "Always devotedly" 
 
 [Here the letter is signed with the butterfly.] 
 
 "Never wrote such a long letter to anyone. 
 
 "I have taken out the papers from the U. S. Con- 
 sulate to the amount of 160 pounds for I have forgotten 
 the exact sum you paid me but this is near enough. 
 Anyhow you have the receipt." 
 
 The pictures referred to by Whistler as being "for the 
 time out of his possession" were, according to Mr. Al- 
 gernon Graves, the Carlyle portrait, that of Whistler's 
 mother, also those of Miss Franklin and Henry Irving, 
 the two nocturnes which figured in the Ruskin trial, 
 and a Battersea in a Fog. These pictures had been 
 taken to Graves by Whistler's friend Charles Howells as 
 
 [143]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 security for a loan, and Whistler up to the time under 
 discussion had been unable to recover them. Chase, with 
 characteristic generosity, had given Whistler a check for 
 the purpose of regaining the Carlyle, and although he 
 longed indescribably to own the picture, left the dis- 
 position of the matter entirely to Whistler. Whistler, as 
 the letter shows, while appreciating Chase's generosity 
 and fine feeling, preferred to return the money he offered 
 and wait for the opportunity to regain possession of his 
 canvas himself. After Ho wells 's death Whistler made 
 Graves a deposit on the Carlyle and finally bought it 
 back, afterward selling it to the Glasgow museum. 
 Later he secured the portrait of his mother and the noc- 
 turnes. The others remained in Graves's possession and 
 were subsequently sold by him. 
 
 Whistler took an immediate fancy to the tall flat- 
 brimmed hat made famous by Chase. 
 
 Mortimer Menpes remembers how Whistler exclaimed 
 at first sight of it: "Ah, that's very good, very good in- 
 deed. I like that," and soon afterward abandoned his 
 much-described white hat in favor of it. Having honored 
 Chase by adopting his head-gear, Whistler used after- 
 ward to inquire unblushingly of visitors from America: 
 "Is Chase still wearing my hat?" Later when the origi- 
 nator of the hat had incurred his enmity by quoting 
 
 [ 144 ]
 
 THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 Whistler's alleged description of Chase's portrait of him 
 "a monstrous lampoon" for exhibition purposes, Whis- 
 tler received the mention of his old friend's name in a 
 different but equally characteristic fashion. "Why, you 
 have a hat like Chase's," a caller remarked one day. 
 Whistler lifted his eyebrows. "Chase? Who is Chase?" 
 he drawled. 
 
 After leaving Whistler, Chase's holiday was more 
 restful. He found his friend Walter Palmer in Holland 
 and in his society enjoyed art and art talk in peace. 
 
 When Chase returned to New York that fall he re- 
 ceived a characteristic letter from Blum in Venice: 
 
 "Because Whistler paints your portrait that need 
 hardly restrain you. 7 think just as much of you. I sup- 
 pose you have seen Palmer by this time. He did some 
 awfully nice things here. Rico is here. He has the room 
 next to mine and is doing some charming things. I have 
 wasted almost all the time I've been here fooling around 
 in oil. Tried some etching, but all were failures. No water 
 colors. Will stay all winter and hope to do something. 
 Ulrich has done some lovely things and Duveneck has 
 under way a large and very good canvas of a water stair- 
 way with woman getting water. 
 
 "Now I come to think of it I know why you won't 
 
 [ 145]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 write, but I assure you I was joking when I said that 
 Jews weren't allowed on the beach. I wanted to say 'in 
 the hotels.' 
 
 "I like you anyhow. BLUM " 
 
 Later in the year when Twachtman had joined the 
 painters in Venice, the two men who were not enjoying 
 the raw Venetian winter sent two nonsensical letters to 
 Chase written the same day and containing caricatures 
 of each other. 
 
 Blum's letter reads: 
 
 "DEAR CHASEY, 
 
 "Now I take my pen in hand to inform you that I am 
 in good health hoping the same of you. (Twachtman sug- 
 gests to say instead, 'hoping that you are the same.') 
 The weather is fine although it is cold and chilly and 
 the fogs are the same. Piero at the cafe thinks there ought 
 to be a change very soon. I think the same. I hope you 
 are well and business good and wish you a Happy New 
 Year. The Jews are all going up to Holland next year. I 
 suppose you will see them there. What house are you 
 
 drumming for now? C is going. I suppose you will 
 
 keep out of his way. He says you cheated him the last 
 time you were here. (Twachtman says the only time you 
 
 [ 146]
 
 THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 were here.) Lend me your nose. I may want to go to Hol- 
 land next summer. 
 
 "We hope you are in good health. 
 
 "Please answer. Splendid weather, especially the wash- 
 ing weather in the morning. I didn't get your Christmas 
 present yet. What is it ? You ought to see the hat Twacht- 
 man wears. He has his hair cut and looks like this [pic- 
 ture]. Don't you think so too ! What ! 
 
 "What do you think of pastels? 
 
 "Hoping you are well and in good health I now lay 
 down my pen telling you that I am the same and hoping 
 to hear from you soon I remain your friend, 
 
 "Bos BLUM." 
 
 Twachtman's "companion piece" reads as follows: 
 
 "DEAR CHASEY, 
 
 "Now I take my pen in hand to inform you that I am 
 well and hoping that you are the same. Blum never knows 
 how to commence a letter. The weather is very fine al- 
 though it is cold and chilly with occasional rains and 
 fogs. The barber suggests that there should be a change 
 very soon. Don't you think so too? Please answer. I hope 
 you are in good health with fair prospects for the Happy 
 New Year. Jews will not be allowed on the Lido next 
 summer, don't come !!!!!!!! 
 
 [147]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "Chase your light's out!!! Old C asked for your 
 
 address. We hope you are in good health. Please answer. 
 The weather is very fine and it is snowing. 
 
 "I saw your caricature the other day and I hardly 
 notice the smallest change. I recognized you at once. 
 Shoot the hat ! You ought to see Blum's hat. He is going 
 to cut his hair and will look like this. [Picture.] 
 
 "How do you like his beard? Please answer. 
 
 "What do you think of pastels? Blum's got the 
 cholera. His hair's coming out. 
 
 "Hoping that you are well for I am the same Write 
 soon. Your friend, 
 
 "TWATTY." 
 
 About the same time Blum writes an illustrated letter 
 to Minnie Gerson about the beard, evidently the second 
 letter on the subject, the first having enclosed a photo- 
 graph of himself thus adorned. 
 
 "I forgot to tell you not to show it (the photograph) 
 to Chase. However the damage is done now I suppose, 
 so show it to him whenever you like or he asks for it. I 
 have had it cut (Twachtman did it), I am wearing it to 
 a point something like Chase's." 
 
 Chase never saw Whistler again, but he never per- 
 mitted his enthusiastic estimate of Whistler the great 
 
 [148]
 
 THE CHASE-WHISTLER PORTRAITS 
 
 and sincere artist to be affected by his occasional 
 moods of retrospective exasperation at the man. Indeed, 
 Whistler's childish wrath seemed only to entertain him, 
 and he was fond of quoting that occasion when his name 
 came up for discussion at a dinner-party and Whistler's 
 sister remarked: "Mr. Chase amuses James, doesn't he, 
 James?" To which James, tapping his finger-tips to- 
 gether, retorted promptly: "Not often, not often." 
 
 Chase also delighted in that delectable Whistlerism 
 made in his presence when the painter disposed of an 
 urgent patron who was attempting to gain possession of 
 her portrait: "Some people seem to believe because they 
 have paid two hundred pounds for a picture that they 
 own it." 
 
 Another remark of Whistler's, profound under its epi- 
 grammatic surface, Chase used often to quote to his 
 students; the story of the fashionable woman engaging 
 a portrait who said to the artist: "And if I don't like it 
 when it is finished, Mr. Whistler, I don't have to take 
 it, do I?" To which Whistler, with a diabolic gleam of 
 the eye, retorted: 
 
 "Ah no, madam, that is not the case at all. Quite the 
 contrary. If I don't like it you can't have it." 
 
 [ 149]
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-SIX 
 was the year of Chase's marriage. That circum- 
 stance which can make or mar an artist and which 
 even in the least influential case must in some way 
 affect his development, was a fortunate one for Chase, 
 for his wife then and always complemented his life 
 and his art. Brought up in intimate association with 
 art and artists, married to an artist in whom the impulse 
 to pass on his knowledge of the beauty he had found 
 was irresistible, Mrs. Chase derived from and adapted 
 herself to her environment, and in every way contrived 
 to create in his home the atmosphere of art. 
 
 Eighteen hundred and eighty -six was also the year of 
 Chase's exhibition at the Boston Art Club, which was 
 something of an event in his artistic career, since at that 
 time the one-man exhibit so usual to-day was practically 
 unknown. 
 
 It was during this year that he was again elected 
 president of the Society of American Artists, an office he 
 held for nine years. They were important years in the 
 development of American art and the value of Chase's 
 influence in that position cannot be overestimated. 
 
 [150]
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 Chase gave up his position at The League in 1884, but 
 in the fall of eighty-five he went back and continued to 
 teach there until 1894. 
 
 The first winter of their married life the Chases lived 
 for a short time in the Tenth Street Studio apartment, 
 afterward taking rooms on East Ninth Street. The next 
 year they moved to Brooklyn, where they lived for a 
 few months with the painter's parents. It was at this 
 period that Chase first painted the Prospect Park sketches, 
 utilizing the small figure in the formal park landscape 
 in a way that was quite original. Any suggestion that he 
 may have received from other sources for these char- 
 acteristic sketches came from the French painters, al- 
 though the canvases contain little more suggestion of the 
 French impressionist's manner of painting light and 
 sunshine than they do of the dark-toned Bavarian 
 school. They are done in a light key, yet without any at- 
 tempt to suggest atmosphere or to record any special 
 time of day. The color notes of a child's ribbon or gown, 
 a park bench or a toy boat have not quite the "touch" 
 that distinguishes the later Shinnecock landscapes, yet 
 they possess in a marked degree that quality of style 
 which Chase unquestionably had. For the next four 
 years the painter was interested in these park subjects. 
 When he returned to New York he found motives of 
 
 [151]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the same sort in Central Park where he often took with 
 him Livingston Platt, an early pupil whose decorative 
 talent had interested his master. 
 
 It was during his stay in Brooklyn that Chase painted 
 at Fort Hamilton that fine and quiet little landscape 
 called Peace. 
 
 A sale of the painter's pictures that took place about 
 this time was disappointing financially, as they went for 
 prices far below those that the painter usually com- 
 manded, but it was an interesting period in the develop- 
 ment of his art. 
 
 Chase and his wife moved rather frequently at that 
 time. From Brooklyn they went to an old house in West 
 Fourth Street, then an attractive part of Greenwich 
 Village. The following summer was spent in Orange; the 
 summer after that they had a cottage at Bath Beach, 
 where Chase painted more interesting outdoor subjects 
 with the figure in the landscape. It was at this house 
 that the painter came very near being accidentally shot 
 by his young wife. In fact his life was saved by his then 
 famous Rubens ring. 
 
 Chase had returned on a late suburban train from a 
 dinner given by Stanford White and conceived the bril- 
 liant idea of entering his room through the bedroom 
 window instead of the door, in order not to awaken his 
 
 [152]
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 wife. Mrs. Chase, who had been alarmed by the behavior 
 of an employee about the place, had retired with a re- 
 volver under her pillow. Hearing some one fumble with 
 the catch of the blind at her window she was naturally 
 very much frightened. The next moment when a man's 
 hand appeared on the edge of the shutter she assumed 
 that the expected intruder had arrived, and raised her 
 arm to shoot when by chance she caught sight of the 
 man's ring and realized that the housebreaker was her 
 husband. 
 
 Those were interesting days in the Tenth Street 
 Studio. The studio itself was a thing quite unique. Many 
 an artist who remembers it as his first impression of an 
 artistic studio has said that in creating the Tenth 
 Street Studio alone Chase did an immeasurable service 
 to art. 
 
 Overcrowded though it may appear in photographs, 
 the painters who remember it distinctly say that its 
 whole effect was one of great beauty of tone and color. 
 Chase's own sketches give a more adequate idea of what 
 it must have been like. 
 
 My own memory of the studio, to which I was taken 
 as a child, was of a vast darkish place containing beauti- 
 ful spots of color. But despite its unlikeness to anything 
 I had seen before, the memory that remained with me 
 
 [153]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 was the extraordinary kindness of the grown-up painter 
 with the Van Dyck beard in showing me his canvases as 
 if my tastes and opinions were of real importance. Of 
 those pictures I remembered most distinctly the one 
 called Mother and Child, recalling every detail of the 
 composition and color and the very shape of the 
 baby's head against the mother's shoulder. Seeing it 
 several years afterward for the second time on an 
 exhibition wall, it held no surprises, it looked just as I 
 had remembered it. 
 
 The studio was full of beautiful things that Chase had 
 collected. One of his hobbies was clocks. There was one 
 Mrs. Keith recalls that the artist wound with touching 
 fidelity each night, although the hands were missing, so 
 that although it ticked with life it informed not. Another 
 clock was, it seems, overactive in its time-proclaiming 
 quality embarrassingly so upon one occasion. 
 
 At one of the studio evenings Kate Douglas Wiggin 
 gave an author's reading. While she was in the middle of 
 it this clock began to strike. Having been purchased, 
 like the others, for beauty rather than practical value, 
 it continued to strike until twenty-three o'clock had 
 sounded, when some one had the presence of mind to 
 stop it. Mrs. Wiggin, in recalling the incident afterward, 
 
 said: "And I was so embarrassed that the onlv thing I 
 
 
 
 \ 1541
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 could think of to say was to stammer: * Really I had 
 no idea it was so late ! ' 
 
 It was in the winter of 1890 that Carmencita danced 
 in the Tenth Street Studio before the most distinguished 
 audience in New York. 
 
 In those days foreign "artists" were a novelty in New 
 York, where now it is the Anglo-Saxon entertainer who 
 is the exception. But in the eighties and nineties Spanish 
 and Hungarian dancers, Russian actresses, Continental 
 entertainers of all descriptions had not inundated the 
 town. The foreigners who came to New York then were 
 not only of a more distinguished and genuine type than 
 the majority of those we have here to-day, but they had 
 the compelling charm of the "different" thing, the ro- 
 mance of the unfamiliar. And of all the personalities 
 clothed in that illusion the most picturesque seems to 
 have been Carmencita. 
 
 The first time that Carmencita danced in Chase's 
 studio it was at the instigation of Mrs. Jack Gardiner. 
 She had danced for a few painters and friends of the 
 Beckwiths in Carroll Beckwith's studio and in the same 
 way at Sargent's studio in East Twenty-third Street. 
 Mrs. Gardiner, hearing of this, was seized with the desire 
 to see the famous dancer in the atmosphere and setting 
 of a studio instead of in a public hall and expressed her 
 
 [155]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 wish to Sargent. Sargent's subsequent letter to Chase 
 shows how the event came to pass. 
 
 "My DEAR CHASE, 
 
 "Mrs. Jack Gardiner whom I daresay you know, 
 writes me that she must see the Carmencita and asks me 
 to write her to dance for her some day next week and she 
 will come up from Boston, but my studio is impossible. 
 The gas man tells me that he cannot bring more light 
 into the studio than the two little jets that are there. 
 
 "Would you be willing to lend your studio for the pur- 
 pose and be our host for Tuesday night or Thursday of 
 next week ? We would each of us invite some friends and 
 Mrs. Gardiner would provide the Carmencita and I the 
 supper and whatever other expenses there might be. I 
 only venture to propose this as I think there is some 
 chance of your enjoying the idea and because your 
 studio would be such a stunning place. If you don't like 
 the idea or if it would be a great inconvenience speak up 
 and pardon my cheek ! Send me an answer by bearer if 
 you can, if not, to the Clarendon soon, as I must write 
 to Mrs. Gardiner. Yours Sincerely, 
 
 "JOHN SARGENT." 
 
 Carmencita danced twice in Chase's studio. Even at 
 this remote day the guests of the evening vividly recall 
 
 [156]
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 it. Women tore off their jewels to throw them at the 
 singer's feet although it is true that one emotional 
 lady returned the next day to ask the painter to 
 recover her gems. The kindly painter made an effort, 
 but the canny dancer shrugged and snapped her fin- 
 gers in true Latin fashion and replied that she hadn't 
 the slightest intention of returning the impulsive lady's 
 property. 
 
 One evening after the dancing Sargent asked Car- 
 mencita to sing some Spanish songs. For a long time she 
 refused, saying that she was a dancer, not a singer. But 
 Sargent, who knew his Spain, kept insisting that she 
 must know some gypsy or folk songs, and finally the 
 dancer yielded and sang a number of songs with the wild 
 peculiar rhythm of Spanish music, and although Car- 
 mencita, as she had said, was not a singer, the little epi- 
 sode made a vivid impression upon her hearers. 
 
 But if Cannencita frugally refused to return the emo- 
 tional lady's jewels, she proved that she was not lacking 
 in Spanish grace of feeling, for both times after she had 
 danced she sent her slipper to the painter's wife who was 
 unable to be present. 
 
 Rosina Emrnett Sherwood, a guest both evenings, 
 thus describes Carmencita's appearance when she danced: 
 "Sargent and Chase made her rub the make-up off her 
 
 [157]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 face, and brush her frizzed hair back from her forehead, 
 and she was very beautiful and as natural as a country 
 girl dancing on the grass." 
 
 Chase and Sargent both painted portraits of- Car- 
 mencita at this time. Chase's canvas is owned by the 
 Metropolitan Museum and Sargent's by the Luxem- 
 bourg. 
 
 The Lady in Black, one of Chase's fine, distinguished 
 canvases and a portrait of one of his pupils, was painted 
 in 1888 and presented to the Metropolitan Museum in 
 1891. 
 
 In 1888 Chase became an Associate of the National 
 Academy, and in 1890 he was made a regular Academi- 
 cian. He had also an exhibition of his pictures at Buffalo 
 that winter which created a great deal of attention. He 
 began to teach at the Brooklyn Art School and painted 
 and exhibited a number of Central Park sketches of the 
 same type as those painted in Prospect Park. 
 
 The Chase household made another move in the au- 
 tumn to an apartment in East Fortieth Street. That 
 year their friend Robert Blum went to Japan to do some 
 illustrating for Scribner's. A letter to Chase from Tokio 
 contains some of his first impressions. 
 
 "... I suppose you are waiting to hear me say some- 
 thing about Japan. ... It is the most puzzling experi- 
 
 [158]
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 ence I have ever had ... it is simply a new world where 
 life is on another plane and yet one where with all its 
 strangeness I feel strangely at home through the little 
 insight I had of its art. But how much clearer that 
 has become to me already by seeing the life that pro- 
 duced it. . . I never thought I was so interesting, but 
 you know what a great respect I have for Japanese 
 taste they stop and look and look and follow me with 
 their earnest eyes wherever I go till I begin to feel proud 
 of being so superior and imposing. But it is rather em- 
 barrassing when you want to do all the observing there 
 is to be done. . . . Tell Cosy that I think of her every day. 
 The little girls remind me of her every moment. . . It 
 is amazing to watch these mites no older than Cosy 
 walking about with a good bouncing baby tied to their 
 backs. They don't seem to be as fretful as our children, 
 and the way they are coddled and loved does even an 
 old bachelor heart good 
 
 "I found Mr. Wigmore, the man who is to write two 
 articles for Scribner, very nice and Mrs. Wigmore most 
 charming, both with that open kindliness that always 
 wins my heart. . . This is all I'm going to write and it 
 will depend upon how you treat me whether I write you 
 again." 
 
 While Blum was in Japan Chase's first son, William 
 
 [159]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Merritt, was born. As soon as the news reached Blum he 
 wrote to his friend, now for the third time a father. 
 
 "I congratulate you most heartily, my dear Will, on 
 the latest addition to the Chase family and am tickled 
 to know that you will now have a chance to hand down 
 to posterity your magnificent whiskers if nothing more ! 
 I received your letter just before starting out on a little 
 trip to Enoshima, a little village on an island where I 
 stayed for a week doing some drawings for Sir Edwin 
 Arnold's articles." 
 
 Of course Blum always had his joke with the ever 
 good-natured Chase. Besides that favorite one connected 
 with the painter's very regular nose, about which he 
 could well afford to permit jokes, there was another 
 to the effect that the always sufficiently thin Chase had 
 become fat, a condition he greatly disliked and of which 
 he seems to have had an unjustifiable dread. Blum 
 wrote to Chase a few days after his last letter: 
 
 "Yes, I suppose it does kind of make a man feel big 
 this raising a family sort of important like! I have 
 imagined what you must look like in these days and I 
 think I've caught the spirit of it. You must excuse de- 
 fects in character and resemblance as I haven't seen you 
 for some time and suppose you have grown a little stouter. 
 So if I had allowed an extra fifty pounds say, I would 
 
 [ 160 ] *
 
 EVENTFUL YEARS IN ART AND LIFE 
 
 just have hit it eh ? . . . . Have you thought yet what 
 you are going to name him. I suppose there is no hope 
 
 for me My kindest remembrances to Mrs. C 
 
 and a big big kiss for my little sweetheart, that is Cosy 
 
 Chase. 
 
 "You SINNER!" 
 
 [161]
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 AN END AND A BEGINNING 
 
 THE next year, 1891, saw the founding of Shinne- 
 cock. Mrs. Hoyt, an amateur artist, who had a 
 summer home at Shinnecock Hills, urged Chase to 
 start a summer school there. Mrs. Henry Porter, of 
 Pittsburgh, another summer resident, also became in- 
 terested in the idea. They offered to give Chase the land 
 upon which to build a summer home for himself and a 
 school studio as well. Chase went to Shinnecock in 1890, 
 was delighted with the place and accepted their offer. 
 McKim, Meade, and White began to work on the plans 
 for the Chase house and studio and the next summer, 
 1891, the school studio was finished and the class opened 
 to students. 
 
 That year the Chases moved from the East Fortieth 
 Street apartment and Chase gave way to a singular de- 
 sire to live in Hoboken. Perhaps he had seen a subject 
 one day passing through. Mrs. Chase remained in Ho- 
 boken with her three children while Shinnecock was in 
 the making. There the first little boy died and a third 
 daughter was born. 
 
 Blum's letters from Japan continue on the note of 
 personal banter that only seemed to entertain Chase. 
 
 [162]
 
 AN END AND A BEGINNING 
 
 Referring to some photographs of the Chase family sent 
 to him, Blum remarks: 
 
 "I was more than pleased to make the acquaintance 
 of the boy. He's a beauty if he isn't mine. And Cosy- 
 how sedate she looks ! And your wife with the delightful 
 hat how well she looks. The photographs are all de- 
 lightful that is except those of you You've fallen off 
 terribly so lank and lean. ... I wish I had you over 
 here I'd give you a good licking for nothing in particular 
 but just because I feel like it and because I think you 
 deserve it. .... But on second thoughts I come to think 
 that someone in New York must have a dreadful spite 
 against you I mean the man who ' did you ' in the paper 
 
 and made you look like a cross between and a 
 
 Baxter street Jew. He is bound some time to lay for you 
 and do worse than I would, so it's all right. I am going 
 to hand over to him the job of caricaturing especially as 
 I notice that you fail to appreciate my efforts. Of course 
 I know it is all put on when you ask, ' Who these horrible 
 looking things are meant to represent' 
 
 "But joking aside, niy dear Will, I can't tell you how 
 appalled I was to get a list of the sale of your pictures" 
 [an unlucky sale in 1891 at which Mr. Chase's pictures 
 went for prices far below their normal value], "it wasn't 
 
 [163]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 only awful but shameful. If you can get any comfort 
 from the fact I will tell you that since receiving it and 
 when I feel blue about my work I say to myself, 'Good 
 God, what does it all matter since nobody will care a rap 
 whether you try or don't try ' . . . A fellow works himself 
 into a sweat and after surmounting all kinds of obstacles 
 sees that his labor was thrown away after all. So why 
 not take life easily and give up this damned driving after 
 something. . . . God, I believe if such a thing were to 
 happen to me I would give up painting. One must be 
 pretty courageous to stand it. I can well understand how 
 you feel about it dear boy and what a dreadful shock it 
 must have been at first. And yet I know that in spite of 
 all you will keep on painting as if nothing at all had hap- 
 pened, and God bless you for it. 
 
 "With lots of kisses for Cosy and Koto and William 
 Merritt and the kindest remembrances to Mrs. Chase, 
 I am as always, ' Y ours, BOB." 
 
 The next letter, written after he had received news of 
 the baby's death, shows the affectionate side of Blum's 
 nature and the sincere friendship he felt for Chase. 
 
 "MY DEAR WILL, "NiKKO, Aug. 27, 1891. 
 
 "The paper containing the sad news of the death of 
 your little boy reached mo before I lefj Tokyo. It would
 
 AN END AND A BEGINNING 
 
 be useless for me to try to tell you how very sorry I feel 
 for your great loss. However much I might wish to say 
 it would resolve itself into expressions of my heartfelt 
 sympathy for yourself and your wife and of this I know 
 you need no assurance. Although I don't believe in time 
 being the healer of all things still I know that it makes 
 us accustomed to the pain it cannot make us forget. 
 Please give my kindest regards to Mrs. Chase and the 
 deep sympathy I feel for her affliction and believe me 
 
 "Your loving friend, 
 
 "Bos." 
 
 In 1892 the Shinnecock house was finished, and the 
 Chase family, which now contained three children, took 
 possession of it. That fall they moved to a little house in 
 West Eleventh Street. Chase continued with his Brook- 
 lyn class, and with his private pupils in his own studio. 
 He painted the delightful picture of a little girl known 
 as Alice in 1893, and also that same year the Woman with 
 the White Shawl. The first is owned by the Chicago Art 
 Institute and the second by the Pennsylvania Academy. 
 
 In 1894 he taught for a month at the Art Institute in 
 Chicago, spreading his gospel of art still further. 
 
 Eighteen hundred and ninety-five was a year of 
 change and transition. Chase gave up his presidency of 
 
 [165]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the Society of American Artists, discontinued his Brook- 
 lyn class, prepared to give up his Tenth Street Studio, 
 and bought the house on Stuyvesant Square which re- 
 mained his home until his death. 
 
 For two years Chase had been trying to get that 
 house. Several years before it had belonged to some 
 people who were the temporary owners of Whistler's 
 White Woman, and there for the first time Chase saw 
 that picture. He took a great fancy to the fine, large old 
 house, partly, no doubt, because of this pleasing as- 
 sociation, and finally succeeded in getting possession of 
 it. In it his sons Robert and Dana were born, also 
 his youngest daughter, Mary Content, and his fifth 
 daughter, Helen. 
 
 Nothing could have been more characteristic than the 
 last scene of that act of Chase's life which had been 
 enacted in the Tenth Street Studio. Whistler might 
 have played his part differently but no more effectively. 
 In 1895 Chase's financial affairs came to a climax. The 
 difficulties attendant upon carrying on the career of a 
 patron of the arts on a painter's income brought about 
 a climax which might easily have been foreseen by 
 every one except the chief actor in the drama. But in 
 all emergencies of life the future beckoned to Chase. 
 If one chapter must be closed, an evqn more alluring 
 
 [166]
 
 From a photograph copyright by Detroit Photographic Co. 
 
 ALICE. 
 Property of the Art Institute, Chicago.
 
 AN END AND A BEGINNING 
 
 one opened on the next page. If he must be sold out 
 then he must. He accepted that fact and began to build 
 a castle in Spain. He decided to give up his New York 
 teaching and to take his family and some pupils to 
 Madrid as soon as his affairs were settled. 
 
 His students when they heard the news gave him a 
 loving cup. He gave them a dinner at his house. Not 
 satisfied with that hospitable festivity, he planned a 
 farewell party for his friends, a veritable banquet. It 
 was held in the Tenth Street Studio which was especially 
 decorated for the occasion. Almost the very plates from 
 which they ate were carried away to go under the ham- 
 mer, but Chase's serene hospitality lasted until an un- 
 usually late hour a courageous climax, an undaunted 
 spirit. 
 
 A few days later he carried his family away to Spain. 
 Before he left he purchased a few rings, the nucleus of 
 a new collection. 
 
 [167]
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 SPAIN AND THE CHASE SCHOOL OF ART 
 
 IN January 1896 Chase and his wife and two of 
 his children, Dorothy and Alice, usually known as 
 "Cosy," sailed for Spain, where they remained until the 
 following June. Chase took a class with him, and the 
 trip was a very happy one for all concerned. 
 
 Despite his humanity Chase enjoyed the bull-fights; 
 he also revelled in the markets, but his greatest pleasure 
 was the Prado Museum. It was during this trip that he 
 made one of his most important Velasquez copies, Las 
 Meninas, now in the collection of copies of old masters 
 by well-known artists got together by Mr. Nelson of 
 Indianapolis. The others, made in 1896, are still in the 
 painter's house. 
 
 One day while Chase was working at his copy of Las 
 Meninas in the museum two Spaniards, picturesquely 
 enveloped in dark cloaks, stopped to watch him. Mrs. 
 Chase, who was with the artist, noticed that one was 
 decorated with the Cross of Santiago. When the Spanish 
 gentlemen saw the copy they removed their hats, and 
 one made a remark in Spanish. When they walked away 
 another watcher translated the Spanish nobleman's 
 
 [168]
 
 SPAIN AND THE CHASE SCHOOL OF ART 
 
 tribute to the masterly copy: "Velasquez lives again," 
 he had said. 
 
 This recalls a remark that Chase used often to make 
 to his class apropos of that decoration and that picture: 
 
 It is told that when King Philip, the patron of Velas- 
 quez, had seen the completed picture, which contains 
 among the figures of the group a portrait of Velasquez 
 himself painting at his easel, he turned to the painter 
 and said: "But your picture is not finished." Velasquez, 
 astonished, asked the King what he meant. 
 
 "Wait, give me your brush," replied Philip. When it 
 was handed to him he painted the Cross of Santiago 
 upon the breast of Velasquez, conferring upon him by 
 this act the highest honor obtainable by a Spanish 
 nobleman. 
 
 "But," Mr. Chase used to add, "I feel sure that 
 Velasquez afterward painted out Philip's decoration and 
 painted it in again himself. It is too well done." 
 
 Chase entered thoroughly into the spirit of Spanish 
 life, and when his work with his class was over went with 
 Mrs. Chase in search of picturesque sights and impres- 
 sions. The evenings they usually spent at the cafes 
 watching the gay pageant of the streets. 
 
 One evening returning from a place in a remote part 
 of Madrid where they had gone to see some gypsy danc- 
 
 [169]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 ing especially recommended by a brother artist, Chase 
 discovered when he came out that he had no small 
 change. Familiar with the ways of Latin cabmen, he de- 
 cided that it would be better to get some before calling 
 a cab. The only lighted place in sight was a small wine- 
 shop, obviously not of the sort that he could take a 
 woman into; so, leaving his wife alone an instant on 
 the street, he went in. As he did not come out immedi- 
 ately, and as she heard footsteps approaching in the 
 darkness, it occurred to Mrs. Chase that it might be 
 better for her to walk slowly along rather than seem to 
 be loitering alone upon the street at midnight. When 
 Chase finally emerged he was distracted to find that his 
 wife was nowhere in sight. Mrs. Chase, having been fol- 
 lowed by a man in a cloak, had continued to walk on 
 until she had lost herself. At a late hour she chanced 
 upon the neighborhood of their pension, where, after 
 some difficulties in identifying herself sufficiently to be 
 allowed admittance by the watchman at the locked outer 
 gate, she finally regained her room in safety, where con- 
 siderably later she was joined by a frenzied husband. 
 
 Every market-day found the painter and his wife in 
 the crowd, and many of the beautiful things in Chase's 
 home and studio were bought at that time. 
 
 Chase returned in June to his Shinne^ock class, and 
 
 [170]
 
 SPAIN AND THE CHASE SCHOOL OF ART 
 
 in the fall of that year he opened an art school of his own 
 called the Chase School in a building on the corner of 
 Fifty-seventh Street and Sixth Avenue. He found a suita- 
 ble studio for himself in the Glaenzer Building, now 
 torn down, on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Thirtieth 
 Street. 
 
 After two unprofitable years as owner and manager of 
 the Chase School, the unbusinesslike Chase wisely gave 
 up all attempt at management and turned the school 
 over to others, who in 1898 changed the name to the 
 New York School of Art. He remained at the head of 
 this institution for eleven years. A little before this he 
 had begun to teach at the Pennsylvania Academy, going 
 over to Philadelphia once a week for the purpose. He 
 always took great pride in the high standard of work 
 maintained by his Philadelphia pupils. 
 
 He continued teaching there until 1909. During these 
 years Chase painted some of his best pictures. The por- 
 trait of Emil Paur was painted in 1899, and about 1901 
 he painted the picture of his two children, known as 
 Dorothy and Her Sister, the portrait of his daughter Alice 
 called The Grey Kimono, as well as the other known as 
 The Red Box. 
 
 From 1896 until 1900 Chase's summers were spent at 
 Shinnecock. But in 1900 he took a flying trip to Europe 
 
 [171]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 in company with his sister-in-law, Minnie Gerson, leav- 
 ing her in France with friends while he made a flying trip 
 to Spain to collect some of his belongings there. 
 
 Miss Gerson recalls with amusement Chase's idea of 
 a preventive of seasickness, which was to read aloud to 
 her from George Moore's "Talks on Art," the topic 
 which he imagined to be of all others the most absorb- 
 ing and diverting to the mind. 
 
 In the summer of 1902 Chase went to London to have 
 his portrait painted by Sargent. For this purpose a sum 
 was raised by his pupils, who made the picture a gift to the 
 Metropolitan Museum as a tribute to their beloved 
 master. 
 
 This portrait, while representing with Sargent's cus- 
 tomary brilliance a superficial phase of Chase, is yet not 
 wholly satisfactory to those who knew and cared for 
 him. Chase, however, enjoyed Sargent's virtuosity so 
 much that he apparently had no fault to find with the 
 canvas as a portrait. 
 
 In a letter to Minnie Gerson from London he speaks 
 of it with enthusiasm: 
 
 "My DEAR MINNIE, 
 
 'There is so much to remind me of you here and I 
 have really missed you so much that I don't understand 
 
 [172]
 
 "Z js 
 
 I 
 
 * 
 
 a
 
 <>
 
 SPAIN AND THE CHASE SCHOOL OF ART 
 
 why I have not written to you before. It is the same 
 old London except that there is more board than lodg- 
 ing here just now (joak). 
 
 "Sargent's portrait of me is now finished. He did it 
 in six sittings, and I think you will like it. My friends 
 here say it is perfect. The painting is certainly beautiful. 
 I shall be most anxious to know how 'Toady' and you 
 all will like it. He has done me as a painter and they 
 say he has caught my animation whatever that means. 
 
 Mr. T and the Deweys are here and have asked if 
 
 they may go and see it. I shall be glad to get away now 
 that the picture is done as every American I meet (and 
 there are many of them) wants to go to Sargent's to see 
 me on canvas. I am afraid it will prove a nuisance. 
 
 "Sargent will most likely go to America next winter. 
 We have arranged to paint one another when he is in 
 New York again. Sargent's exhibit at the Academy is 
 magnificent. [Three underlinings.] 
 
 "I have been in so many of the same places we visited 
 together and I always think of you. Love to Jennie. 
 
 "Bless you. 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 That year Chase painted his portrait of Doctor Angell, 
 the charming little portrait of his daughter Dorothy in 
 
 [173]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 a Mexican hat, now the property of the St. Louis Mu- 
 seum; also his finely characterized portrait of Louis 
 Windmuller. 
 
 In the summer of 1902 John Twachtman, Chase's 
 companion in Venice and Munich, died, and in the spring 
 of the following year Chase was elected a member of 
 the Ten American Painters in his place. 
 
 [174]
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 TO all familiar with contemporary American art the 
 Shinnecock landscape must ever be associated with 
 the name of Chase. To that extent does the thing seen 
 with the eye and recorded with the brush impose itself 
 upon the mind of the beholder. 
 
 "How terrible if nature were to come to look to you 
 like that," Chase used to say to the student who pro- 
 duced one of those dreary paraphrases of nature possible 
 only to ineptness; but the reassuring side of that psychic 
 fact is found in the artist's ability to educate the layman's 
 aesthetic sense by revealing to him some selected phase 
 of beauty in nature that his own eye could not have 
 discovered unaided. In so doing, the painter sets his pos- 
 sessive impress upon the landscape. 
 
 This thing William Chase did with the sand-hills of 
 Shinnecock. He scorned the picture that told a story; 
 nevertheless he did more than present a fine bit of tech- 
 nical painting in his Shinnecock landscapes, for he was 
 able to lead the imagination over the lonely road winding 
 through the sand-dunes to the sea and make one feel 
 the wide sweep of the wind across the moors. 
 
 In the same way he has placed his children in the 
 
 [175]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Shinnecock landscape, pink-ribboned and red-capped, 
 in a perpetual summer-time. He used to call his oldest 
 daughter "his red note" because, having usually a touch 
 of red in her costume, she was constantly called upon to 
 add that accent to his composition. 
 
 Surrounded by bay, sweet-fern and vivid patches of 
 butterfly-weed, Chase's house is set, as it were, in the 
 midst of one of his own landscapes, its nearest neighbor 
 off on a distant hilltop. On one side lies the ocean in vista, 
 on the other Peconic Bay. The water is not near enough 
 to be heard except in a storm; its place is decorative 
 rather than intimate. Indeed, it would seem as if house 
 and studio must have been designed to make pictures 
 from within, for every window and doorway frames a 
 composition. 
 
 Chase's studio, built a few steps below the level of 
 the house floor, is a part of the house, yet shut off from it 
 in such a way that intrusion was impossible. There some 
 of Chase's best work was done fish pictures, interiors, 
 and kimono portraits. 
 
 The sky, which so impresses itself upon the imagina- 
 tion in those wide Shinnecock spaces, always strongly 
 compelled Chase's painting impulse. Some days he spent 
 hours at his wide studio window simply painting the 
 changing clouds, veritable sky studies. 
 
 [176]

 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 The school studio, where his criticisms were given, was 
 located about three miles from the house. The group of 
 small houses surrounding it was known as the Art Vil- 
 lage. These cottages, designed by prominent architects 
 for a nominal sum, were occupied by Chase's pupils, 
 several of them sometimes combining to rent one for the 
 summer. The students came from all over the country, 
 and many painters now well known were among them. 
 The school grew to such proportions, however, enrolling 
 some years as many as a hundred students, that many 
 of them had to find lodgings in the village. The school 
 building contained besides the large room where criti- 
 cisms were held, a studio for indoor painting on rainy 
 days and a supply shop for materials. 
 
 Chase gave two criticisms a week. Every Monday 
 morning the week's work was taken to the studio and 
 put up on a special sort of easel resembling a black- 
 board, which held a number of sketches at a time. After 
 the criticism Chase remained at the studio until lunch 
 time, so that the students could ask questions or submit 
 for further criticism some sketch made the preceding 
 week. 
 
 On Tuesdays Chase went off with the class for the 
 entire day, a wise arrangement, as there could be no 
 more stimulating time to put into effect what had been 
 
 [177]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 learned than after one of his criticisms, for he always 
 made the student feel that the next time he was going 
 to do the best thing he had ever painted. Chase gave a 
 talk once a month. He also painted regularly as a lesson 
 for the class, a landscape, a head, or a bit of still life. 
 Students were encouraged to ask questions. These were 
 written on slips of paper and dropped in a little box. 
 During his lectures and his weekly criticisms Chase un- 
 dertook to answer all these faithfully. 
 
 The students soon discovered that if they chose a 
 subject along the road leading from Chase's house to 
 Southampton they were sure of an extra criticism. Chase 
 could seldom pass a painter at work pupil or stranger, 
 at home or abroad. Especially if the unknown artist 
 seemed poor and uninstructed did that generous soul 
 want to offer all he had to give, so beautiful was his 
 feeling for the thing that the worker was struggling, 
 however obscurely, to express. Therefore, the pupil 
 with her back toward the approaching vehicle, but her 
 canvas turned toward the road, was sure sooner or 
 later to hear her master's voice: "Drive slowly, please. 
 Stop here just a minute." Then words of warning or 
 commendation were offered. On days when several 
 pupils were imbued with this same happy thought, Chase's 
 ride to the village was rather a long one. 
 
 [178]
 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 At no other time did Chase have greater occasion to 
 put into effect his view-point concerning the choice of a 
 subject than during these days at Shinnecock, frequently 
 holding up as an example of what not to do the student 
 who had walked miles over the moors to find something 
 sufficiently paintable. The pupil in question was not al- 
 ways pleased at being told to paint the rail fence across 
 the way instead of the panorama of sea and sky, but if 
 she had arrived at any real perception of art in the 
 course of her studies, she came eventually to under- 
 stand her master's purpose. 
 
 Although Chase never lost sight of the eternal prin- 
 ciples underlying the art of painting, and while at that 
 peaceful day he could not have foreseen the variously 
 evoked nightmares of Futurism, he had as deeply rooted 
 a hatred of conventionality as a sane painter could possi- 
 bly have. Above all things, he warned his students 
 against the rut, and the danger of seeing things "in a 
 tiresome way." Of himself he said: "I have experimented 
 always." In order to uproot any tendency to routine in 
 the minds of his students he carried his suggestions 
 to them to "queer" their compositions to the point of 
 arranging at intervals actual "queering" contests in 
 which the student was advised to imagine the most un- 
 likely seeing of his subject. To stimulate competition, 
 
 [179]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Chase offered one of his own sketches as a prize for the 
 best result. "And some of them were very queer," his 
 daughter, Mrs. Sullivan, remarked pensively, recalling 
 them, and yet we may be sure, after all, very proper and 
 dignified arrangements compared with the compositional 
 chaos of the hysterical hour now blessedly passing. For 
 while the erratic subject handled with real professional 
 knowledge may provide the mental fillip that Chase 
 recommended for jaded seeing, the neurotic, ignorant, or 
 charlatan production is now disappearing, as we all 
 knew it must, into the limbo of forgotten things. 
 
 Many characteristic comments, profound, satirical, 
 constructive, were made at those Monday criticisms. 
 
 One summer when a hectic wave of impressionism 
 was agitating the students' colony, several canvases 
 were brought into the Shinnecock class showing lurid 
 patches of yellow and blue. When Chase saw them upon 
 the screen he began to hem and hum, tug at the string 
 of his glasses, tap his stick upon the floor, and twist his 
 moustache. Finally, with a slight frown, he turned upon 
 the perpetrator it was seldom necessary for him to 
 ask his or her name. "And it was as yellow as that?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "Oh, yes, Mr. Chase. Really it was. The sun was 
 right on it, you know, and it was very yellow." The 
 
 [180]
 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 pupil babbled on, imagining that she was being very 
 convincing. 
 
 "Hm," was Chase's reply, after another glance. "And 
 September not here yet ! Give the goldenrod a chance, 
 madam. Give the goldenrod a chance." 
 
 Howard Chandler Christy, an early pupil of Chase's 
 at Shinnecock, recalls his master's reply to one of those 
 serious-minded muddlers who infest summer painting 
 classes. The efforts of this rather mature lady were par- 
 ticularly hopeless, but apparently quite unaware of 
 limitation she looked up brightly at her instructor as he 
 approached: "There is just one thing I am worried 
 about, Mr. Chase. Will you advise me about my colors ? 
 I'm afraid I'm not using the right kind. I'm afraid these 
 colors may fade." 
 
 Chase bent a cold eye upon the enthusiastic lady's 
 canvas and, after the familiar manifestation of sounds 
 and movements recognized as a danger-signal by the ac- 
 customed pupil, he replied: "In your case, madam, the 
 very best you can possibly use!" and passed on. 
 
 But Chase was always considerate of the sensitive 
 pupil, talented or untalented, sometimes giving a private 
 criticism after the general discussion in order to spare a 
 nervous girl the embarrassment of public comment upon 
 her deficiencies. 
 
 [181]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 He was, however, disturbed by the problem of the in- 
 dustrious but ungifted pupil. Pausing one day beside the 
 easel of a young man of this type, after regarding his in- 
 harmonious and painstaking work with distaste for a 
 moment, he inquired in a troubled tone: "Do you really 
 like that manner of painting?" 
 
 The perplexed pupil looked up. "Why, no, Mr. Chase, 
 I can't say that I do." 
 
 "Then try some other way. Try some other way." 
 
 Chase's wit was likely to emit sparks in contemplation 
 of artistic futility, but it seemed inspired by, rather than 
 at the expense of, the hopeless pupil. Christy remem- 
 bers another case of a boy quite devoid of talent, whose 
 admiring family were determined that he should be an 
 artist. One day as the master walked over the sand-dunes 
 seeking out the various pupils camped about in the 
 landscape, he came upon the boy seated in a little hol- 
 low, painting nothing in particular as there was really 
 no subject in sight, but industriously covering his canvas 
 with paint and whistling cheerfully a sound that Chase 
 never enjoyed. 
 
 "Well, and how are you getting on ?" he inquired with 
 perfunctory pleasantness, but we can imagine with a 
 perceptibly ruffled brow. 
 
 The inartistic youth looked up brigl^ly. "Fine, sir, 
 
 [182]
 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 fine !" he replied, full of good spirits and his healthy igno- 
 rance of art. The painter gave a look at his canvas and 
 turned away. 
 
 "Quite the contrary, I assure you, sir,'* he remarked, 
 and without further elucidation passed on to the next 
 disciple. 
 
 For the pupil showing the faintest trace of the gleam 
 Chase's kind helpfulness was always ready. But like 
 others who have had to overcome obstacles and opposi- 
 tion to their chosen career, he had little patience with 
 the ungifted pupil surfeited with opportunity. For that 
 reason he sometimes made the retort that seemed un- 
 sympathetic. 
 
 "Consider nature as the painted thing," was one of 
 his suggestions helpful to the imaginative student. 
 "Paint a tree that the birds could fly through," was 
 another criticism of the same rather cryptic type. "Make 
 your sky look as if we could see through it, not as if it 
 were a flat surface," is a little more tangible; and, "No- 
 tice how the darkest spot outdoors is lighter than the 
 white window-sill within," is an entirely practical hint. 
 
 One afternoon in the week, usually Saturday or Mon- 
 day, Chase's studio was open to students, friends of 
 students, and, indeed, all of Southampton, for Chase's 
 talks and receptions were one of the features of the
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 place, and always all that he knew or had to give was at 
 the disposal of the interested, whether it was a brother 
 artist, a student, or the merest outsider. 
 
 So much did Southampton appreciate the social as- 
 pects of the School Studio and Chase's talks that at one 
 time it became necessary to make clear the fact that the 
 school was primarily for the benefit of the art students. 
 
 Another Shinnecock event that combined art with 
 the social side of things was the Old Master Tableaux 
 given by Chase and his wife at the School Studio and at 
 the houses of the summer residents. 
 
 These pictures, which were never produced under more 
 fortunate conditions than at Shinnecock, had interested 
 Chase ever since his Munich days when as has been told 
 he used to pose his model in a frame in the semblance of 
 a favorite Van Dyck for an audience of his fellow students. 
 
 The artist's children and his pupils usually posed for 
 the Shinnecock tableaux. Among the most interesting 
 experiments were the pictures arranged in sunlight in a 
 room in Mrs. Porter's house, where a certain atmospheric 
 effect of indoor light suggested possibilities to the 
 painter's wife. Two of the pictures devised for that oc- 
 casion were especially successful; one hurriedly arranged 
 at the last minute as an eleventh-hour substitute was of 
 Mrs. Chase posed as the Dagnan-Bouyeret madonna, 
 
 [184]
 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 which Chase found so much like her. In her lap she held 
 one of her own babies, the mysterious nimbus of light 
 around the child's head created by a concealed night- 
 candle. The other picture which so impressed the audi- 
 ence was of Helen Chase, then a small child, posed as 
 the Velasquez Infanta, an effect so charming that Mrs. 
 Porter ordered a portrait of the little girl painted in 
 that costume. 
 
 Several of the Chase children were born at Shinne- 
 cock. The fact was always proclaimed in Japanese fash- 
 ion, with a fish floating from the housetop. The fourth 
 daughter, Hazel, is said to have been the first white 
 child born on Shinnecock Hills, which were formerly oc- 
 cupied by the Indians. For that reason the child was 
 given an Indian middle name, Neamaug, meaning "be- 
 tween two waters," which perfectly describes the loca- 
 tion of the Chase home. 
 
 A deposit of clay opportunely placed by nature near 
 the painter's house was much appreciated by the Chase 
 children who used it for modelling, and enjoyed also a 
 privilege that is not the portion of many children, for 
 both Chase and Blum, who often visited Chase at Shin- 
 necock, entertained themselves by making it into archi- 
 tectural blocks. These were then baked in the sun and 
 used for the construction of Greek temples or any imag- 
 
 [185]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 inative structure that happened to strike the artists' 
 fancy at the moment. A particularly successful building 
 was cemented together and kept for a permanent play- 
 thing. The men also made serious experiments in 
 modelling. 
 
 Chase's mother was his first guest in his new home, 
 and her portrait was the first thing he painted in his 
 new studio. Mrs. Chase says that as she watched the 
 progress of her portrait she wondered why a spot on the 
 top of her head was ignored by the painter. The next 
 day, after a trip to town, he brought in a dainty little 
 lace cap and told her to put it on. Ever since that day 
 she has worn a cap. 
 
 Chase's mother was anxious for any opportunity to do 
 her son a personal service during her visits. One day he 
 sent home a pair of new white trousers and remarked to 
 his wife in his mother's presence that they were too long, 
 and asked her to shorten them so that he might wear them 
 the following day. That evening his wife remembered the 
 request and shortened the trousers according to in- 
 structions, but when the painter put them on the next 
 morning they proved to be about knickerbocker length, 
 for his devoted mother had taken her turn at shortening 
 them first ! 
 
 The Shinnecock Indians, a mixture >f negro and In- 
 
 [186]
 
 CHASE'S MOTHER. 
 
 The first portrait painted by the artist in his Shinnecock studio.
 
 SHINNECOCK 
 
 dian, played their part in the life of the summer school. 
 In the beginning the students, like other residents of 
 Shinnecock, were not allowed to enter the reservation 
 at all. Before long, however, the tactful Chase made one 
 of the old Indians a friendly call and obtained permission 
 without asking it. The students often went there to paint 
 and a number of the Shinnecock Indians served as 
 models both outdoors and in the studio. One girl named 
 Romaine, of whom Chase made a study, posed fre- 
 quently for the painter and his students. Chase's rela- 
 tions with the Indians remained friendly to the last and 
 the Indians were always interested in the school. One of 
 the Shinnecock students tells a story of Chase's spon- 
 taneous generosity upon one occasion when he was 
 painting for the class near the reservation while a fair 
 was being held for the benefit of the Indians. When his 
 sketch was finished Chase presented it to the fair com- 
 mittee to be sold at auction. 
 
 Although the house was not near enough to the school 
 to permit of the intrusion of the thoughtless, the students 
 often enjoyed the hospitality of the Chase household. 
 Chase liked to bring sympathetic students home to lunch. 
 The day when, after having carelessly stated before 
 going to his criticism, that he had invited a student to 
 lunch and brought home seventeen was one remembered 
 
 [187]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 for some time by the painter's wife, for the nearest mar- 
 ket was six miles away and motors and telephones then 
 practically non-existent. 
 
 Nineteen hundred and two was the last summer of 
 the art school, although the Chase family continued to 
 spend their summers at Shinnecock. 
 
 The Art Village is now a popular and artistic summer 
 settlement. Mrs. Porter, who had so much to do with 
 the founding of the school and had always a heartfelt 
 interest in its success, now uses the School Studio as her 
 summer home, having extensively added to and built 
 around it, thus preserving both the room and its asso- 
 ciations. 
 
 The school was never larger or more successful than 
 in its last year and every one concerned regretted Chase's 
 decision to give it up. 
 
 During the eleven years of its existence a far-reaching 
 influence had been set in motion, for in that time little 
 more than a decade Shinnecock had set its impress 
 upon the landscape art of America. 
 
 The following summer Chase began to hold his summer 
 classes in Europe. 
 
 [188]
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 CHASE'S contact with European art and life, if 
 brief, was continuous. The story of the summers 
 that he spent abroad, usually teaching for part of the 
 time, is told in outline in his letters to his wife and the 
 other members of the family, but except for an occasional 
 sentence here and there they do not reveal much of his 
 personality, the charm of which was not somehow com- 
 municable through his pen. 
 
 The letters to his wife are the literal affectionate 
 chronicles of the day rather than interesting comments 
 upon his experiences. Even when he speaks of the pic- 
 tures he admired he substitutes emphasis for selective 
 characterization. It is true that this was also his way, 
 although to a less extent, when he talked about art; but 
 in talking the personality of the man, his enthusiasm, 
 a certain dramatic gift of implication that he had, made 
 his hearers feel that they felt the thing that had impressed 
 him in a canvas, although "a beautiful thing, a wonder- 
 ful thing" was generally the extent of his comment. 
 And so in his letters he used a system of underlinings, 
 one, two, three, and even four, to indicate the degree of 
 
 [189]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 his enthusiasm or admiration rather than the descriptive 
 adjective. 
 
 In the summer of 1903 Chase went to Holland, where 
 he held his first European summer class. His daily let- 
 ters to Mrs. Chase at this time give a faithful account 
 of his doings. As was his invariable habit, he first visited 
 London and Paris, but before he proceeded on to Hol- 
 land he revisited Munich for the first and only time since 
 his student days. 
 
 Writing from London in June to Mrs. Chase, he tells 
 of going with a Mr. Howard, an American artist living 
 in London, to a sale of pictures and art objects. 
 
 "I bid on two pictures," he remarks, "but did not get 
 them. I did get however a small statuette in china of 
 Benjamin Franklin with Washington's name lettered on 
 the base, a rather interesting piece. Three shillings is all 
 I had to give for it." 
 
 A guilty consciousness of his almost uncontrollable 
 spending impulse causes him to add: 
 
 "You must congratulate me by the way I haven't 
 yet bought a single ring! After the sale I went to Mr. 
 Howard's studio. Some people came in for five o'clock 
 tea, among them Mrs. Meyer whom Sargent painted. 
 She asked Mr. Howard and me to take lunch at their 
 house to-morrow and see the Sargent portrait and other 
 
 [190]
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 pictures. . . . After dinner I went to a house in Co vent 
 Garden where I was asked to drop in any time between 
 ten and twelve. I found a very large dinner party in the 
 most magnificent house I have ever been in, filled with 
 fine old masters. I arrived a few minutes before the 
 gentlemen joined the ladies when we went up and saw 
 an assemblage of the most magnificently gowned and 
 bejeweled lot of ladies ALL smoking cigarettes. Three 
 of the ladies are Americans who have married titled 
 lords or earls. There was music and a bridge whist game 
 later. I did not stay very long. It is now twelve o'clock 
 and I will go to bed. So much excitement is likely to 
 keep me awake for a while. I'll think only of you and 
 the children if I am. Bless you, I love you. Kisses to the 
 
 chicks. Goodnight. 
 
 "Love. WILL." 
 
 The next letter describes his second day. 
 
 "Early this morning I called on La very and after 
 called on Brangwyn. At one o'clock went to lunch at 
 
 Lady M 's, another fine house, lots of pictures, 
 
 servants and all. The luncheon was pleasant. If I stayed 
 long enough here I would find myself introduced to all 
 the swells. One gratifying thing about it all is that they 
 all seem to know about me. This afternoon I went to the 
 
 [191]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 National Gallery and tonight I had Kennedy to dine 
 with me. Afterwards we went to the hippodrome and 
 saw a fine performance. ... It is now eleven thirty. I 
 find on consulting my watch that it is five o'clock in the 
 afternoon with you, and I am imagining you packing 
 for Shinnecock with Roland holding on to you. 
 
 "I got a letter from you this morning which was 
 written the day before I sailed. I shall hope to find more 
 letters in Paris. How I wish you were all with me. God 
 
 bless you and our dear children. 
 
 "Love. 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 A few days later he writes from Paris: 
 
 "This morning I went to the Salon. . . . Only a few 
 really good pictures. Tomorrow I shall go at once to 
 Munroe's hoping to get letters from you. I suppose you 
 will go down to Shinnecock tomorrow. I dream about 
 you and the children very often. I find on consulting my 
 watch that you are probably having lunch now at home. 
 I am wondering if you went to Shinnecock today. I 
 watch my watch and have reckoned the time you would 
 take a train." 
 
 In his next letter he alludes to the death of his friend 
 Robert Blum. 
 
 "I got yours and Dorothy's letter this afternoon. I 
 
 [192]
 
 PORTRAIT OK ROBERT BUM BY CHASE.
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 had already heard of Blum's death. Isn't it awful? I 
 lunched with Knoedler and Alexander Harrison today. 
 Harrison told me of Blum's death. I can't get it out of 
 my head. Was he sick long? Just think of his being no 
 more. I am afraid he did not take good care of himself 
 for a long time back." 
 
 Further on he relates with the evident expectation of 
 being commended: "I have not bought anything as yet 
 although I have seen some tempting rings." 
 
 In another letter from Paris he inquires: "How is our 
 baby getting along ? Does he walk yet ? I am so glad you 
 gave me the photographs of the children. I would like 
 some more when you can send them. I haven't any very 
 satisfactory ones of you or Cosy. It is still raining and 
 so cold. The boulevards are dismal and deserted. . . . 
 Bless you, sweetheart, I wish you were with me. . . . 
 
 "Tell Dorothy and Cosy that I will write to them 
 soon." 
 
 He mentions in the course of his next letter that he is 
 proud of himself because he "has not bought a single 
 trinket," which shows that he at least made some at- 
 tempt to restrain his purchasing vagaries. From Munich 
 his first letter reveals the frequent grievance of the 
 traveller who asks information not dealing with France 
 from French officials. 
 
 [193]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "Well darling here I am. Owing to a stupid French- 
 man's putting me on the wrong train I reached here at 
 three P. M., instead of ten A. M. When I reached Ulm, 
 a city about three hours from here, I decided to stop 
 and see what the place was like, it looks so picturesque 
 from the train. I was well repaid for the hour's stop. 
 I sent you post-cards from there. I found when I reached 
 here that my trunk and hat-box had been held at the 
 frontier because I was not there to open them for inspec- 
 tion." 
 
 Chase was in the habit of blandly leaving all customs 
 transactions to his travelling companion; in this case he 
 did not have one. He continues with his impressions of 
 Munich: 
 
 "I have been looking Munich over and find much of 
 it so changed that I do not recognize the place. I am 
 astounded at the beauty of the city. It is simply mag- 
 nificent." [Three underlinings.] "I did not run across 
 any of my friends this afternoon. I am in a hotel di- 
 rectly opposite a place where Shirlaw and I lived for 
 several years. The hotel is now made a magnificent one, 
 every modern convenience. I have a room superbly fur- 
 nished. They tell me my breakfast will be served in my 
 room tomorrow morning. . . . Tomorrow morning I 
 
 [194]
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 will go to the gallery. I feel sure I am going to enjoy my 
 stay here and thank heaven it is warm. I was almost 
 frozen in Paris. Goodnight darling. God bless you. 
 Kisses to all the children. 
 
 "YOUR DEVOTED HUSBAND." 
 
 The next day he tells of going to the New Pinakotek, 
 where he "saw some good pictures, among them that 
 splendid picture by Dagnan-Bouveret which looks so 
 wonderfully like you. I choked with emotion when I saw 
 it and I also forthwith had a spell of homesickness. I 
 would give anything to possess this picture. It is more 
 like you than the other one owned by Shields Clark. I 
 shall go to see it often while I am here. 
 
 "I went to the Secession Exhibition. I am a member 
 of this society and I told the man at the entrance who I 
 was and he admitted me free and told me that I had 
 many friends in Munich who would be glad to see me. 
 It is a very good exhibition. I got my trunk all right 
 this morning. Have not seen any of my friends yet. I 
 got three crosses for you today, pretty good ones. I went 
 to the Gartner Platz Theater tonight. It is the theater I 
 used to go to so often. It is not changed at all, even the 
 same drop curtain. For the moment I was taken back 
 to the student days." 
 
 [195]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 The next day he continues his story: 
 
 "Today I went to the old Pinakotek and enjoyed the 
 pictures very much. They looked like old acquaintances 
 and old friends. I have been strolling about seeing parts 
 of the city that I had not seen since my arrival. Tomor- 
 row I will look up some of my former friends. I am 
 served with splendid coffee in my room every morning. 
 Of course I am thinking of you all in Shinnecock. It will 
 be several days before I can know any news from home 
 as I have ordered my mail forwarded to Haarlem. Good- 
 night sweetheart. Love and kisses to the chicks. 
 
 "WILL." 
 
 The following day he writes of meetings and renewals: 
 "... I went to call on some of my artist friends to- 
 day, found Prof. Dietz and Prof. Dietrich in their studios 
 and enjoyed a very pleasant call. They expressed them- 
 selves as delighted to see me. At the old gallery I met 
 my summer pupil Mr. Rittenberg. He said that he and 
 Mr. TJllmann had been looking all over the city to find 
 me. I have been with them all day. We went to the two 
 modern Exhibitions which are here now. Ullmann who 
 was leaving for Paris tomorrow has decided to go to 
 Vienna and Berlin with me. We will likely leave on Wed- 
 nesday. Tonight we went to a vaudevi|Je entertainment 
 
 [196]
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 at a magnificent theatre, the best of the performance 
 was a young American girl and a troupe. They met 
 with great success with the audience. 
 
 "I am always thinking of you and wishing you were 
 with me to enjoy all this. ... I am sending Dorothy 
 and Cosy a letter by this same mail." 
 
 Mr. Rittenberg gives an amusing account of their 
 sightseeing and visiting in Munich. Chase, resplendent 
 in summer white, with black-ribboned glasses and a 
 general effect of immaculateness, seated beside him in 
 the open droschke, presented, he says, rather the appear- 
 ance of a naval officer than of an artist. When they ar- 
 rived at the marble steps of the beautiful new academy 
 building the driver stopped at the entrance for the gen- 
 eral public. Within another closer half-circle was the 
 descending place for royalty and titled guests. Chase, 
 democratically unaware of this distinction but with an 
 American determination to effect the most precise 
 descent, waved magnificently to the cabman, "On, on !" 
 The cabman turned in his seat, hesitated, glanced at the 
 glittering attire of his fare, and at the third peremptory 
 "On!" without further question turned into the sacred 
 driveway and deposited the two painters at royalty's 
 entrance. As they entered the hall they found all the 
 eyes in the place upon them. As unfamiliar members of 
 
 [197J
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the royal family they were naturally of peculiar interest 
 to the German citizens. 
 
 Chase was delighted with the beautiful new building. 
 Afterward he went to visit the old academy where he 
 had studied, the sight of which revived many happy 
 memories. 
 
 Mr. Rittenberg says that their call upon the old 
 painter Dietz was quite touching. Chase had never been 
 a pupil of Dietz, having placed himself in Piloty's class, 
 but in his student days the young American painter had, 
 of course, been known to the other German instructors. 
 
 Old Dietz was seated at his easel painting as they went 
 in. Chase went up to him and held out his hand. "Do 
 you remember me, Herr Dietz?" he asked. The old 
 Bavarian looked up, keeping his eyes upon his guest's 
 face an instant, then with a cry of delight he rose, ex- 
 claiming, "It is Herr Chase," and welcomed him with 
 almost childlike affection. Chase was deeply touched by 
 this greeting after his twenty -five years of absence. 
 
 Carl Marr, whom they visited next, seemed also glad 
 to see the American painter again, but his manner, Mr. 
 Rittenberg says, was more that of the bashful school- 
 boy than the well-known painter. Marr, he thought, 
 was embarrassed by his consciousness of their artistic 
 differences. 
 
 [198]
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 Another letter from Chase to his wife alludes to these 
 Munich meetings. 
 
 "I am afraid I got to bed rather late last night ."I 
 spent the evening with the boys who seemed never to 
 know when to stop talking. Yesterday was a very in- 
 teresting day for me. I visited several of the dealer's 
 places and after lunch went to Lenbach's studio and 
 after that to Baron Schack's gallery where I saw some 
 beautiful pictures by Boecklin. Lenbach's studio and 
 house is simply magnificent. He was apparently glad to 
 see me and first of all said, 'Herr Chase you have made 
 a great name for yourself.' He showed me many portraits 
 which are fine." [Three underlinings.] "I dined with 
 several of the students and after spent the rest of the 
 evening in one of the magnificent cafes they have here. 
 Today we are going out to the Schlesheim palace where 
 we will see some pictures. I used to go there often." 
 
 Mr. Rittenberg said that he had never seen von Len- 
 bach more gracious than he was to Chase. He paid every 
 tribute to the American painter and was cordial to a 
 degree most unusual with him. Chase seems to have 
 been deeply impressed with the significance of von Len- 
 bach's beautiful home and commented a bit wistfully 
 upon the recognition given by Germany to her artists. 
 It was at such moments as these that it seemed to Chase 
 
 [199]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 that Europe was a better place for a painter to live in 
 than America. It is doubtful, however, if he would really 
 have been able to adapt himself successfully to a foreign 
 environment. Chase was not a natural linguist. Even 
 his long residence in Germany did not give him any 
 real command of the language. It seems probable that 
 the life he led, pupils and all perhaps pupils most of 
 all was the one that made him happiest and that best 
 enabled him to express the thing he was able to contrib- 
 ute to the art to which he gave his life. 
 
 The next letter to Mrs. Chase tells of the trip to 
 Schlesheim: 
 
 "There are a few good pictures in the palace, 
 one capital Velasquez. I dined with my friends and 
 spent the evening in the cafe which I have sent post- 
 cards of. To-morrow I must make several calls on old 
 friends whom I have not yet seen. I am having as good 
 a time as it is possible to have without you and the 
 children. ..." 
 
 With Mr. Rittenberg, Chase also visited Stiick's 
 house, which was decorated with and after the manner 
 of that painter's peculiar art. There Chase's horrified 
 comment was: "How terrible to have to live in such a 
 place!" Stiick's childish striving for the gruesome, a 
 development of the German romantic sdiool that might 
 
 [200]
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 be considered unwholesome were it less naive in its ef- 
 forts to inspire the shudder, his obvious striving for 
 symbolism, his mannered treatment, is after all just 
 Chase's old enemy, "the bonbon-box kind of thing" 
 turned to dank uses. The result is of all things the fur- 
 thest possible remove from Chase's ideal of art. He ad- 
 mired the exterior of Stuck's beautiful white house set 
 among carefully tended German green things, but he 
 was glad to close the door upon the deliberately con- 
 trived ghoulishness of the interior. 
 
 Chase went also to call on Fritz von Uhde, who lived 
 in the country outside Munich, and to Piloty's house, 
 where he saw for the first time since he had painted it 
 one of his portraits of the Piloty children, that of the 
 child who is no longer living, the others being in the 
 possession of their respective subjects. In the museum 
 Chase pointed out to Mr. Rittenberg a section of one of 
 Piloty's canvases that he had painted on in his student 
 days, a vast historical subject, relic of a bygone phase 
 of art. 
 
 Rittenberg and Ullman journeyed on with Chase. In 
 his letters to his wife from various points Chase con- 
 tinues his faithful, if somewhat unilluminated, account of 
 his doings. From Vienna he writes: 
 
 "Mr. Rittenberg, Ullman and I have been to see both 
 
 [201 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of the galleries here and have enjoyed a rare treat. The 
 pictures by Hals and Velasquez are very fine. . . ." 
 
 Two days later he writes from Berlin: "Immediately 
 after breakfast I went to the picture galleries," adding 
 characteristically, "I did not know until I had taken a 
 cab and found everything closed that it was Sunday. 
 The Velasquez and Hals pictures also the Rembrandts 
 are fine here, especially the big fat man by Velasquez. 
 After seeing the old masters we went to the modern ex- 
 hibition. The American part of it looks well, is well 
 placed occupying one of the best locations. My picture 
 of Cosy holding the Japanese book looks pretty well. 
 (I think perhaps you would say that it looks better than 
 pretty well.) The exhibit is a good one throughout, the 
 best modern show that I have seen since I left Paris. 
 Berlin is a beautiful city. One sees much of the pomp 
 which is so agreeable to your friend William. I sent you 
 a post-card of him. He is down at Kiel today where he 
 is dining and being dined by some of our naval men and 
 the Vanderbilts. I saw one of his sons drive through the 
 street today. You would have been amused to see the 
 taking off of hats and the low bowing. I was in an open 
 carriage and took off my hat. He saluted me but not the 
 street people. 
 
 "... Ullman and Rittenberg are stil^ with me. . . .
 
 MUNICH REVISITED 
 
 They have been very agreeable traveling compan- 
 ions. . . . 
 
 "I can scarcely wait to reach Haarlem and get your 
 letters." 
 
 The next letter from Cassel speaks of visiting the 
 galleries, seeing some excellent modern pictures in Ber- 
 lin, some "splendid" works by Leibl. He notes also at 
 the Secession Exhibition "some beautiful pictures." "I 
 am getting almost an indigestion of pictures," he re- 
 marks, "and will be glad when I can get to work. I am 
 in great anticipation of getting some letters from you to- 
 morrow when I will arrive at Haarlem. At the different 
 cities I have passed through I have found some crosses 
 for you. Have bought three rings not of much consequence. 
 I will likely drop you another line from here today. I 
 am always wishing you were with me. 
 
 "YOUR WILL." 
 
 [203]
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 THE next day Chase reached Holland. Henry Rit- 
 tenberg returned to Germany, but Eugene Ullman 
 went on with him to Haarlem. From Haarlem he writes 
 to Mrs. Chase of his preparation for the coming class. 
 
 "The students will arrive tomorrow and I have ar- 
 ranged to give them a little dinner at the principal cafe 
 here. This afternoon I went down to Zandvoort. I went 
 to the house where I lived the summer I spent there 
 and was immediately recognized by the woman who 
 lives there. It is the place where I painted my picture 
 known as The Tiff" * 
 
 His letter, written the following day, describes the 
 Fourth of July dinner he gave to welcome his students. 
 
 "Early in the morning I had them put out a large 
 American flag. Mr. Townsley went to Rotterdam to 
 meet the party. I had sent to Amsterdam for flags and 
 I must say the room looked very pretty. He got a small 
 picture of Washington and one of Roosevelt. I had flowers 
 and music, a small American flag at each place made 
 especially at Amsterdam. They are funny looking things. 
 
 * Subsequently called the Outdoor Breakfast, also Sunlight and Shadow. 
 
 [204]
 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 I will bring one home with me for you to see. Mrs. Wads- 
 worth and Frank look well. I thought you might give me 
 a surprise by sending Cosy with them to me. I have 
 found a little studio and will get to work at once. Love 
 to you my darling. Good-by until tomorrow. 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 The next letter carries on the tale of the students. 
 
 "The students will begin work tomorrow. I went over 
 to Amsterdam this afternoon and in the Jews quarter I 
 came upon a market quite like the Madrid one, anything 
 from a rusty nail to a fine cabinet clock or a silk dress. 
 The place would delight you everything spread out on 
 the pavement. I found a few things for the studio and a 
 cross for you. There are very few old rings to be had 
 and they are not very good. I have not bought any as 
 yet. My how I would enjoy to go through these old places 
 with you ! The weather is still unpleasant. I had to wear 
 my overcoat all day." 
 
 A few days later he writes of more pilgrimages to the 
 galleries. 
 
 "Mr. Townsley and I went to the Hague and went 
 directly to the gallery. There are some superb pictures 
 there and I was just in the mood to enjoy them. After 
 
 [205 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 lunch we went to call on Mesdag (you know I have 
 known him for a long time). He said he was glad to see 
 me, that he had heard I was in Haarlem with a lot of 
 American students and he considered that I was pay- 
 ing Holland a great compliment to come so far to study 
 their pictures. He could not have been more congenial. 
 His collection is very fine, and he is giving it to Holland. 
 . . . We are to have the first private view. We stayed 
 the entire afternoon. Mrs. Mesdag joined us with tea 
 and we returned to Haarlem feeling happy over a most 
 enjoyable time. Tomorrow morning is to be the first 
 criticism. If I decide to go to Spain next year do you 
 think you could manage to go with me? I don't care 
 how many of the children you take, the more the better 
 for me. "Your devoted 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 The next letter repeats the tale of cold weather, gal- 
 leries visited, talks to students, the starting of a new 
 still-life, another trip to the market, of crosses and rings 
 he had seen, without any comment upon the facts enu- 
 merated. Concerning the still-life he says: "I hope when 
 I see it tomorrow that I wont have to scrape it out. 
 Ullman and I took a long walk after dinner through the 
 beautiful canal streets here and saw many beautiful 
 
 r 2061
 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 motives for pictures some of which I shall hope to get 
 done. . . . 
 
 "I see in the Herald of yesterday that Whistler is 
 
 dead He will be very much missed as an 
 
 artist." 
 
 A letter written a few days later has rather more per- 
 sonality than some of the others. "I found you a cross 
 and a bit of old lace, a collar. It may not be good. You 
 know I am no expert in lace so don't expect too much. 
 The ladies say it is lovely but they would say that of 
 anything I buy I think. I also got two pretty good rings. 
 I did not go with the party this afternoon to Scheveningen 
 but returned here after I had visited several bric-a-brac 
 shops. 
 
 "The students telegraphed to London and arranged 
 to have a wreath placed on Whistler's coffin in the name 
 of me and the class. Nice of them to do this, don't you 
 think so ? Ullman begins a portrait of me tomorrow. 
 
 :< Yesterday (in the name and memory of you) I took 
 Mrs. Wadsworth a small bottle of Pond's Extract which 
 I had in my bag. I believe her ankle is better now. She 
 is as enthusiastic as any of the young pupils over what 
 she finds here. I wish you were with me." 
 
 Again he enthusiastically describes some early-bird 
 shopping: 
 
 [207]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "My DARLING: 
 
 "I was ahead of everyone else this morning at the 
 old market, and got quite a lot of things, furniture, 
 brass, copper, clocks and some lace for you. You would 
 have enjoyed to look the stuff over and I don't doubt 
 but that you would have found some bargains that 
 missed me. 
 
 "The photographs arrived this afternoon. They are 
 splendid. I am very much disappointed not to find any of 
 you. Bob looks important and fine. Dorothy is superb. 
 
 "Love from your 
 
 "WiLL." 
 
 A letter written to his wife before breakfast shows 
 the necessity of his affectionate nature to communicate. 
 
 "... Not that I have anything new to tell you. You 
 know that I love you dearly. You have known this for 
 more than twenty years. Oh how I miss you. . . . To- 
 day after breakfast we (Townsley and I) take a train 
 for Antwerp. I am anticipating the pleasure to see again 
 the pictures I saw so many years ago." 
 
 In a letter to his sister-in-law, Minnie Gerson, written 
 from Haarlem, he shows both the affectionate feeling he 
 had for his wife's family and his omnipresent kindly in- 
 terest in his students. 
 
 [208]
 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 He begins by apologizing for not answering more 
 promptly her "lovely letter," and adds: 
 
 "I suppose you know how alarmed I was at not 
 having heard from you. You can imagine my relief to 
 know that you are the same sweet Minnie as of old. I 
 think of you often and did so especially in London and 
 Paris. . . . 
 
 "I am enjoying my stay here as much as is possible 
 without 'Toady' and the children. My students are very 
 happy and are hard at work. . . . 
 
 "It is just two months since I left home, it seems like 
 a year when I think of it. My pupils have about bought 
 all that there is to be had in brass and copper here and 
 the price has actually gone up since our arrival. I am 
 getting some interesting things in furniture. 'Toady' 
 would revel in the old furniture markets here. If I come 
 abroad next year I am going to try to get 'Toady' and 
 you to come along. 
 
 "Do write to me soon again. I love to get your let- 
 ters. My love to Jennie. 
 
 "Lovingly yours, 
 
 "WILL." 
 
 The next letter to his wife inquires anxiously about 
 some promised snap-shots of "Rollie." 
 
 [209 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 "Has he walked yet?" he asks. "I think you expected 
 him to about this time." He speaks of his friend Mr. 
 Kennedy. "He stopped here for the express purpose to 
 see me which I think was very nice of him indeed. He 
 did not know to tell me much of Whistler's death except 
 that Whistler was out with a friend to drive the day be- 
 fore he died." 
 
 The letters continue with complaints of dark weather, 
 comments on a day's painting, and finally record the 
 arrival of the promised photographs of "Rollie." "How 
 nice the big ball is with him and Dorothy and Helen in 
 the distance. They make me homesick." 
 
 "I think I have something done," he writes, referring 
 to his day's work. "/ don't know what I will think tomor- 
 row. I have (as I wrote you yesterday) been away from 
 you and the dear children just two months today. Only 
 one more lap and then to you as fast as I can get there. 
 Saturday Townsley, Ullman and I are going over to 
 Antwerp and Brussels to see the galleries. I'll tell you all 
 about what I saw when I get back." 
 
 "I have been at work all day doing a still life," he 
 informs his wife the following day. "I found the work of 
 yesterday not too bad when I saw it this morning. While 
 at breakfast a tiny little letter (also a newspaper and a 
 magazine with the autobiography of Blum) was handed 
 
 [210]
 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 to me. I do wish you would write me more news of home. 
 ... I will try to find you something in Antwerp and 
 Brussels." 
 
 From Brussels he reports at once upon the pictures 
 which he pronounces very fine. He records seeing "six 
 magnificent Stevens" (three underlinings) and describes 
 a present she is to receive. "I was lucky to get a very 
 good long stick for you (a better one than those we saw 
 in Madrid). I got another rather good cross there. . . . 
 Three letters from you today, thank you. 
 
 "Love to Minnie. I suppose she is with you. 
 
 "YOUR WILL." 
 
 Writing to his sister-in-law, Virginia Gerson, about 
 this time he speaks of the death of his friend Robert 
 Blum. 
 
 "It is too bad about Blum's taking off. I saw with a 
 keen feeling of regret the little house he occupied here. 
 He is well remembered here. One party showed me a 
 photographic group in which Blum appears." Farther 
 on he remarks that the Franz Hals pictures are "even 
 finer than I remembered them." 
 
 In another paragraph he says: "I am getting some 
 pretty good crosses for Toady's collection. Bless her ! 
 How I do miss her and the children. Have I offended 
 
 [211]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Minnie? (my Minnie). I wrote her from London and 
 have not had a line from her. Please tell her I didn't mean 
 it, whatever it is that she may have taken offence at." 
 
 A few days later he took the students to see the Mes- 
 dag collections at The Hague. The students, he informed 
 his wife, "all came away very enthusiastic. Mr. Mesdag 
 and Mrs. Mesdag showed us their studios and were 
 most hospitable. ... I found two interesting crosses 
 for you. No rings to be found." 
 
 Josef Israels was the next painter who had to do 
 his duty by the students. The entire class made the trip 
 to The Hague with Chase. He comments upon their visit 
 as follows: 
 
 "We found Mr. Israels a very charming little man. 
 (He does not stand as high as my shoulder.) The stu- 
 dents were all delighted with the man and his pictures. 
 After the students scattered, some going to the mu- 
 seum and a number in search of bric-a-brac, I found the 
 cross. It is a pretty good one so I bought it for you. 
 
 "This afternoon John Van Dyke the art writer ar- 
 rived here. He dined with me tonight. I like him. You 
 know I have known him for a long time. He says he 
 simply stopped here to see me and the Hals pictures 
 again. 
 
 "I got three letters from you tonight. Thank you. 
 
 [212]
 
 A SUMMER CLASS IN HOLLAND 
 
 "In answer to your question did I get any Brussels 
 lace for you while there, I did get a bit, but I am sure 
 it is not good. Only I thought I must get something in 
 that line since Brussels is so celebrated for lace. I be- 
 lieve you will be interested in some of the things I have 
 got for you. . . . 
 
 "I went over to Amsterdam early this morning and 
 got my Hals copy going. I worked through for three 
 hours and I believe got a good start." 
 
 Nothing that could contribute to the students' plea- 
 sure or store of knowledge was overlooked. One of them 
 remembers how Chase took them all to a private house 
 in Holland to see the family portraits, one of which was 
 a fine example of Rembrandt. 
 
 Before he left Haarlem, Chase showed his apprecia- 
 tion of the friendly spirit of the townspeople as well as 
 his devotion to their greatest master by laying a wreath 
 at the foot of the Hals monument in the presence of the 
 mayor and the people of the town. 
 
 That the people of Haarlem valued the compliment 
 that Chase paid to the art of their country is shown by 
 the fact that before he left a silver medal was presented 
 to him by the burgomaster, Paul Vlissingen, inscribed: 
 "Remembrance of the visit of William Chase, U. S. A., 
 and his class to the Franz Hals Museum in Holland." 
 
 [213 ]
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 .LONDON AND MADRID 
 
 IN the spring of 1904 Chase's youngest child, Mary 
 Content, was born. Her entrance inlo the world oc- 
 curred one evening when Chase was to have been a 
 guest of honor at a dinner given by the Salmagundi 
 Club. When he failed to arrive and no explanation or 
 excuse seemed forthcoming, Chase's hosts could not 
 imagine what had happened, but as they sat at dinner, 
 having given up their guest, a telegram arrived for 
 Frederick Dielman stating that Chase was unable to 
 be present on account of the birth of another daughter. 
 
 Congratulations were telegraphed immediately to the 
 painter and his wife, all present drank a toast to the 
 baby, and a musician, a guest of the evening, instantly 
 improvised a cradle-song upon his violin. 
 
 That summer Chase held his summer class in Eng- 
 land. The centre of interest was Hampstead Heath, 
 where the students painted daily. Chase rented a fur- 
 nished studio in Chelsea for himself. 
 
 As in all the countries he visited with his pupils, he 
 took them to the studios of the painters, an experience 
 invaluable to his students, as aside from the interest 
 and stimulation of coming in contact with the painters 
 
 [214]
 
 LONDON AND MADRID 
 
 themselves, it gave them the opportunity to see their 
 studies and half-finished pictures, an object-lesson they 
 could have had in no other way. He escorted his entire 
 class to the studios of Edwin Abbey, Frank Brangwyn, 
 Alma-Tadema, La very, Shannon, and Sargent. 
 
 At Abbey's house the enthusiasm of the students did 
 not stop with the studio, but, charmed with the quaint- 
 ness of the English house, they penetrated even into the 
 kitchen, much to Mrs. Abbey's amusement. One of 
 Abbey's Shakespearian subjects was in the studio un- 
 completed at the time, and Chase, at Abbey's request, 
 criticised it. Abbey was also at work upon a coronation 
 picture for which the Queen was posing. Her gown lay 
 upon a chair in the studio and was the cause of great ex- 
 citement among the feminine pupils. 
 
 Walter Pach, a pupil in the class that summer, recalls 
 interesting pilgrimages to the galleries with their master, 
 his enthusiasm over the work of his favorites, his scorn- 
 ful wit expended upon the treasures of the Tate Gallery. 
 Catholic as was Chase's taste, he found himself unable 
 to discover any virtues in the Preraphaelites. After gaz- 
 ing for some time one day at one of Burne-Jones's heavy- 
 lipped, long-necked, large-eyed ladies, he turned to his 
 companion and said: "If I saw a woman like that com- 
 ing down the street I can tell you I'd run like a deer." 
 
 [ 215 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 But if Chase suffered from the Tate Gallery, he found 
 his greatest pleasure in the National Gallery, which he 
 used to say was probably the finest collection of pic- 
 tures in the world. 
 
 Always loyal to his compatriot Sargent, when he 
 paused before the Carnation Lily, Lily Rose picture, 
 quoting Whistler's paraphrase, Darnation silly, silly 
 pose, he refused to accept the Whistlerism as a just 
 criticism. 
 
 It was in 1904 that Chase painted his English Cod, 
 now owned by the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, and 
 this is how that particular cod came to be painted: 
 Passing a fishmonger's shop one day, Chase saw a large 
 and opalescent cod lying upon a marble slab. He stood 
 for some time gazing at it, priced it, decided that it was 
 rather an expensive and perishable bit of still-life mate- 
 rial and continued on his errand, but he could not forget 
 the fish. Its subtle color haunted his dreams as the face 
 of a beautiful woman is supposed to obsess the painter's 
 imagination in fiction, and the spell of its beauty drew 
 him back to the fishmonger's stall. He explained to the 
 owner of the shop the nature of his interest, and sug- 
 gested, since it was not his desire to dispose of the fish 
 in the usual and permanent manner, that perhaps he 
 might rent it for a few hours. 
 
 [216]
 
 LONDON AND MADRID 
 
 The fishmonger, since it was Saturday and a half- 
 holiday, hesitated at first lest he lose the sale of his fish. 
 After a short dicker, however, he agreed to rent the 
 cod to the artist, and Chase went away with his prize, 
 promising to pay for it if he kept it over the allotted 
 time. 
 
 When the fish was not returned on time the fish- 
 monger sent an emissary to the painter's studio to find 
 out what was going on. His report, whatever it was, 
 evidently aroused curiosity, for in a little while the fish- 
 monger himself appeared on the scene. He came in so 
 quietly that the painter did not hear him at first. When 
 discovered, he replied most respectfully: "Don't 'urry, 
 sir; it's getting on fine." 
 
 Chase kept the fish a little over time, but the fish- 
 monger waited patiently until he was through with it. 
 When the last brush stroke was planted that final 
 exactly right stroke that, as some one has said, seems al- 
 ways to say "there!" the painter turned to the owner 
 of the cod and, generous as always, suggested that he 
 ought to buy it since the fishman might by now have 
 lost all chance of selling his fish before Sunday. But the 
 fishmonger, after all an art-lover in his fashion, said that 
 he would take his chances and would accept nothing more 
 than the two hours' ' 'ire" for his fish. 
 
 [217]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 The next year when Chase was in London on his way 
 to Spain, finding himself in the vicinity of the fish- 
 monger's shop, he went in and asked the man if he re- 
 membered him. The fishmonger replied at once: "Oh, 
 yes, you are the American artist who painted my cod." 
 
 "I thought you might like to hear about it," said 
 Chase. "I sold that picture to a museum for four hun- 
 dred pounds." 
 
 The fishmonger listened with interest and remarked 
 that it certainly was a beautiful picture, but that also it 
 undoubtedly was a fine cod. When the generous Chase 
 offered to give the fishmonger an honorarium on the 
 strength of his sale the honest Britisher flatly refused. 
 He would not take any more of the painter's money, but 
 he stated modestly that he would very much like a 
 photograph of the fish picture to hang in his shop, a re- 
 quest which, of course, delighted the painter. A photo- 
 graph was made of the cod when Chase went home. It 
 was packed in his trunk and carried to England the fol- 
 lowing summer and carried back to America in the 
 fall. Since the artist's tangible appreciation never reached 
 him it is a pity that the fishmonger could not know how 
 pleasantly he was cherished in Chase's memory. 
 
 Chase became a member of the Institute of Arts and 
 Letters in 1905, from which society he was elected to
 
 LONDON AND MADRID 
 
 membership in the Academy of Arts and Letters in 
 January, 1908. 
 
 The summer of 1905 he had his class in Madrid, 
 making first his usual trip to London and Paris. Mrs. 
 Chase accompanied him as far as France, but was obliged 
 to leave him to return to her children at the end of a few 
 weeks. 
 
 While in Madrid Chase stayed at the pension of Seiiora 
 Carmona Dolores, who has entertained nearly all the 
 painters who have visited Spain. Sargent always stayed 
 there, also Whistler. Chase said that he could never get 
 Whistler to admit that he had been to Spain. For some 
 reason that eccentric being chose to shroud the fact in 
 mystery. But the leaf in Senora Dolores's guest-book 
 autographed with the butterfly was conclusive proof. 
 
 Chase made a few portrait-sketches from interesting 
 models that summer, but he painted no landscapes. 
 He seems never to have painted much outdoors in 
 Spain, and on this trip did no copying in the galleries. 
 He found a studio for himself, a beautiful apartment in 
 an old house. Irving Wiles, who was in Madrid with 
 him for a few weeks, enthusiastically describes its dec- 
 oration and arrangement, and tells how Chase's Spanish 
 landlady, who sniffed with scorn as she saw the dusty 
 loads of old brocades, crockery, brass, and copper arriv- 
 
 [219]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 ing at her door, threw up her hands and broke into ex- 
 travagant exclamations of admiration when she entered 
 the studio after Chase had decorated it. 
 
 A pupil in the class that summer remembers how 
 Chase took them all to Sorolla's house, which was filled 
 with that painter's pictures. Sorolla was not in Madrid 
 himself at the time, but his brother-in-law played the 
 host in his absence. 
 
 Sunday in Madrid was a gala-day for Chase. He began 
 the day by wandering through the market, where he 
 never failed to find treasures. Irving Wiles still recalls 
 with feeling the active manner in which Chase dragged 
 him about in the hot sun hunting for bargains. 
 
 In the afternoon there was the bull-fight. "And I 
 don't think he ever missed a Sunday there," said Walter 
 Pach. Chase not only enjoyed the spectacle, but became 
 an expert judge of the bull-fighter's art, appreciating 
 their points almost as critically as a Spaniard. 
 
 In the late afternoon and evening he liked to watch 
 the pageant of the streets from a seat at a sidewalk cafe 
 or from one of the pay-benches along the Prado. There 
 he delighted in picking out the Velasquez types in the 
 crowd, finding now a dwarf, then a beggar, next an 
 Andalusian horse, quite as if they had stepped out of a 
 Velasquez canvas. I remember his saying that before 
 
 [ 220 ]
 
 LONDON AND MADRID 
 
 he went to Spain he used to think those strange horses 
 in the Velasquez pictures were a sort of artistic license, 
 but that the very first day he went to Spain he saw one 
 coming down the street. 
 
 Walter Pach remembers the evening of an informal 
 students' dance in Madrid when Chase sat with Senora 
 Dolores a spectator against the wall. Suddenly he jumped 
 up, inviting the elderly Spanish lady to be his partner, 
 and they both danced off together like the youngest 
 people in the room, much to the delight of the students. 
 
 When his face was turned toward home at the end of 
 the summer Chase expressed his anticipations as father 
 and painter in a letter to his daughter Dorothy. 
 
 "You must get ready to do a lot of posing for me 
 when I get home. I have brought a lot of things which I 
 know you will look nice in. How is Content ? Is she as 
 sweet as ever? . . . Give my love to everybody. Good- 
 bye, sweetheart. 
 
 "Lovingly, 
 
 "PAPA." 
 
 That was Chase's last visit to Spain. He always in- 
 tended to go back, always retained his affection for the 
 country, and often recalled the memories of his days in
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Madrid. The very last year of his life he was planning a 
 trip there with his wife, but as practically all of his 
 journeys to Europe were made with reference to his 
 summer classes, and as. he disliked the discussion of 
 plans or any necessity to think of details, he left the 
 selection of the place where the class was to be held to 
 others. And so it came about that much as he loved 
 Spain he never went back there again. 
 
 [ 222 ]
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 THE summer of 1906 Chase spent at Shinnecock. 
 The following winter he continued his teaching in 
 New York and Philadelphia. In 1907, after his usual 
 visit to London and Paris, he went to Italy. Much of 
 the time he spent in Venice, although he held his class 
 in Florence. It was at the end of this summer, his first 
 visit to the Florentine city, that he bought his beautiful 
 villa on the farther side of the Arno. 
 
 When Edwin Abbey heard that Chase was in Europe 
 that summer he urged him to visit them in England. 
 "Do come if you can," he urges. "I should like you to 
 see my stuff." Which shows how Abbey, who used to 
 take his work to Chase for criticism in the early Tenth 
 Street days, still valued his opinion. Chase however was 
 obliged to go on to Italy without seeing Abbey. 
 
 As this was Chase's first visit to Florence, it was his 
 first unavoidable contact with Florentine art, for since 
 his natural tastes had led him in quite opposite direc- 
 tions, he had been at slight pains to study the Floren- 
 tine masters in the English, French, or German galleries. 
 In Florence when he first went to the museums it was 
 merely to enjoy the examples of his favorite masters,
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 but his attention was finally drawn by the omnipresent 
 Botticellis and other Florentines, and while he cannot 
 be said to have acquired any great enthusiasm for them, 
 he came to enjoy their decorative quality. He liked best 
 the Botticelli Calumnia and the Primavera. He came 
 also to appreciate the decorative quality of the Paduan 
 Mantegna, but the Fra Angelico angels he refused to 
 accept on any ground. 
 
 In Florence Chase ran across his confrere George 
 DeForest Brush (who does admire Florentine art, as 
 evidenced in his own work). He also met his friend 
 Julius Rolshoven, and promptly conducted his class to 
 that painter's beautiful old castle near Florence. 
 
 In Florence, as in Madrid, Chase enjoyed a spec- 
 tator's seat at a sidewalk cafe. There he sat almost every 
 evening with his friend Rolshoven discussing the Munich 
 School, Leibl, and the tendencies of modern art. In the 
 American and English colony in Florence he found a 
 number of old acquaintances and made some new ones. 
 Shortly before his return he sent a characteristic post- 
 card to his little son, Roland Dana, saying: "I am com- 
 ing home soon to play with you." 
 
 In 1908 Chase severed his connection with the New 
 York School of Art. The summer he again spent in Italy, 
 but had no class. That year the Italian Government 
 
 [224]
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 asked Chase for a self-portrait to add to the collection of 
 self-portraits of old and modern masters in the Uffizi 
 Gallery, an honor he deeply appreciated. I chanced to 
 meet Mr. Chase in an antique shop in Florence shortly 
 after this compliment had been paid him, and his un- 
 affected pleasure in it was most characteristic of the in- 
 nate modesty of the man which underlay all the little 
 surface mannerisms and innocent affectations so affec- 
 tionately remembered by his pupils. 
 
 He was full of enthusiasm at that time for his recently 
 purchased villa on the farther side of the Arno, which 
 he asked me to visit, but the fact that I was leaving 
 Florence that day, unfortunately prevented my seeing it. 
 
 Chase had the greatest admiration for the competent 
 maternal contadina who had charge of his villa. "But it 
 is a good face, a beautiful face," he used to say as he 
 looked at her. He made much of her children and brought 
 them dolls that seemed to the Italian peasant much too 
 fine for use. When Chase returned the next summer 
 with more dolls, supposing the others to be worn out as 
 toys were in his household, he was overcome at being 
 shown the first ones still untied in their boxes. "What 
 shall I do?" he asked one of his feminine pupils in per- 
 plexity. "Here I have brought them new dolls and they 
 have never even used the others. Didn't they like them ?" 
 
 [225]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 The winter after he had bought the villa, as he passed 
 the ever-present temptation of an auction-room near his 
 New York studio one day, Chase espied some colonial 
 beds. "Just the thing for the villa," he exclaimed. 
 
 "An American colonial bed in an Italian villa," ob- 
 jected the friend who was with him. 
 
 "But why not, why not? . . . With canopies, eh?" 
 the painter indicated airily with his expressive hands. 
 "Just the thing." Undeterred by discouraging criticisms, 
 he went in to purchase a colonial bed. He admitted after- 
 ward that he had bought two and had ordered them 
 boxed and sent to Italy, after which he thought of them 
 no more. Unfortunately they arrived in Florence after 
 he had left that summer, too late to be installed. Notices 
 from the Italian customs, whose import he but vaguely 
 gathered, followed him about, finally becoming so in- 
 sistent that he felt that they must be attended. So the 
 next summer, about a year and a half after their pur- 
 chase, he appealed to one of his pupils who spoke Italian 
 to go with him and disentangle the matter. 
 
 At the customs office he was bewildered by floods of 
 incomprehensible language and besieged with gestures. 
 He subsided upon a chair, and gave the pupil with the 
 Italian tongue to understand that he had entire con- 
 fidence in her and left the matter al^solutely in her 
 
 [226]
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 hands. The pupil, after listening to duo, trio, and chorus 
 no solo informed Chase that the officers said that 
 they must know the exact number of pieces of the beds 
 before they could search for them. Chase was over- 
 whelmed. He did not know how many pieces, he was 
 not sure how many beds. The pupil gently sought to 
 draw from him the probable number of beds. At first 
 he stuck to his original estimate of two. The pupil hastily 
 multiplied the number of beds by the probable number 
 of pieces, and an excited search began. Ma, no! There 
 was nothing there of that number of pieces, niente, 
 niente. Under cross-examination by the pupil the be- 
 wildered Chase admitted that there might be three beds. 
 Eighteen pieces, sixteen pieces. The frenzied search be- 
 gan again with the same climax of despair. There was 
 nothing from America in sixteen pieces; no, nor in eight- 
 een pieces. 
 
 The search was started on another basis, suggested by 
 v the feminine American mind, and at last, late in the day, 
 with every one exhausted Chase most of all four 
 colonial beds, the property of Signer William Chase, 
 Americano, were unearthed, customs duty and storage 
 charges paid, the beds repacked and sent to the villa, 
 where they were unpacked, set up, but not canopied, and 
 never used; there presumably they stand still. 
 
 [ 227]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Chase sent two pictures to an international exhibition 
 in Berlin in the summer of 1908 the well-known Woman 
 with the White Shawl and one of his fine fish pictures. 
 The Kaiser, who was naturally the first to inspect the 
 exhibition, was particularly struck by Chase's portrait. 
 He asked a number of questions about the painter and 
 was, of course, delighted at hearing that he had studied 
 in the Fatherland. Mr. Hugo Reisinger, who with von 
 Kompf, the director of the academy, accompanied the 
 Kaiser on his round of the gallery, noting his enthusiasm, 
 immediately pointed out the still-life canvas to his 
 Majesty, but the Kaiser passed the fish without com- 
 ment and scarcely a glance. 
 
 Mr. Reisinger thought that he had overlooked the 
 picture and ventured to remark: "This is a marvellous 
 bit of still-life, your Majesty, by the same artist." But 
 the Kaiser briefly disposed of the matter: "I do not like 
 Fisch." 
 
 Von Kompf then protested: "But it is a magnificent 
 bit of painting, your Majesty." 
 
 "But I do not like Fisch!" again remarked the Kaiser 
 with greater firmness. 
 
 Both artistic enthusiasts, combining German persist- 
 ence with German regard for their sovereign, set out 
 deferentially to lead the Kaiser to see the merits of this
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 most excellently painted fish, only to find themselves 
 cut short after a few protesting sentences. 
 
 "But 1 do not like Fisch !" And the voice of the royal 
 one did not admit of further argument. 
 
 In 1908 Chase gave up his Fifth Avenue Studio and 
 took the large suite of rooms in the Tiffany Building on 
 Fourth Avenue. The location of this studio was not 
 known to the general public and was not in the telephone- 
 book, in order that the painter might be protected from 
 intrusion as much as possible. 
 
 The Fourth Avenue Studio was even more spacious 
 than the Tenth Street place. Partitions were taken down 
 until a connecting chain of four rooms remained, two of 
 which were extremely large. Somewhat overcrowded, 
 yet without seeming actually cluttered because of their 
 size, these rooms were beautiful in tone and color. Rich 
 draperies, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, and Japanese em- 
 broideries were in evidence on all sides. Pictures of his 
 own and of other painters, including a few old masters, 
 stood about or were hung on the walls. Beautiful old 
 furniture, including some rare Spanish pieces, bits of 
 porcelain, brass, copper, Japanese carvings; miscel- 
 laneous objets d'art, Italian, French, Dutch, Spanish, and 
 Oriental, were set each in the exactly right place for 
 the taste that can enjoy such multitudinous ornament ! 
 
 [229]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Certainly there was in Chase, as an artist friend re- 
 marked, something of the Lorenzos de' Medici. He liked 
 magnificence, efflorescence, the multiplication of material 
 beauty, and seemed often to lose sight of the value of 
 simple spaces in his love of ornamentation and bric-a- 
 brac. Fortunately his best canvases have a greater sim- 
 plicity than the rooms he decorated. 
 
 The floor of the Fourth Avenue Studio was of a most 
 delicious transparent mysterious green the green of 
 water in deep woods. The effect was produced by a 
 covering of heavy green linoleum, stained, waxed, pol- 
 ished, and coaxed by various means into the desired 
 tone. Chase had a peculiar fondness for green. Mrs. 
 Chase was amused once at his absent reply when she 
 asked him what color he preferred for the bathroom 
 wall: "Anything you like, so long as it's green." 
 
 Another set of rooms on the floor below was kept for 
 the use of his private pupils. With characteristic trust- 
 fulness Chase would descend from one floor to the other, 
 leaving an open door to the possible intruder. It was not 
 surprising in these circumstances that certain treasures 
 were missed from time to time. 
 
 The scheme of the classes in the Fourth Avenue Studio 
 was practically that of an art school. A model for the 
 figure was provided, with a separate room for the men 
 
 [230]
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 students in that class. A number of the pupils painted 
 still life, with all of the beautiful objects in their mas- 
 ter's studio to draw upon for their composition. 
 
 That autumn Chase accepted an invitation to teach 
 again at the New York Art League, as he had decided 
 to give up his teaching at the Pennsylvania Academy. 
 
 In 1909 he went to Florence, where he again had a 
 summer class. His villa was greatly enjoyed by his stu- 
 dents but he never lived in it, although cart-loads of 
 beautiful objects purchased in and about Florence were 
 sent there some of which arrived at their destination. 
 Chase had an unreasoning trust in the somewhat over- 
 subtle Latin shopkeeper. "Nonsense, the man is honest," 
 was his invariable answer to the person who suggested 
 precautions. When actual proof of disingenuousness was 
 offered to him, his invariable answer was that he could 
 never have believed it of that particular person. Chase 
 was not only trustful to the point of simplicity in his 
 business transactions, but he undoubtedly lacked dis- 
 crimination at many points, perhaps because his com- 
 plete absorption in his art had trained his perceptions 
 rather exclusively along one line. Certainly his ability 
 to judge human nature was often insufficient for his self- 
 protection. 
 
 A letter to his daughter Dorothy, written in August 
 
 [231]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 from Florence, shows his usual affectionate thought of 
 his children. 
 
 "I want to write you a letter and what shall I say? 
 I think of you so often when I am out driving the pony. 
 You would love to drive her, and you shall if Dana doesn't 
 mind (I find myself calling Roland, Dana because you 
 all do, I suppose)." 
 
 He inquires how his daughter likes the theatre-coat he 
 sent her, saying: "It was Mamma's choice and I liked 
 it also because it was nice and simple. Now, darling, 
 when you can find time write me a little letter. Give my 
 love to all at home. It sounds nice to say 'home.' I wish 
 I could see you all this morning. Love to you, sweet one. 
 
 "PAPA." 
 
 Chase had an exhibition of his pictures in Cincinnati 
 in 1909, the third large exhibition of his work to be held 
 outside New York. And in April, 1910, a most interest- 
 ing and representative exhibition of his pictures was 
 held at the Gallery of the National Arts Club, preceded 
 by a large dinner given him in the galleries. Concerning 
 this exhibit, his confrere Frederick Vinton, an old friend, 
 wrote to Mrs. Chase: 
 
 "When I found myself in that superb exhibit I was 
 
 [ 232 ]
 
 THE LADY WITH THE WHITE SHAWL. 
 
 Property ol the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 quite bowled over by it. I really did not realize how rich 
 and varied his work has been during the last thirty years. 
 . . . The White Shawl ought to be owned by the Metro- 
 politan. ... In my opinion that canvas in its simplic- 
 ity, breadth, construction and sentiment will always 
 rank with the best done in our century not in America 
 alone but in the world." 
 
 In the summer of 1910 Chase again had a summer 
 class in Florence. He writes again of the villa to his 
 daughter Dorothy and comments with his unfailing 
 parental interest upon the photographs with which his 
 wife kept him supplied. "I see that Mary Content is 
 again wearing junipers." Then remarks, feeling perhaps 
 some consciousness of his lack of facility in expression: 
 "It is not easy for me to describe places and things 
 here so you would understand, as you have not as yet 
 been here. Some day I shall hope to have you see it all 
 with me. I go out to the villa almost every day and am 
 doing some painting there. Rollie's little pony is a per- 
 fect dear. We get on splendidly together. The pony 
 seems to enjoy going about as much as I do. I have 
 named her Lilly, the abbreviation of Liliputian, she is 
 so like a tiny horse." 
 
 Irving Wiles and his daughter Gladys were in Florence 
 while Chase was there that summer and afterward went 
 
 [233 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 on with him to Venice. Carroll Beckwith and his wife 
 were also temporarily settled there in a villa outside of 
 Florence. The friends had many pleasant meetings. 
 Chase instructed them in the technic of feeding pigeons 
 in the Piazza San Marco in Venice, entertained them at 
 the villa in Florence, selected a hat for Wiles's daughter 
 in the absence of any of his own, and generally made 
 himself agreeable. 
 
 Gladys Wiles describes a brisk ride behind the pony 
 with the painter, who, apparently unaware of dispropor- 
 tionate effects, snapped his whip with all the air of a 
 horseman driving a blooded steed, while the pony's 
 little feet pattered over the pavement with the exagger- 
 ated activity of a black-and-tan terrier. She says that 
 Chase always spoke as if his little son might come at 
 any minute to take possession of the pony, but that 
 dream was never realized. The undertaking of moving 
 eight children and household effects every summer to 
 Italy was too much even for Mrs. Chase's executiveness 
 and willingness to serve her husband. 
 
 When Wiles went away from Florence he left a little 
 sketch inscribed to Chase in his room, an attention 
 which touched and pleased the painter indescribably. 
 He alluded to it constantly afterward. "Dear old Wiles,, 
 what a beautiful thing for him to do. Wasn't it just like 
 
 [234]
 
 THE FIRST VISIT TO FLORENCE 
 
 him ? " One day after his return to New York the sketch 
 was missing and Chase was terribly distressed. He 
 hunted for it for days. He even went to the trust com- 
 pany where his pictures were stored and had everything 
 taken out. At last he found it. A pupil who had listened 
 to his lamentations on the subject says that one day he 
 came to her with a radiant face. "I have found it," he 
 said. "I have found Wiles's little sketch." In such fashion 
 did he treasure the tribute he valued. 
 
 The next letter to his daughter Dorothy expresses his 
 great regret at having been absent at the celebration of 
 her birthday. "Soon," he says, "I will see your sweet 
 face again, and I am glad." 
 
 Certainly Chase's children can carry with them al- 
 ways the loving memory of a father's affection freely 
 expressed. 
 
 [235]
 
 IN January 1911 Chase's oldest child, Alice, was 
 married. Up to the very day of the wedding the 
 painter refused to take his daughter's engagement seri- 
 ously, much as he liked the young man of her choice. 
 
 "That child to be married! Absurd! Nonsense!" was 
 his only remark when details of the approaching cere- 
 mony were mentioned to him. But when at the very 
 last the realization came that little "Cosy" actually 
 was to be married, the first form that awareness took 
 in the painter's mind was that art's tribute to the oc- 
 casion should be impeccable. Accordingly, his most 
 severe and concentrated attention was bestowed upon 
 the arrangement of the pictures on the walls of his 
 home, his own and those of other painters. The result 
 was dissatisfaction. He decided to have them all changed. 
 But when this imagined improvement was accomplished, 
 his final verdict was that they had, after all, been better 
 as they were. Hastily recalling his man in the act of 
 removing the step-ladder, he ordered them to be placed 
 in their original positions. In the ardor of this task a pot 
 of palms that proved to be abnormally full of earth was 
 overturned upon the carpet, and a great ^deal of dried 
 
 [236]
 
 A FAMILY EVENT 
 
 Christinas green for it was holiday time was scattered 
 upon the floor and corduroy-covered furniture, where it 
 clung tenaciously. When the mother of the bride, only 
 partly forewarned by the sounds of scratching and 
 scraping from below, descended the stairs to take a last 
 look at the drawing-room before the arrival of the 
 wedding-guests, she silently and swiftly removed her 
 pearl-gray gloves and spent the remaining moments in 
 a greater activity than she had expected. 
 
 In short, Chase did not display his usual savoir-faire 
 upon this occasion, which he only too evidently found 
 upsetting. Both wife and daughter were relieved when 
 his part of the ceremony was over, as he had required a 
 great deal of prompting in his role and showed an almost 
 feeble-minded dependence upon the bride and the bride's 
 mother to help him through. But two years later, when 
 his second daughter, Koto, was married, he had evi- 
 dently grown accustomed to the idea that daughters 
 are liable to marry, for he did nothing to upset the 
 equilibrium of the occasion. 
 
 The afternoon of the day that Koto was married, 
 Chase's first grandchild, Dorothy Sullivan, the child of 
 his oldest daughter, was christened. 
 
 In the summer of 1911 Chase went abroad again, first 
 to Paris and London, then to Florence to teach his sum- 
 
 [237]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 mer class and enjoy his new toy, the villa. He made a 
 number of studies of the villa, but in spite of the fine 
 appreciation of the Italian atmosphere they reveal, 
 they lack the inspiration and freshness of his Shinne- 
 cock landscapes. 
 
 In one of his letters to Mrs. Chase from London that 
 year Chase speaks of his visit to the Royal Academy 
 Exhibition, which he finds "more interesting than usual." 
 "Sargent has some fine things," he writes, "a portrait, 
 a big decoration, part of the Boston series, very fine, also 
 some landscapes. After lunch I went to see Brangwyn, he 
 seemed glad to see me. He is doing a big decoration." 
 
 In 1912 Chase gave up his position as instructor at 
 the League, and his New York teaching thereafter was 
 confined to his private class in the Fourth Avenue Studios. 
 That summer was spent in London, Paris, Bruges, and 
 the Dutch cities. His class was held in Bruges. Mrs. 
 Chase and his son Dana crossed with him. In Paris they 
 all went to their first futurist exhibition together. Mrs. 
 Chase and her son reached home first after this curious 
 experience, and while waiting for Chase's return Mrs. 
 Chase conceived the idea of making a futurist exhibition 
 as a surprise for the painter. They got to work at once 
 with colored pencils, and upon Chase's return held him 
 up at the door and demanded admission. Till the last 
 
 [238 ]
 
 A FAMILY EVENT 
 
 Chase treasured in his studio one of these sketches, a 
 portrait of him by his wife done in the post-impressionist 
 manner in all respects an excellent imitation of the sort 
 of thing indigenous to such exhibits. 
 
 "But you see it really looks like me," he used to say 
 with what was certainly a most impersonal pleasure in 
 the intentionally horrible production. 
 
 During his stay in Paris that summer he went to see 
 La Touche with Mrs. Chase, who describes the uncon- 
 scious humor of the occasion. La Touche could not 
 speak English nor Chase French. This fact did not pre- 
 vent their having a most lively conversation about art 
 and the pictures in the studio without the aid of an in- 
 terpreter. Both painters fairly glowed with enthusiasm. 
 They liked each other immensely and apparently 
 parted with all the sensations of having had a most 
 delightful and congenial interchange of opinion. Who 
 shall say that in that subtler undercurrent that can 
 underlie words there had not been something of com- 
 munication ? 
 
 Chase painted two of his most notable still-life pictures 
 in Bruges the study called Just Onions and the Belgian 
 Melon, which in richness of color and texture and dis- 
 tinction of handling can stand with the best still life of 
 the old masters. 
 
 [239]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 The winter of 1912-1913 he had a large class of pri- 
 vate pupils and worked daily in his own studio. His con- 
 tribution to the exhibition of portrait-painters in Febru- 
 ary was an excellent portrait of Robert Underwood 
 Johnson, concerning which he received a letter from 
 Charles Dana Gibson which particularly pleased him. 
 
 "DEAR CHASE, 
 
 :< Your portrait of Johnson is great. It's a fine thing 
 to go on doing better and better all your life. Here's 
 hoping you'll live to be a hundred. 
 
 :t Yours always, 
 
 "C. D. GIBSON." 
 
 In the summer of 1913 Chase again had a class in 
 Italy, this time in Venice. It was his last European class. 
 His wife and his daughter Dorothy sailed with him but 
 left him in June in Paris to return to Shinnecock. 
 
 The story of the summer Chase tells after his fashion 
 in his letters. From Venice he complains of the constant 
 rain and speaks of painting from his sheltered balcony. 
 
 "I think perhaps I got a fairly good thing today," he 
 remarks. "The one I made yesterday is well enough to 
 keep and show you when I get home." Remembering 
 the masterly quality of these small Venetian sketches, 
 
 [240]
 
 A BELGIAN MELON. 
 
 Painted in Bruges in 19H.
 
 A FAMILY EVENT 
 
 one realizes the sincerity of Chase's modesty disclosed 
 in the intimate frankness of these home letters. 
 
 Later on he inquires: "Has Helen done anything in 
 the way of sketching, and have you made a photograph 
 of Rollie in the English messenger cap? Did he like it? 
 I wish I could see you all tonight. Has dear little baby 
 Dorothy grown much ? I suppose you are seeing a lot of 
 her. I wish I could. 
 
 "Tomorrow we go to the Doges' Palace. Do you re- 
 member the time we went there and you made the 
 photograph from the balcony? Tonight I met all of the 
 Rolshovens at the Piazzi." 
 
 The next letter speaks of hunting a studio and of the 
 industry of his class, and another is filled with enthusi- 
 asm for a perfect Venetian day in which he painted all 
 morning. He refers to an afternoon visit with his pupils 
 to the studio of Signorina Ciardi, an Italian painter. 
 "She is a splendid artist," he remarks (with two under- 
 linings). "I wish you could see her work. She speaks 
 English quite well and was most agreeable to the stu- 
 dents." 
 
 Chase's admiration for Signorina Ciardi was such that 
 he very much resented the fact that the Venetians did 
 not appreciate her at her true value. Once an Ital- 
 ian at whose palace he was calling remarked in the 
 
 [ 241 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 characteristic manner of the Old World disparaging 
 the younger generation, "Oh, yes, Signorina Ciardi she 
 is very well, but her father, ah, you should see his work, 
 he is a great artist!" Whereupon Chase very promptly 
 set his host right: "Ah, but that is where you are entirely 
 wrong, sir; it is Signorina Ciardi, make no mistake, 
 Signorina Ciardi, she is the great artist!" 
 
 Chase's next letter to his wife speaks of his unsuccess- 
 ful hunt for a studio. "Fortunately," he adds, "there is 
 always something to paint here. I want a studio to paint 
 fish in. Tomorrow I am going to try down by the Rialto 
 near the fish market." (It was there that he painted the 
 Fish Market in 1878.) "This afternoon I went out to the 
 Lido with my paint box but did nothing because of the 
 great crowds everywhere. How is baby Dorothy? You 
 must be getting lots of pleasure out of her. Love her up 
 for me. I would love to see her sweet little face again. 
 I was in the piazza again tonight music and the Rol- 
 shoven party. All was pleasant." 
 
 The next day he went again, this time with the Rol- 
 shovens, to see Miss Ciardi and reports: "She had some 
 new and interesting work." Of an interior begun the day 
 before he says: " I am in hopes of making something out 
 of it." He tells of taking the students to the Scuola San 
 Rocco to see the Tintorettos, which he characterizes as 
 
 [ 2-42]
 
 A FAMILY EVENT 
 
 "very fine," and comments briefly upon the death of La 
 Touche, whose work he greatly admired. "He will be 
 missed. His exhibition in the last salon was the best in 
 the exhibition." 
 
 Another letter encloses a sketch showing the com- 
 position of a still-life which he painted for his class. 
 "The students now want to paint still life the rest of the 
 time while here." Further on he remarks: "I am reading 
 * Twenty Years After' piecemeal. I find it interesting. 
 What a lot of intrigues there must have been in those 
 days ! " Chase never lost his simple enjoyment of the 
 emotion of astonishment. 
 
 A later letter from Venice mentions a visit to Madame 
 Fortuny. "She is an old, well-preserved lady of seventy- 
 three. She owns a small palace here where she has lived 
 for a number of years. At the time of her husband's sale 
 after his death at Paris she brought back many of his 
 studies and many of the fine stuffs. The studio and 
 begun pictures are splendid and the stuffs are mag- 
 nificent. It was a rare treat which I am sorry you could 
 not have enjoyed with me. She asked me to come again 
 to see some etchings by Fortuny and some by Goya. Of 
 course I will go. I feel a fresh spell of enthusiasm after 
 seeing the things. Oh, Toady, I wish we had the means ! 
 We could then have fine things too." 
 
 [243]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 A pupil in Chase's class who went with him to visit 
 Madame Fortuny says that the great artist's widow had 
 a real understanding of art and expressed a great desire 
 to see Chase's work, but as the senora was old and not 
 very strong she did not feel able to make the journey to 
 his studio. Determined that if Madame Fortuny wanted 
 to see his pictures she should, Chase proceeded to take 
 the mountain to Mahomet. He filled a gondola with his 
 work Venetian sketches, fish pictures and portrait heads 
 and gave the Spanish painter's widow a private view at 
 her own house. Both Chase's work and the gracefulness 
 of his act delighted Madame Fortuny inexpressibly. 
 
 Another letter from Chase to his wife concerning his 
 unfinished picture records a typical painter state of mind 
 at that stage of his work. 
 
 "While I don't know what it will look like tomorrow, 
 I feel now that I've got something that you will care for. 
 I will tell you in my next letter how I find it." Before he 
 concludes he acknowledges with profuse gratitude the 
 receipt of some home-made butter-scotch. 
 
 The next letter comments enthusiastically on some 
 photographs Mrs. Chase had sent of the two younger 
 children, Mary Content and Dana. "I think those of 
 Mary are quite the best you have made. They are 
 splendid, composition and all. Hurrah for^you!" 
 
 [244]
 
 A FAMILY EVENT 
 
 In September Chase sailed for home, unaware that he 
 had taught his last European class. 
 
 One of his greatest pleasures during those summers 
 in Europe was the buying of presents for his wife and 
 children. According to his travelling companions his 
 thoughts on the homeward trip were entirely concerned 
 with anticipations of his home-coming, the joy of see- 
 ing his family again, their probable pleasure in his gifts. 
 "Won't Mary Content be lovely in that little blue coat ?" 
 he would exclaim out of a mid-ocean revery, or "That 
 flame-colored lining on Dorothy, eh?" And again: "That 
 blue-and-gold scarf will just suit Helen." "He bought 
 things like a prince," said a pupil who was with him on 
 some of his shopping expeditions. "Nothing was too 
 good for them; the price was not even to be asked when 
 he thought he had found something they would like." 
 
 [245]
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 IN the spring of 1914 Chase went abroad again for a 
 short trip. He called, as usual, on Brangwyn and 
 Shannon soon after his arrival in London. In a letter to 
 Mrs. Chase from there he speaks of the work of. those 
 painters. 
 
 "Shannon had a sitter on a portrait but saw me. 
 He has a fine exhibit at the Royal Academy this year. 
 I telephoned Sargent this morning and am to see him 
 tomorrow afternoon. Harrison and I are going together. 
 Brangwyn is doing the big decorations for the Pan- 
 American Exposition at San Francisco. They are fine." 
 
 Chase had a great admiration for Brangwyn's work 
 and never went to London without going to see him. 
 Entering his house that day he stopped to look at a small 
 picture by one of the early Italian painters not the 
 type of thing that usually appealed to him and ex- 
 claimed: "Where did you get this beautiful thing?" 
 
 Brangwyn was delighted. "Do you know," he said, 
 "that of all the painters who have passed that picture 
 you are the first one that has really seen it?" 
 
 The trip though pleasant was not eventful. In May 
 Chase returned to America. It was his> last crossing. 
 
 [246]
 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 In June he went to California, where he had arranged 
 to hold a summer class at Carmel-by-the-Sea. He lo- 
 cated himself at Del Monte, a short motor ride from 
 Carmel. Mrs. Chase went with him, but returned after 
 a short stay. In a letter written to her from Del Monte 
 soon after her departure he tells of securing a small 
 studio at Monterey, where he "expects to get a lot 
 done." And, "you made me very happy all the time you 
 were with me," he adds with his unfailing appreciation 
 and affection. 
 
 Another letter expresses profound gratitude for a box 
 of butter-scotch. "You are so thoughtful," he exclaims. 
 "The others are almost used up." He speaks of receiv- 
 ing a "nice letter from Arthur," his son-in-law, then 
 touches on his day's work. "I painted in my little studio 
 today laying in a large picture." 
 
 Writing again from Del Monte, he describes his day's 
 imusement. "Today I went out with a young artist 
 to see the Rodero at Salenas. Do you remember we saw 
 the sign swinging across the street at Monterey? The 
 Rodero is a gathering of cowboys and cowgirls, the 
 performance is most interesting. I wish you could 
 see it." He records his pleasure in the family letters 
 and photographs. "The one of dear little Dorothy 
 walking with you is sweet/ You complain that you do 
 
 [247]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 not get letters. I can't understand it as I write every 
 day.'* 
 
 He refers again to the still-life he had started. "My 
 last fish picture I believe to be my best. Tonight I am to 
 give my class and the Carmel high-brows my talk on 
 Whistler. I wish you were here to give me your sym- 
 pathetic support. I do so wish you and the children 
 could be out here in this wonderful cool climate." 
 
 Later he writes of his full-length portrait of Miss 
 Townsley called The Flame, his last kimono portrait: 
 "I believe it is one of my best things. The students are 
 quite enthusiastic about it. When you see it you will 
 tell me if it is any good." A letter to his son Dana, written 
 about this time, shows his constant affectionate remem- 
 brance of his children when separated from them. 
 
 "DEAR ROLLIE, 
 
 "You must have begun to think I had forgotten you 
 and your brother and sisters altogether. No!!" [Three 
 underlinings.] "I liked the picture your Mama sent me 
 of you on that funny looking cycle or whatever it is. 
 You appear to be standing straight up and I can't make 
 it out. Mary Content looks as if she were about to split 
 herself. I will soon be home now. I have some new 
 stories to tell you. I wish you were all oiat here to come 
 
 [248]
 
 CHASE PAINTING FOR HIS CLASS AT CARMEL, CALIFORNIA. 
 
 From a photograph.
 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 home with me. There's lots of country out here. Be good 
 and be glad to see me when I get home. Give my love to 
 your good mother and all the others. 
 
 "Love. 
 
 "PAPA." 
 
 A few days later he writes to his wife: "I worked all 
 day in my studio. I am doing a study of Townsley." He 
 describes some monotypes' he has made. "I found that 
 impressions could be had with a clothes wringer so I 
 got one. I will send you some to show you what I am 
 doing in that line. I am enclosing another photo of my- 
 self. I am afraid you will grow tired of them. As the 
 students give them to me I send them to you. I wish I 
 could have been home for Dorothy's birthday." 
 
 In another letter we find him thanking his wife most 
 gratefully for some paint rags sent in a newspaper. 
 Referring to his grandchild he remarks: "You must 
 have enjoyed having sweet little Dorothy with you. 
 Two sweet Dorothys at one time is a lot." 
 
 Another day he refers to the enthusiasm of the stu- 
 dents over his portrait of Miss Townsley, a tribute he 
 always prized highly, and adds: "I think myself it is a 
 canvas you will care to have me exhibit." 
 
 Again he encloses the plan of a portrait about which 
 
 [249 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 he is more explicit than usual. "The dress is old gold 
 color and a blue kimona background. I think you would 
 like the combination. The girl is rather pretty. I made 
 some monotypes in the studio this afternoon. Tomorrow 
 I will send you some. I played a short game of billiards 
 and was beaten." 
 
 A letter written in September, shortly before his re- 
 turn, tells of a stag-dinner given in his honor. "Many 
 speeches lauding me were given," he relates, with the 
 childlike pleasure he had in appreciation. He also makes 
 mention of another portrait upon which he was working 
 at the time with his characteristic lack of special com- 
 ment. "She is a very picturesque subject and I am en- 
 joying it very much. Today I finished the outdoor thing 
 I was doing of which I told you. I had another game of 
 billiards just now with the attendant and beat him. I 
 am beginning to call back some of the shots I used to 
 make." 
 
 The route home from California led through the Grand 
 Canon. When Chase heard that two of his friends in- 
 tended to stop off there he was scornful. Why did they 
 wish to see that freak of nature ? To Chase that which 
 was not paintable never seemed worth looking at. The 
 canon he conceived of as panoramic. Being, however, a 
 gregarious soul, he stopped off with hia> friends, pooh- 
 
 [250]
 
 poohing a little, but when he saw the impressive sight of 
 the great gorge he was moved as one would be sure he 
 would be. 
 
 But the stop-over was shadowed by an unfortunate oc- 
 currence, for Chase, having met with some unfair treat- 
 ment in business matters in California, discovered that 
 his finances were at a low ebb. He was, therefore, unable 
 to make any purchases, and finding, of course, in the va- 
 riegated stock of the large shop there some things he 
 wanted to buy, he could only hover over them like a 
 wretched little boy with no pocket-money. 
 
 The winter of 1915 he painted a number of portraits, 
 among them several of his own children, one of his 
 daughter Dorothy in an eighteenth-century pink-satin 
 costume that he had purchased for the purpose, a seated 
 half-length portrait of his youngest son Roland Dana, 
 and another of his second daughter, Koto. Not any of 
 these pictures are representative of Chase's best work, 
 but a certain personal interest naturally attaches to 
 them. 
 
 In 1915 Chase received an order to paint a self portrait 
 for a museum in his native State, in the town of Rich- 
 mond, Indiana. The amount offered was only sufficient 
 to pay for a head portrait, and that was all that the 
 donor of the picture expected to receive. But Chase, who 
 
 [251]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 delighted in doing the generous thing and knew how to 
 do it charmingly, planned a surprise for Richmond. He 
 painted a large canvas, a three-quarter length figure 
 standing, palette in hand, before his easel in his Fourth 
 Avenue Studio. It was finished in November, 1915. The 
 pleasure that he took in doing this and in keeping his 
 act a surprise up to the moment that the portrait was 
 shown to the envoys from Richmond was characteristic 
 of artist and man. 
 
 Having been asked to serve on the Art Committee of 
 the Pan-American Exposition, Chase went to California 
 again that summer, but he did not have a class. An en- 
 tire room in the art building was devoted to his work, 
 making an exhibit which the painter himself felt to be 
 representative of his best work. He also designed and 
 personally supervised the decoration and arrangement 
 of the room. 
 
 Throughout the winter of 1915 Chase continued with 
 his private class in the Fourth Avenue Studio. It was his 
 last year of teaching. 
 
 
 
 {252]
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 CHASE was perhaps more individualized as an artist 
 than as a man. On the human side he was a simple 
 person. Witty as well as analytical on the subject of his 
 art, he thought simply about the things outside his 
 sphere of interest where he thought at all. Of those ut- 
 terances of his that were so entertaining at the moment 
 much of the flavor escapes in print. Chase had the 
 actor's gift of creating the little situation, of giving 
 point and effect to his utterances, whether satirical or 
 violent, and his satire was never intentionally unkind. 
 To quote Birge Harrison: "Chase was the simplest and 
 most sincere of men and also one of the kindest as many 
 a struggling young artist can testify, and this last trait 
 always seemed to me to be the most dominating note 
 in his character. But he could be quite savage in his 
 outspoken dislike of all shams and pretenses." 
 
 No man ever lived more completely in the atmosphere 
 and idea of art than Chase did. He had no other com- 
 pelling interests except his family, and, indeed, in his 
 devotion to them art was inextricably intertwined. At 
 his first meeting with his wife, then a picturesque child, 
 the strong impression she made upon his eye took the 
 
 [253]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 form of a desire to paint her. His children he painted 
 almost from the moment of their birth. Art was talked 
 in his home as it was in his studio. 
 
 Aside from his personal feeling and the practical 
 convenience of propinquity, it was evident that some- 
 thing in his wife's type especially appealed to the painter. 
 Yet few of the pictures are portraits in the exact sense 
 of the word, and therein lies one of the mysteries of the 
 art of portraiture. Mrs. Chase never grew to dislike 
 posing, as many members of painters' families do. In- 
 deed, she was as frequently a volunteer as a conscript, 
 devising costumes suitable to her type with the purpose 
 of pleasing the painter's eye or of suggesting a subject. 
 She says that he seldom kept her posing long enough to 
 be fatiguing. The sureness of his seeing made the process 
 swift. 
 
 Chase was not a reader, George Moore's "Lectures 
 upon Art" being one of the very few books of this sort 
 that he ever enjoyed, since he had the painter's belief 
 that only people who paint are qualified to write about 
 it. He bought editions of books for his library principally 
 with reference to their appearance and the spots of color 
 they would contribute to the room. He did not indulge 
 much in sports, and, except for his skill in shooting, did 
 not become expert in any of them. H# enjoyed music 
 
 [254]
 
 THE BLACK KIMONO. 
 
 Portrait of Chase's daughter Alice.
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 and the theatre rather in the spirit of light amusement 
 than as seriously considered arts, but he had one other 
 supreme interest that passion of the collector which 
 was curiously strong in him. Indeed, his impulse to buy 
 was almost abnormal, in that he seemed to be increas- 
 ingly unable to resist its promptings. That he was ex- 
 travagant as the result of his desire to possess the thing 
 that attracted his eye cannot be denied, but it must 
 have been apparent to any one who knew him that he 
 was utterly unpractical in all matters of finance. Some 
 bills were paid twice, others not paid at all. At times 
 when buying a present or some particular object that had 
 cast a spell upon his imagination so that he felt he must 
 have it at any price, he spent as if his treasury was in- 
 exhaustible, but in the case of pictures he quite often got 
 a bargain through his knowledge of values and his abil- 
 ity as an expert to judge the genuineness of a canvas. 
 
 One time in Spain he discovered a Greco believed by 
 its owner to be a Murillo, incredible as that may seem. 
 Chase, not having much money with him, made a de- 
 posit on the Greco and told the woman to hold it for him. 
 Meantime Zuloaga strolled in, discovered Chase's dis- 
 covery, promptly paid the woman the whole amount 
 and bore away his unlawful prize. When Chase returned 
 with the balance and found out what had happened he 
 
 [255]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 was beside himself. Time did not soften this blow, and 
 later in Paris he hunted up Zuloaga in the vain hope of 
 appealing to his better nature, and very politely and 
 pathetically told his little story; but the Spanish painter 
 was unmoved, in fact he was quite unpleasant and even 
 sneered at poor Chase, who for long afterward suffered 
 at the very mention of Zuloaga or Greco. 
 
 Sometimes Chase bought things that did not seem 
 worth his buying where some quality of tone or color 
 attracted him or suggested its possible value in a still- 
 life study, or where his desire to encourage a struggling 
 artist made him anxious to discover any promising 
 touch. He tried so hard to find merit in the work of a 
 person who was really trying. He longed so to give the 
 assistance of his encouragement that not infrequently 
 he would buy from the poor painter poor in every sense 
 of the word things that he would have criticised se- 
 verely if done by one of his pupils. But in general he 
 bought like the connoisseur he was. 
 
 In his fondness for tangible beauty he used often to 
 carry about in his pocket small objects that he enjoyed 
 looking at a rare ring, an interesting button, or some 
 sort of curiosity. These he would pull out to show callers 
 or the called-upon as a great treat. At one time his favor- 
 ite object was a small Peruvian mummy head. This he 
 
 [256]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 had with him once in Paris while visiting the studios of 
 the French painters. The friend who was with him, 
 another artist, was somewhat embarrassed because Chase 
 after unconsciously giving the misleading impression 
 that he was about to present the mummy's head would 
 placidly return it to his pocket. 
 
 But the story of a thing, its authenticity even, except 
 in the case of a picture, was of no interest to Chase. 
 He did not know such facts because he did not care about 
 them. His interest was supremely and simply the artist's 
 lust of the eye. He cared how the thing looked, not a 
 jot what its history was, however interesting. That was a 
 characteristic quality, not a limitation. 
 
 Yet he seldom felt a strong attachment to things in 
 spite of his collecting mania for it almost amounted to 
 that. A few objects, not always the most interesting or 
 valuable ones he possessed, he seemed to have a per- 
 sonal feeling about, but in general his pleasure in a thing 
 seemed to be the finding of it. Not so with pictures. He 
 could not bear to part with a picture he loved; he seemed 
 to feel as if he had lost part of himself in giving it up. 
 
 At one of those periods usually recurrent in artists' 
 lives when a temporary economy seemed desirable, it 
 was judged wise to part with some pictures out of Chase's 
 large and valuable collection. He came home from the 
 
 [257]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 sale as from a funeral and would not be comforted, but 
 one day not long afterward he returned to his family 
 in excellent spirits. They were not surprised when the 
 explanation proved to be that he had bought back sev- 
 eral of his choicest art treasures at a considerable ad- 
 vance upon the price he had sold them for! 
 
 And he was generous in giving. Once he bestowed a 
 cherished Vollon upon his son Roland, who had been 
 patient in posing for him. Quite often he gave sketches 
 to his pupils. Frequently he gave the same sketch to 
 several people in succession, having absent-mindedly 
 forgotten his previous generosity. Quite a number of 
 friends and relatives are thus the honorable owners of 
 pictures touchingly inscribed to some one else on the 
 back. The recipient who bore away his prize on the spot 
 was usually the one who gained possession of it. 
 
 Chase was a famous raconteur; more than that, he had 
 a talent for impersonation that almost any monologist 
 might envy. German, Hebrew, African, or Irishman he 
 could imitate equally well. With that ability to imitate 
 and the quite indescribable gift of implication and sug- 
 gestion that he also possessed he created effects of 
 which it is impossible to give any impression in de- 
 scription. A certain tale of two intoxicated persons, much 
 to Chase's amusement, was a great favorite with his 
 
 [258]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 children, who never tired of hearing it. "Tell us the 
 Robinson story," they would beg when he was in the 
 mood to entertain them. 
 
 This story dealt with two convivial gentlemen who 
 had been making a day of it, but as the tea-hour ap- 
 proached and ladies began to enter the restaurant they 
 felt it necessary to brace up and make a proper appear- 
 ance. 
 
 "Do you know Robinson," one intoxicated gentle- 
 man then inquired of the other in the attempt at easy 
 conversation. "No," said the other with great interest. 
 "W-w-what's his name?" 
 
 "I dunno," replied the first intoxicated gentleman. 
 That was all, but the expression, the tone, the demoraliz- 
 ing touches to hair, beard, and moustache made the dig- 
 nified painter into the drunkest being imaginable as he 
 told the story. 
 
 Sometimes on shipboard Chase would entertain his 
 fellow passengers with an evening of his stories. At one 
 time in his life he says that he seriously entertained the 
 idea of becoming an actor. 
 
 Chase did not forget faces, but he seldom remembered 
 names except those of his intimate friends and pupils of 
 long standing. Not infrequently he failed to recall the 
 names of men high in the ranks of his profession if he 
 
 [259]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 did not meet them often. Maxfield Parrish in a letter to 
 Mrs. Chase refers to an old joke on the subject of Chase's 
 non-recognition of him, Mrs. Chase having insisted that 
 at their last meeting Chase really had remembered him. 
 
 "MY DEAR MRS. CHASE, 
 
 "No, he didn't! I introduced myself as Smith and he 
 remembered me at once, was most charmed and ah to 
 be sure and all that. But I think if I keep it up long 
 enough my face such as it is will finally sink in. The name 
 of course is unimportant." 
 
 But the egoist who came into competition with Chase 
 was not likely to get the best of it. 
 
 When the violinist Wilhelmj came for his first sitting 
 at Chase's studio he was kept waiting a few minutes. 
 The artist arrived to find the virtuoso in a tempera- 
 mental state of excitement. 
 
 "Do you realize," Wilhelmj violently demanded of the 
 painter, "that my time is worth a thousand dollars a 
 minute ? " 
 
 "Indeed," replied Chase instantly, without a change 
 of expression. "Mine is worth two thousand." 
 
 Another answer of his to a rather persistent author who 
 attended his class criticisms showed Chase's quickness 
 
 [ 260 ]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 in retort. The writer had wanted him to enter a contest 
 in which she should paint a picture and the artist write 
 a story. "I'll wager that my picture will be better than 
 your story," she said. One criticism day as Chase was 
 leaving the class, quite undeterred by the fact that he 
 had failed to show any interest in her challenge, she ran 
 after him with a freshly painted canvas. 
 
 "Now, Mr. Chase, where's your story? Here is my 
 sketch." 
 
 Chase, thus accosted, gave a quick glance at the can- 
 vas. "Ah, I see I have won the bet !" he said. 
 
 One day as Chase was walking along Broad Street in 
 Philadelphia a little ragged street urchin camped in the 
 gutter caught sight of the painter as he passed. The 
 child rose, ran up to him, and after looking earnestly at 
 him a moment, inquired: "Say, mister, ain't you some- 
 body?" a tribute to his outer man that greatly amused 
 Chase. 
 
 But if he made the most of his personal appearance in 
 careful consideration of hair and beard, immaculate 
 linen, white spats, black-ribboned glasses, rings, and gar- 
 ments of the latest fashion, it was primarily one felt a 
 part of his concern with the thing of the eye rather than 
 personal vanity. One of his idiosyncrasies in dress was 
 his custom of wearing a scarf-ring. His neckties were 
 
 [261]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 seldom ornamented with a pin, but were preferably drawn 
 through some ring chosen from his interesting collection. 
 At one time a large carved emerald set with small dia- 
 monds was his favorite; at another a carved ivory circlet 
 was most in evidence; again it would be a curious carved 
 silver ring, or one containing a turquoise of peculiarly 
 intense blue. Of course, he also wore the rings. In the 
 middle eighties his Rubens ring, an odd, worn old ring 
 of silver and gold, was a familiar sight to his friends and 
 associates of that period. In later years he seemed to 
 prefer one containing a vivid turquoise and another 
 with a seal cut in a reddish, semitransparent stone. It 
 was characteristic of Chase's type that he was able to 
 wear his jewelry like an artist, not like a dandy. 
 
 For some reason, although Chase's features were so 
 regular, perhaps because of his marked mannerisms, 
 he was a much-caricatured man. His Philadelphia pupils 
 always made one of him for the annual Academy ball. 
 One youth was famous for his ability to make a carica- 
 ture of his master in a single stroke. Coming upon an- 
 other talented pupil one day in the act of caricaturing 
 him, Chase, after a quick glance at it, remarked: "Ah, 
 if I fail in the Uffizi commission I see that I may call 
 upon you !" 
 
 The hat that Chase made famous aftd that Whistler
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 subsequently adopted was the subject of many jokes 
 and anecdotes. There is a tale that one day the painter 
 ordered something sent home from a shop and forgot 
 to notify the household of his purchase. The maid sent 
 the delivery boy away without making inquiries, but the 
 boy, more alert than the servant, made a discovery that 
 caused him to refuse to carry away his bundle. His eyes 
 were fastened upon the hat-rack. "Does the feller that 
 wears that hat live here?" he asked. "It's all right, 
 then. He's the one," and the boy firmly set his package 
 down in the hall. 
 
 A rather ineffectual person in practical matters, Chase 
 frequently amused his friends and family by his excessive 
 appreciation of their assistance in some matter that 
 loomed a formidable mountain before his mind's eye. 
 William Baer, the miniature-painter, still remembers 
 how Chase marvelled at his prowess in packing some 
 canvases for him in Holland. "He seemed to think that 
 I was a most extraordinarily gifted person to be able to 
 do it," said Baer, "and thanked me repeatedly as if he 
 owed me the debt of a lifetime." 
 
 One of Chase's replies to a customs inspector upon his 
 arrival at the port has all the effect of intentional wit al- 
 though it was really only a simple statement of the fact 
 of his helplessness. Having admitted that he had taken 
 
 [ 263]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 but one trunk over and had bought nothing, the inspector 
 caught him up with: "But you have two trunks now." 
 "Yes," Chase explained, "my wife packed when I left 
 home." 
 
 Chase's home life was one of special harmony. Al- 
 though an extremely nervous man, he never seemed to be 
 disturbed by the presence of his children even in his 
 studio, perhaps because they understood so well how to 
 keep their freedom from becoming intrusion. He was 
 proud of them all, from the oldest son to the youngest 
 girl, Mary Content, named for two of his pupils, and -al- 
 ways took them to walk, all eight, every Sunday after- 
 noon. One daughter was the object of particular interest 
 to him from her earliest childhood. Mrs. Chase tells of 
 overhearing him tete-a-tete with the baby, a small dark 
 object too young to voice articulate wants, inquiring 
 with helpless but elaborate courtesy: "Is there anything 
 I can do for you?" 
 
 Chase was a father more indulgent than disciplinary. 
 He enjoyed nothing more than taking a cab full of chil- 
 dren to Coney Island in the summer, where after dining 
 them well the distinguished artist enjoyed the joys of 
 shooting the chutes and all the other characteristic di- 
 versions of Coney Island. 
 
 He took the most profound interest 'in the children's 
 school entertainments. The Chase children all attended 
 
 [264]
 
 CHASE AND HIS WIFE. 
 
 THE ARTIST'S WIFE AND CHILDREN AND THE FIRST SON-IN-LAW.
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 the picturesque old Friends' Seminary opposite their 
 home on Stuyvesant Square, where their mother went 
 before them. At the yearly performance given by the 
 school children the majority of the jokes were personal. 
 There were many in which the size and special charac- 
 teristics of the Chase family were touched off, all of 
 which highly entertained the painter, who never by any 
 chance missed a performance. 
 
 Chase was particularly fond of his father-in-law, 
 whose unfailing gayety was temperamentally attractive 
 to him. One time when Chase was sailing for Europe his 
 father-in-law sent him a box of particularly good cigars 
 inscribed "To William M. Chase, who knows a good 
 thing when he smokes it, with a bon voyage from Julius 
 Gerson." 
 
 When Chase came back, however, Mr. Gerson received 
 a package which, when opened, seemed to indicate 
 that his present had been returned unused. But upon 
 opening the box he discovered not cigars but a delicious 
 little Italian landscape painted on the under-side of the 
 cover for cigar-box wood, as all painters know, makes 
 an excellent painting panel. On the other side was in- 
 scribed: "To Mr. Julius Gerson who knows a good thing 
 when he likes it, with best wishes from William M. 
 Chase, Florence, 1907." 
 
 Chase's intentions were always sympathetic and con- 
 
 [ 265 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 siderate, but like many other men he frequently lacked 
 imagination concerning the possible discomforts involved 
 in their carrying out. Mrs. Chase gives an account of 
 one of his attempts to pay his affectionate respects to 
 his mother, who was visiting a daughter in a Long Is- 
 land suburb. 
 
 One Sunday afternoon, immaculately dressed, Chase 
 entered the room with the remark that he believed he 
 would go out on the trolley to call on his mother. The 
 open cars were on, it would be a very pleasant trip. 
 Mrs. Chase, remembering his dislike of the Sunday 
 crowds, the whistling and pushing and odors of chewing- 
 gum, peanuts, and candy, asked him if he did not think 
 that Sunday was rather a bad day for the journey, 
 wouldn't the crowds be disagreeable perhaps. No, he 
 didn't think so. "Of course, you needn't go with me," 
 he added. " No indeed, I wouldn't have you take the trip 
 for anything." 
 
 A few minutes later he entered the room carrying his 
 hat and cane, the invariable white carnation in his but- 
 tonhole, and asked his wife if she were ready. She was. 
 So they started forth over the Fifty-ninth Street bridge 
 to swing on straps while the car jerked and crawled its 
 tortuous way to Long Island. After a brief endurance of 
 his pet aversions the exasperated artist turned to his 
 
 [266]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 wife: "Well, you can go on if you want to, but / shall 
 get out now and go home. This car is impossible." Mrs. 
 Chase, without mentioning the fact that she had really 
 not been the originator of the plan, answered mildly 
 that having come so far it seemed as if they might as 
 well go on. No, he would not go on, Chase declared, 
 it was useless for her to urge him, he was going back at 
 once. 
 
 He did go on, however, and by the end of the day had 
 forgiven his wife for the discomforts of the trip. He did 
 not suggest repeating the visit the following Sunday, 
 but experience never seemed to teach him to imagine in 
 advance what might be expected to occur. 
 
 The men who travelled in Europe with Chase tell of 
 his constant remembrance of his family in his absences. 
 
 "We were always missing him and once almost lost 
 our steamer because he would sit down to write to his 
 wife at any and all spare moments," remarked William 
 Thorne, who was one of the painter's travelling com- 
 panions. 
 
 Thorne, who was a poor sailor, also remembers how 
 Chase, who seemed to him quite offensively strong and 
 active on shipboard, used to come into his stateroom to 
 read him selections from the daily letters with which his 
 wife and children had provided him, one for each day of 
 
 [267]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the trip. So moved was the seasick painter in his weak- 
 ened condition by this beautiful spectacle of domestic 
 devotion that he remembers shedding tears over the 
 affectionate extracts that Chase read to him. 
 
 Another provision for the voyage made by Chase's 
 wife was the indispensable white carnation which he al- 
 ways wore in his buttonhole. Mrs. Chase always left in 
 the steward's care a sufficient number of these to last 
 for the trip. Chase was very proud of this attention and 
 Mr. William Guard, who made his last return trip on 
 the same steamer, says that he was so much touched at 
 the painter's sentiment about the white carnations that 
 he never remarked upon the fact that they were sailing 
 toward and not from the devoted wife, even when he 
 caught Chase one day helping himself to the necessary 
 white carnation from the table decorations. 
 
 Outside of his family association Chase had few human 
 relationships. Although he did not have intimate friends 
 among his confreres either in Europe or America, he 
 was on terms of cordial friendship with the majority of 
 contemporary painters. He had affectionate memories of 
 his master Piloty and his idol Leibl. He knew Couture, 
 Von Lenbach, Fritz von Uhde, Von Habermann, Bol- 
 dini, Manet, Alfred Stevens, Whistler, Sorolla, La Touche, 
 Carolus Duran, Alma-Tadema, Lavery, Shannon, Frank 
 
 [268]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 Brangwyn, and Mesdag, and a number of other European 
 painters with the touch-and-go association of artists, 
 nothing more. 
 
 The friends of his earlier days, Duveneck, Shirlaw, 
 Beckwith, Church, Dielman, Currier, Twachtman, and 
 Blum, were on somewhat more intimate terms with him. 
 He was also very fond of his one-time pupil, Irving Wiles, 
 whose work he greatly admired. Of his old friends Robert 
 Blum was perhaps the one of whom Chase saw most. 
 When Blum came to New York a talented young man 
 having had little or no art instruction, Chase was al- 
 ready a celebrity in the artistic world. His friendship as 
 well as his criticism was of value to Blum, and Blum's 
 letters show how deeply he valued both. 
 
 Chase's artistic dandyism, with which all his friends 
 and associates were familiar, was neatly touched off 
 once by Blum at a rather dull and long committee meet- 
 ing from which Chase had escaped. 
 
 "What's become of Chase?" inquired a fellow vic- 
 tim, suddenly discovering the painter's absence. Blum 
 looked up. 
 
 "Chase?" he drawled. "Oh, why, I believe Chase has 
 gone out to change his scarf-pin." 
 
 Mrs. Chase tells of an occasion when her husband 
 wished to give Blum a present on his birthday. Instead 
 
 [269 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of buying something new, Chase hunted about among 
 his treasures for some unique gift that would please his 
 friend's fastidious taste. Finally he appeared, looking 
 very much pleased with an interesting old scarf-pin. 
 "This looks like Blum," he declared. "Don't you think 
 he would like it ? " 
 
 Mrs. Chase glanced at the pin. "Yes, it does look like 
 him," she agreed. "I am sure he would like it. The only 
 objection to giving it to him is that he gave it to you last 
 year." 
 
 When I asked Charles Dana Gibson about his asso- 
 ciation with Chase, he remarked without hesitation: 
 "Why, we usually met at prize-fights." 
 
 Chase, it seems, was a great enthusiast on the subject 
 of the modern gladiator, and well versed in all the points 
 of such contests. There is a pleasing incongruity in this 
 picture of the famous illustrator and the distinguished 
 painter ardently discussing the technic of prize-fights on 
 the edge of the ring as if art did not exist. 
 
 Chase also enjoyed the prowess of Buffalo Bill and 
 his cowboys. Each year he took his wife and children 
 to see them and each year he went to call upon William 
 Cody in his dressing-room and ardently insisted that he 
 must paint him a plan that was never carried out. 
 Another celebrity of this type, Zack MiHer, Chase met 
 
 [270]
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 once on the steamer. We can imagine the polite adapta- 
 tions of their conversation, the respectful questions of 
 Chase, his astonished comments, the characteristic jargon 
 of the cowboy. In parting, Zack Miller exacted Chase's 
 promise to come to his "show" and sent him a box. 
 Chase went, of course, accompanied by all his family 
 and was made conspicuous in the eyes of the world when 
 Zack on a white charger rode up to his box and saluted 
 him a public honor greatly enjoyed by the younger 
 children. Another yearly festivity attended by the en- 
 tire family was Barnuin's Circus, which entertained Chase 
 quite as much as it did the children. 
 
 He did not even spurn moving pictures. There he also 
 seemed to enjoy the emotion of astonishment. Once he 
 was asked to pose for a screen representation of an art- 
 ist's hands in his Fourth Avenue Studio. The camera 
 man requested that Chase show himself in the act of 
 painting. Chase, with his dramatic instinct, seized the 
 idea at once. His daughter Helen gives an amusing de- 
 scription of how he painted on a portrait of his wife in 
 the most convincing manner with no paint on his brush, 
 stepped back to view his supposed work, and turned to 
 chat with an imaginary critic. In fact Chase's mind had 
 rapidly visualized an appropriate scene in which the 
 children were to run in and embrace their mother who 
 
 [271]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 was posing; but unfortunately the photographer, who 
 was instructed to be interested only in the hands of the 
 painter, explained that his limited range would not per- 
 mit him to take advantage of this facile dramatization. 
 
 At Shinnecock Chase went fishing regularly with his 
 children on the breakwater, and always, the boys loyally 
 insisted, returned with some fish. He used to play base- 
 ball with them on the sand, and the family, including 
 the artist, quite made up the requisite nine for there 
 are eight Chase children: Alice Dieudonnee, now Mrs. 
 Arthur Sullivan, Koto Robertine (named for a Japanese 
 friend), now Mrs. Kenneth Carr; Dorothy Bremond, 
 Hazel Neamaug, Helen Velasquez, Robert Stewart, Ro- 
 land Dana and Mary Content, named in order of their 
 appearance. 
 
 When Chase came home from Europe the presenta- 
 tion of his gifts was as much of an event as Christmas. 
 The children would wait in the living-room, looking over 
 the foreign periodicals he had brought back, while their 
 father and mother unpacked the gifts. The boys usually 
 got mechanical toys suited to their age and sex, the girls 
 something interesting to wear. 
 
 When he found that his oldest son instead of turning 
 toward art was interested in electricity and mechanics, 
 Chase was deeply bewildered. Instead oi protesting, how- 
 
 [272]
 
 CHASE S PORT RAIT OF HIS YOUNGEST SON. ROLAND DANA CHASE 
 Painted the year before the artist's death.
 
 CHASE, THE MAN 
 
 ever, he contented himself with such dark allusions as 
 that he "was glad that Bobbie was at the top of the 
 house where he could only blow the roof off with his 
 experiments." But in time he came to have quite a 
 deferential attitude toward his scientific son and would 
 inquire quite formally and respectfully when he read or 
 heard of some mysterious scientific phenomenon: "What 
 explanation can you offer of this?" 
 
 Of course it was the natural destiny of all the chil- 
 dren, especially the girls, to pose for their father. The 
 oldest daughter, Alice, familiarly known as Cosy, has 
 probably posed more often than any painter's child 
 in America, and Dorothy, the third daughter, is a close 
 second. Helen, the original of the Infanta portrait, says 
 that one of her earliest recollections is of posing in a 
 difficult position and being repaid with caramels, which 
 she was allowed to eat during her rests. 
 
 Often the children were unconscious subjects as they 
 played about the moors at Shinnecock. Helen remembers 
 her surprise as a small child when after having watched 
 her father's canvas she ran off, to return almost in- 
 stantly, and discovered that in that brief moment her 
 pink hair-ribbon had been immortalized upon the canvas. 
 
 At another time, at one of the numerous birthday 
 celebrations in the family, when Helen had put on one 
 
 [273]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of the little colored-paper caps that come in French 
 motto bonbons she remembers how her father, after 
 staring intently at her an instant, commanded her to 
 go down to the studio, and play was abandoned for 
 posing. 
 
 There seems to have been no indolence in Chase's 
 nature. His days were as full as an average man's week. 
 It was no uncommon thing for him to have a sitter in the 
 morning in addition to giving conscientious criticism 
 to his large class, afterward attending a luncheon at 
 which he made an address; then to take an afternoon 
 train to Philadelphia or Washington for some important 
 meeting, returning on a midnight train. All of his life 
 until his failing health forbade, Chase was tireless in 
 the cause of art. If one asked of him in that name he 
 gave to the full measure of his strength. 
 
 o 
 
 [274]
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 IN passing through a gallery it is often unnecessary to 
 look for the signature on a canvas in order to recog- 
 nize the painter. This may be a question of personality 
 or of manner. The big man has artistic personality, the 
 lesser one a manner. The clever painter has mannerisms, 
 the master has touch. 
 
 The brush of William M. Chase had touch. More than 
 that, it held the elusive secret of style, and style is a 
 quality of the master. The most talented student's work 
 can only promise, not possess it. The canvases of many a 
 strong painter lack it. It cannot be acquired, it is the most 
 aristocratic and intangible of all the qualities that go 
 to make a good picture. It seems a gift as subtle and in- 
 nate as magnetism. Yet at this present period or 
 rather phase of painting when brilliant but too often 
 unsound technic on the one hand and the hysterical un- 
 inspired search for eccentricity on the other have been 
 most in evidence, it would seem as if this precious heri- 
 tage of the old masters were the rarest thing in modern 
 art. 
 
 The influences that worked upon Chase and went to 
 form his individual style are interesting not only because 
 
 [2751
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of the part they played in his own artistic destiny, but 
 because they are concerned with the great transition 
 period of modern art. Although a pioneer of art in this 
 country Chase does not seem to have been of the spon- 
 taneously creative type. He had not only a very definite 
 art personality of his own but the bigger thing, individ- 
 uality. Yet it was a thing variously derived and sug- 
 gested, not, as occasionally happens in the arts, an innate 
 expression. His art was individual, but his inspiration 
 was derivative. The thing he ultimately produced was 
 a combination of the things he had absorbed, a new 
 thing and his own. To the depths of his soul Chase felt 
 a reverence for the great art of the past, a much needed 
 lesson to the immature, self-assured young students of 
 to-day who confide to each other over their long pipes 
 that "Velasquez couldn't paint and Holbein couldn't 
 draw." 
 
 When the talented young American boy was a stu- 
 dent in Munich Piloty's pupil but Leibl's disciple 
 he painted brilliant old masters. It was Alfred Stevens, 
 the Belgian painter whom he so profoundly admired, 
 who said to Chase after seeing some of his pictures at 
 the Salon: "Why do you try to make your canvases 
 look as if they had been painted by the old masters?" 
 From that time on Chase sought to Express himself. 
 
 [276]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 In analyzing those qualities which constitute the in- 
 dividuality of Chase's art and which have become its 
 influence, one would select as most obvious his painting 
 of the figure in the interior and in the open, his revivifica- 
 tion and development of the art of still life and the em- 
 phasis he laid upon it as painting material, and a certain 
 distinctive treatment evolved from the study of Japanese 
 art. 
 
 In the more direct influence of his teaching he laid 
 emphasis upon two fundamental and all-important points. 
 His reiteration of the fact that a painter's first considera- 
 tion must be the purely technical side of painting, and 
 his insistence upon what is in truth the Greek spirit in 
 art the joy of the creative impulse, that essence which 
 should inform the slightest sketch as well as the finished 
 picture. "You must enjoy what you are doing if others 
 are to enjoy it with you," he often used to say to his 
 pupils. 
 
 Chase's use of the figure in the landscape was a new 
 and characteristic thing. No one has better appreciated 
 the value of the small decisive human note in relation 
 to the large spaces of earth and sky, the significant 
 accent of that small color note a little pink hat, a red 
 bow, a child's colored stockings, a woman's parasol in 
 relation to the wide sweep of the Shinnecock moors, the 
 
 [277]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 fine subtle touch of the little figure in that quiet plane 
 of grass of many colors yet one value these qualities 
 belong to Chase. They are recognizable the minute the 
 eye falls upon the canvas in a gallery. The figures are 
 often children, sometimes a woman or an old man- 
 whatever it may be, it is always part of the landscape. 
 
 In his interiors there is the same appreciation of the 
 relation of the figure to its surroundings. In painting 
 the atmosphere of a dark interior, the sense of light in 
 the dark, Chase has been extraordinarily successful and 
 has had many imitators among his pupils. Undeniably 
 from the old Dutch masters he learned much about the 
 painting of interior light, yet he cannot be said to have 
 imitated them. He accepted their lesson and gave out 
 his knowledge in his own manner. 
 
 Chase's early interior subjects must not be taken as 
 examples of his interior painting. Neither the picture 
 of his Tenth Street Studio in the Brooklyn Museum 
 which was painted in the early eighties, nor the one now 
 the property of the Carnegie Institute, which is an early 
 sketch quite recently filled in, make any attempt at paint- 
 ing interior light. They are decorative sketches with an 
 excellent handling of patches of strong color, but they 
 are innocent of any attempt to suggest atmosphere. 
 Such pictures as Hide and Seek, painted in 1888, and 
 
 [278]

 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 Ring Toss, of a somewhat later date, are fine examples 
 of Chase's painting of interior light. His mastery of that 
 trick seems to date from his visits to Holland in 1884 and 
 1885, when he became particularly interested in the art 
 of the Dutch painters and perhaps studied De Hooghe 
 and Vermeer more carefully than he had before. 
 
 Chase's interest in still life was awakened by his study 
 of the French masters Chardin and Vollon, but he evolved 
 a still-life technic of his own and revealed the result to 
 America at a time when still life was known only as a 
 dull step in the student's course. In doing this he did 
 more than present new subject-matter to American 
 students and painters, he declared a creed of art, for 
 William Chase, like Whistler, discovered and proved 
 that beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder and lies 
 therefore in all objects alike, whether the special subject 
 is a fish, a piece of fabric, or a woman's face. "While 
 there is still life there is hope," Chase used to say in 
 diagnosing the health of American art. And another 
 time, with his quaint kindly humor: "If you can paint 
 a pot you can paint an angel." 
 
 The lesson he drew from Japanese art became part 
 and parcel of his own. Its direct influence is obvious in 
 his decorative use of the kimono-clad figure, the Japanese 
 arrangement, the introduction of Japanese objects into 
 
 [ 279 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 his composition; the indirect influence is found in his 
 sense of elimination and color composition, and most 
 of all, in his absorption of that indescribable thing that 
 is the essence of a people's art. In this day when Japanese 
 prints of a sort are a commonplace to the shop-girl, it 
 is difficult for us to realize that they stood as a veri- 
 table entrance to a new world to the painters of the 
 seventies and eighties, for now we are all familiar with 
 their influence upon modern art. 
 
 The Spanish suggestion in Chase's work is less definite. 
 In the painting of face, hair, or figure, in the treatment 
 of the actual Spanish subject, in the masterly handling 
 of blacks and whites, one glimpses the Velasquez lesson ; 
 but the trail that contact with the art of Spain left upon 
 the painter's imagination is something less specific than 
 the influence of any one painter, however great. It is 
 an essence like the rhythm of a Spanish dance. One can 
 trace it in the pose of a figure not Spanish, as in the por- 
 trait called Dorothy, or just in some indefinable manner or 
 detail of treatment. 
 
 Doubtless his discovery of the French plein air school 
 in the early eighties helped to emancipate Chase from 
 the painting of outdoors in the dark tones of the Munich 
 School. Some suggestion from the French painters may 
 have assisted his seeing of his Central Park subjects, 
 
 [280]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 but the Shinnecock landscapes are pure Chase, for as 
 has been said, the thing that developed out of these in- 
 fluences and associations, this opening out of new vistas, 
 was so essentially his own that one always identifies as 
 such not only a real Chase, but anything in the manner 
 or imitation of one. More than one pupil never got be- 
 yond the stage of making little Chases. 
 
 Chase's work, however, does not divide itself into 
 sharp periods. After his emancipation from the Munich 
 manner there was that time early in his career when the 
 specific charm of the Spanish manner and subject the 
 Fortuny influence intermingled with the Velasquez 
 caused him to paint a number of Spanish pictures of the 
 type of A Spanish Lady, shown in the Memorial Ex- 
 hibition in the Metropolitan Museum February, 1917, 
 in which white, yellow, pink, and black are combined in 
 a manner peculiarly Spanish. In the early eighties and 
 late nineties the park subjects just referred to absorbed 
 him; but his Shinnecock landscapes and interiors, his 
 Japanese kimono-clad subjects, his still-life studies, all 
 these seemed to be expressions of a painting mood rather 
 than a phase in his development since he painted them 
 at intervals during a period of thirty years. 
 
 His first Japanesque portrait, that of Mrs. Chase hold- 
 ing their first baby, called Mother and Child, was painted 
 
 [281 1
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 in 1886. The Red Box, one of his best, was painted about 
 1901. He did another called The Flame the year before 
 his death. 
 
 Nothing in Chase's painting was more individual than 
 his use of color, nothing more distinguished than his 
 painting of blacks and whites. If not a colorist in the 
 usual sense of the term, he had a keen and subtle sense of 
 the value of the color note that was one of the hall-marks 
 of a Chase canvas. 
 
 He never attempted to manipulate a "riot of color." 
 Indeed his use of large patches of color found in some of 
 his earlier canvases is seldom entirely successful. His 
 taste was rather for the reserves of color, the finer tones 
 and juxtapositions, comparative blacks and contrasted 
 whites, with the significant accenting touch of light or 
 dark. But most effective of all is his subtle, economical 
 manner of using a small quantity of color in such a way 
 that it tells for ten times its quantity and speaks more 
 authoritatively than an overwhelming brilliance. The 
 Red Box is an example of this. The most trumpet-like 
 proclamation of scarlet could not penetrate more keenly, 
 seize more compellingly upon the imagination than do 
 the elusive quirls and splashes leading up to the final 
 "let go" on the wide patch of the pinkish -red sleeve 
 and the coral glow of the red box. The canvas called
 
 THE RED BOX. 
 
 Owned by Mr. Philip Sharpless, of Philadelphia.
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 Mother and Child shows a slender reposeful standing 
 figure in a black kimono, holding against one shoulder 
 the soft form of the baby. The harmony is quiet and 
 simple blacks, low-toned whites, a touch of red, a note 
 of smoky violet in the roll of the kimono at the feet, 
 grayish figures on the black robe connecting the light 
 tone of the baby's robe with the black ones, the intense 
 note of the red in the neck-band of the kimono repeated 
 more lightly in the handle of the baby's rattle and in the 
 pattern on the violet border. The Open Japanese Book is 
 a portrait of his daughter Alice in a black kimono against 
 a neutral tone. The strong accent of red in the sash re- 
 peats through the book of prints and the figures in the 
 robe. The girl's smile and the expression of the hand are 
 happily caught. Another interesting portrait of this 
 class is the one called The Gray Kimono, in which the 
 finely felt color note lies in the blue touches in the gown 
 and book. 
 
 Although Chase's manner of working was in direct 
 opposition to that of the artist who experiments in 
 glazes and other indirect means of obtaining effects, 
 he objected most of all to fixed ideas, rules, or habits. 
 He kept his mind open and experimented in uncon- 
 ventional ways with his palette. He frequently used 
 siccatif and undiluted varnish as a medium, which, in 
 
 [283]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 the case of his fish pictures, played a very definite part 
 in his method. As fish, of course, will not keep, Chase's 
 directness and quickness in working was never of greater 
 advantage than when he was painting them. His method 
 of working on a fish still-life was to lay in his whole 
 picture in the morning, using varnish as a medium. By 
 the time he returned from lunch the surface was agree- 
 ably "tacky," which is to say, in just the right condi- 
 tion for that interesting manipulation that he used to 
 call playing with the paint. When he laid down his 
 brushes that afternoon the picture was finished. 
 
 Once a landscape painted as a joke by his wife with 
 enamel house paint suggested to Chase that that pig- 
 ment was worthy of serious consideration as a means 
 of effect, and the next time he painted a fish picture he 
 added white enamel house paint to his palette. The in- 
 gredients of the paint were perfectly good; he knew that 
 there was no reason why it should not last. 
 
 On his trips to Pittsburgh for jury duty Chase used 
 to pass a certain fence painted red, an offense to the 
 landscape, but in itself a strong, beautiful color. As he 
 noted in passing it twice a year that the color did not 
 fade, even outdoors in the sunlight, it was evident that 
 the pigment had great permanency, so the next time 
 Chase went to Pittsburgh he hunted tip the source of 
 
 [284]
 
 MOTHKR AND CHILD. 
 
 Chase's portrait of his wife and their first baby.
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 the paint. Having finally trailed it to the manufacturer, 
 he bought all the red paint the man had on hand and 
 had an artist's color firm put it up in tubes. With char- 
 acteristic generosity he scattered it among his painter 
 friends. With this red many of his red notes were touched 
 in those characteristic accents which caused Kenyon 
 Cox to say that in his use of a red note Chase had 
 signed his canvas. 
 
 While Chase was in England not long before Abbey's 
 death, Abbey sent him an urgent request to come and 
 see his Harrisburg decorations. At first Chase thought it 
 impossible, but at the last minute he took a flying trip to 
 Abbey's country house by motor. When he saw the 
 decorations his diagnosis sounded proverbial, but it was 
 as Abbey realized afterward quite right. "What your 
 canvas needs is a spot of red." Abbey took his advice. 
 
 Always generous in passing on anything that he dis- 
 covered, evolved, or spontaneously knew, Chase was 
 almost non-understandable to the kind of painters who 
 guard their little trade secrets with jealous care; espe- 
 cially did the continental painters, who as a rule con- 
 sider such generosity sheer madness, marvel at his lack 
 of self -protection. 
 
 Chase always told freely in so far as the thing was ex- 
 plainable just how he had obtained his results. In 
 
 [ 285 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 painting the Whistler portrait he said that he started 
 by laying in the whole atmospheric envelope, then lit- 
 erally drawing out the significant masses and spots with 
 a paint-rag, gradually refined the masses and drawing as 
 he painted. 
 
 Chase always drew with the brush. It was the way 
 natural to him and the method he believed in as the 
 best means to the end. He encouraged his students to 
 paint almost as soon as they drew. With his own chil- 
 dren he gave them color at once. 
 
 Chase used to lay great stress (perhaps too great 
 stress for the understanding of the student) upon what 
 he called the "happy accident," although one interested 
 in the psychic would explain such happenings by the 
 workings of the artist's subjective mind. Along some- 
 what the same line of belief was his advice to students 
 to use all sorts of brushes. House-paint brushes he con- 
 sidered excellent for many purposes, also ragged brushes, 
 moth or mouse eaten brushes had, he maintained, great 
 possibilities for certain effects. 
 
 There are painters who think that Chase did not help 
 the student by this insistence upon what might be called 
 the temperamental rather than the studious side of art 
 training. But such an estimate is superficial. There is no 
 royal road to art. Any student who Ras achieved any- 
 
 [ 286 J
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 thing in this world, whatever schools may have done for 
 him, has worked out his own salvation. Chase was con- 
 cerned with the student's attitude. In laying emphasis as 
 he did upon the light-hearted side of art, the spirit of 
 play in work, he was no doubt urged by his belief that 
 the academic attitude he had to combat in his own 
 career was as false in feeling as it was in result. He was 
 just as much opposed to the striving for effect without 
 knowledge as the most didactic academician. 
 
 Chase's unerring perception as to what a canvas 
 needed to achieve harmony or effect caused him to do 
 or advise at any moment the exactly right thing. Notic- 
 ing in one of his own canvases after it was placed upon 
 an exhibition wall that the face and hands seemed to 
 lack color, he brushed over them with a little red in his 
 varnish as it hung on the wall. It looked to the younger 
 painter watching him much too pink at the moment 
 he was, to tell the truth, filled with consternation at 
 Chase's rashness but when he saw the canvas again a 
 day or two later after the exhibition had opened, he 
 realized that when the surface was no longer wet the 
 effect was exactly right. 
 
 Another time Chase offered artistic first aid on hang- 
 ing day to a confrere, a painter of less spontaneous gifts 
 than his own, who was very melancholy over his realiza- 
 
 [287]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 tion that his canvas did not "hold together" when he 
 saw it on the exhibition wall. Chase cast a quick eye 
 over it. It was a decorative picture with patches of blue 
 in its scheme which were distinctly "out." The picture 
 had been worked over until its freshness was gone and 
 the original idea lost. Chase instantly advised the painter 
 to go over the whole with blue in his varnish. The other 
 artist accepted the suggestion, and when his entire can- 
 vas had had a wash of blue, the whole was not only 
 drawn together, but had regained the appearance of 
 freshness it had lost. 
 
 As a portrait-painter pure and simple, Chase's work 
 was uneven. Not infrequently he failed in the matter of 
 likeness which, while having no bearing upon the art 
 value of a canvas, is undoubtedly a necessary considera- 
 tion in the valuation of a portrait as such. Chase has, 
 however, painted some masterly portraits, strong in 
 characterization as well as in technic. In these he seems 
 for some reason to have been more successful with men, 
 despite such brilliant exceptions as the Woman with the 
 White Shawl. 
 
 Among his finest portraits of men are those of Emil 
 Paur, Louis Windmuller, Watson Webb, Spencer Kel- 
 logg, A. B. Gwathmey, Edward Steichen, William Howe, 
 Robert Underwood Johnson, and Dean Grosvenor. And, 
 last and most brilliant of all, his portrait of Whistler. 
 
 [288]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 In this memorable canvas the figure stands a dark sil- 
 houette against an atmospheric golden-brown tone. 
 Quiet, elusive, insidious in treatment, it conveys the very 
 essence of the man fantastic, diabolic, egotistic, ma- 
 licious, yet holding unmistakably the light intangible 
 quality of genius. It is even touched with the very art 
 personality of the subject an added subtlety on the 
 part of the painter, for though the manner recalls Whis- 
 tler, the canvas as it stands is unmistakably a Chase, 
 not a Whistler. 
 
 Chase, as may be readily imagined, had no desire to 
 paint the pretty feminine subjects, yet he was not en- 
 tirely proof against the effect of the outer man or woman, 
 and there were types before which his muse fled in re- 
 volt when he flatly refused a portrait order. 
 
 Some one in conversation with him once mentioned a 
 well-known man of his acquaintance, to which Chase's 
 only reply was, "Is his wife still living?" which his com- 
 panion thought a rather singular answer. The explana- 
 tion proved to be that the man had once asked Chase 
 to paint his wife's portrait, but Chase after meeting the 
 lady felt that he could not possibly do it. Not knowing 
 how to refuse flatly, he had simply evaded making any 
 definite date and had been avoiding the excellent gentle- 
 man ever since. 
 
 On one occasion Chase was commissioned to paint the 
 
 [ 289]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 portrait of a woman unsophisticated in art but with very 
 definite personal tastes. When she went for her first sit- 
 ting Chase, who had understood that he was to paint a 
 half-length, found that she wanted a full-length por- 
 trait. Looking about he discovered that he had no can- 
 vas large enough in his studio. There may have been 
 several in the storeroom across the hall for Chase must 
 have suffered from fear-thought where painting supplies 
 were concerned judging from the amount of material he 
 had accumulated but in any case he did not find what 
 he wanted in the studio. He did however, come upon a 
 very large, almost square canvas upon which a pupil 
 who sometimes painted in his studio had started a group 
 portrait of a mother and two children. Turning it upside 
 down so that the picture already laid in should not 
 prove confusing, thinking, if he thought at all, that 
 necessity knows no law, he began his portrait. 
 
 But after his sitter had left he was smitten by a sense 
 of guilt, and going to the telephone confessed to the 
 owner of the canvas what he had done. She reassured 
 him however, having the pupil's feeling that whatever 
 Chase did was right, and Chase retained possession of 
 the sixty -foot canvas. 
 
 Being so large it contained more space than he would 
 naturally have used, and within thi space the picture 
 
 [290]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 had to be composed. He seated his subject therefore to 
 accommodate the shape of the canvas and made a back- 
 ground of studio accessories deliciously and illusively 
 touched in. Indeed the Japanesque pattern of the whole 
 
 was one of Chase's .most successful effects. His sitter, 
 
 ^ 
 however, had her own point of view, with reasons if they 
 
 were not artistic ones. She preferred a plain background, 
 she said anyway those were not her things in the back- 
 ground, why should they be there? She did not want 
 them. 
 
 Chase was in despair. It needed the sure relentless 
 shafts of a Whistler to pierce a conviction so simple and 
 firm. Chase could only despair and groan: "What shall 
 I do?" 
 
 Luckily the subject's husband had a different view- 
 point. With some innate feeling for beauty perhaps, or 
 with the realization that it was a desirable thing to have 
 the record of the painter's beautiful studio decorations 
 in his possession, he told his wife that the picture must 
 remain quite as it was, and so fortunately it did. 
 
 Chase's work in pastel is worthy of special considera- 
 tion. In his effects one never feels any obtruded sense of 
 the medium, only so much consciousness of it as enables 
 him to utilize its special quality the delicacy, sugges- 
 tiveness and lightness of pastel, and the transparent 
 
 [291 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 quality obtainable with water-color. He often com- 
 mented to his pupils upon the fact that the water-colorist 
 so often seemed to discard all idea of values and natu- 
 ralistic effect in using this medium. Considering one of 
 these fictitious productions, he would murmur protest- 
 ingly in his eliminative fragmentary fashion: ; 'The 
 state of mind with which you approached it, madam." 
 [Chronic water-colorists are usually feminine.] "Think 
 of it as if it were something else." 
 
 In addition to his work in oil, pastel, and water-color, 
 Chase made a few etchings, among them one of his Court 
 Jester, one of Currier's Whistling Boy, and a dry-point 
 from his portrait of one of the Piloty children. He also 
 experimented with monotypes from time to time, but it 
 apparently interested him little to work without color. 
 
 Not a small part of Chase's contribution to the under- 
 standing of art lay in his demonstration of the painter's 
 seeing of his subject. He once said that it was in con- 
 templation of the art of the old masters that he first 
 realized that the subject was of no importance, that the 
 painter's interest must lie in the quality of his art. He 
 called attention to the fact that Raphael's best pictures 
 were not his religious subjects but his portraits of the 
 men and women of his time. "Rembrandt's Beef in the 
 Louvre is finer than his religious pictures," he once re-

 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 marked. "From that one canvas I feel that I know 
 Rembrandt." 
 
 In his student days Chase was deeply impressed by the 
 remark of his teacher, Piloty, that the next great art 
 development would take place in America. He never 
 ceased to believe in the art destiny of his country or to 
 work for its fulfilment. He never expatriated himself 
 despite the lure of the Old World, yet none can say that 
 his art was the sufferer thereby. 
 
 Chase's work, it must be admitted, was uneven. So 
 was Tintoretto's, perhaps for the same reason. Both men 
 had an incessant impulse to paint. But it is a Philistine 
 misconception of the art impulse to call this creative 
 activity industry as it often is by the layman. Rather 
 is it the result of a great and exclusive concentration upon 
 and a tremendous and absorbing enthusiasm for just 
 one thing. But it is, perhaps necessarily, not the type of 
 talent that produces the greatest average in results. 
 The conventional Victorian painter was as even as a 
 machine in his correctness. The true artist is never even; 
 but the degree of his unevenness, the amount of inspira- 
 tion, present or absent, from the special piece of work 
 varies with the individual type. With Chase, despite his 
 technical brilliancy, it varied considerably. That fact 
 does not make him the lesser artist. 
 
 [293]
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST (CONTINUED) 
 
 THE artist's material may be found anywhere; the 
 subject exists in the eyes of the painter. It becomes 
 art when he shows us how he has seen it. The lay mind 
 does not imagine the ancient fish-basket to be a paint- 
 able object; yet there is one in a Chase canvas, allied to 
 a pink fish and others, subtly brushed in in rose and 
 brown, that is as unforgettable to the artist or student 
 as a Botticelli Madonna is to the sentimentalist. Few 
 painters could discover the possibilities of the too 
 neighborly seaside cottage as a subject; yet Chase has 
 so treated a group of these drearily trim little houses 
 that they have the light charm of a Japanese print. 
 
 In short, all art is translation. Pictorial art is the 
 record of the exterior beauty of the world as seen by the 
 eyes of the artist. Beauty, it is hardly necessary to ex- 
 plain in these days of the eccentric, grotesque, and de- 
 cadent in art, does not mean smooth and obvious beauty. 
 The sin of prettiness against which William Chase re- 
 volted was the vice of the Victorian age. Before he died 
 he came to inveigh with equal consternation against the 
 sin of meaningless ugliness and inept pretentiousness 
 rampant in the secession art of the hour. 
 
 [294]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 "Try to queer your composition somehow. See it in 
 some way in which it would never occur to you to ap- 
 proach it," he used to say to the conventionally minded 
 pupil, hoping to jog the routine mind out of its rut. But 
 such "queering" of composition and everything else as 
 has run riot for the last nine years in Europe and the 
 last three or four in America was surely the furthest 
 thing from the imagination of this intrinsically sane 
 painter. 
 
 In defining the qualities of a great work of art, Chase 
 has said that it must contain three things: "truth, qual- 
 ity and interesting treatment." Truth, of course, in- 
 cludes all the technical necessities; quality he character- 
 ized as the ring of gold compared with that of a baser 
 coin; style he included in interesting treatment. But 
 since it is evident that a picture can have interesting 
 treatment and yet lack the subtle tang of style, the 
 definition, excellent as it is, may only be considered as 
 broadly inclusive "and that is the trouble with talk- 
 ing about art," says the painter. 
 
 It seems incredible to those of us who have known 
 him in his later years that in the first days of his return 
 to America Chase was considered an intolerant, aggres- 
 sive, opinionated person by the older painters whose 
 dry and dusty art he was demolishing. We who are fa- 
 
 [295]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 miliar with his kindness, tact, and breadth of view, his 
 tolerance of all sorts and kinds of achievement, find this 
 difficult to imagine. He used to expend his scornful wit 
 upon Murillo, yet for contemporary Murillos, in his later 
 days, he came to feel a kindly toleration, admitting that 
 they had accomplished something that they had set out 
 to do however it might differ from his own idea of art. 
 His charity extended to all, even, to a degree, to that 
 cult calling itself variously cubist, futurist, postimpres- 
 sionist, in so much as he recognized it as a manifesta- 
 tion of the law of periodicity or rhythm in art (although 
 he did not call it that). For since all schools tend to 
 crystallization, revolt, break-up must occur in order to 
 prevent stagnation. This fact Chase fully realized. The 
 bizarre or eccentric he appreciated for what it was 
 worth if professionally executed, but for inefficiency and 
 failure masquerading as revelation, even to the weak- 
 headed professional painter led astray by that singular 
 epidemic, he had nothing but scorn. 
 
 At one time he was asked to talk before an audience 
 very sympathetic to secession art. Only a few minutes 
 before he had been discussing the subject with a pupil 
 in his broad-minded way, remarking that absurd as the 
 productions of the young revolutionists usually were in 
 themselves "a consolation," as he expressed it, "for 
 
 [296]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 their stupidity" they were nevertheless the inevitable 
 protest against the set standards created by schools. But 
 it chanced that Chase's predecessor in his last words had 
 referred to the sketches on exhibition as "these things," 
 certainly with no intention of disrespect since he ad- 
 mired them profoundly. Chase got up immediately after- 
 ward. "I am glad that this gentleman has properly re- 
 ferred to these productions as things," he remarked. 
 "/ was about to make the mistake of calling them pic- 
 tures." Having been started on this line by the cue he 
 had been unable to resist, Chase proceeded to make 
 entertaining fun of futurist art. The result was that 
 his audience regarded him more or less scornfully as a 
 "back number," whereas the truth was that in his 
 heart and mind he was extending all possible charity 
 and understanding to the spirit that moved the sincere 
 revolutionists, even though unable to take their results 
 seriously. 
 
 For the early American painters Chase had the great- 
 est respect and admiration. In one of his public talks 
 on art he remarked that Copley, Stewart, Morse, Inman 
 and Sully deserved to rank among the great painters. 
 
 Among the old masters his particular gods were 
 Velasquez and Hals. After them he valued most, Rem- 
 brandt, Titian, Holbein, Tintoretto, De Hooghe, Ver- 
 
 [297 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 meer, Chardin and El Greco. Of painters of a later 
 date, Vollon, Goya, Fortuny, Manet, Stevens and 
 Mancini were his favorites. He also greatly admired 
 Boldini, La Touche, Boudin, Sorolla, Brangwyn and 
 Monticelli; to which list must be added, without enter- 
 ing further into his contemporaneous compatriotic ad- 
 mirations, Whistler and Sargent. With his appreciation 
 of his confreres and pupils, Chase was generous almost 
 to the point of overstatement. "I would have been glad 
 to have painted that bit myself," was one of his gener- 
 ous tributes to gifted pupils adapted from Whistler, it 
 is true, but none the less encouraging to the recipient. 
 
 Yet Chase had au fond a very just estimate of modern 
 American art, despite that surface tendency to over- 
 appreciation which was the outgrowth of his kindness. 
 "I suppose there never was so much fairly good paint- 
 ing done as is turned out by the artists of to-day," he 
 used to say, "yet there is nothing quite so rare as really 
 good painting." 
 
 Chase not only introduced America to the works of 
 Manet, since he was instrumental, as has been told in a 
 previous chapter, in influencing Alden Weir to buy two 
 beautiful Manets for the Metropolitan Museum, but he 
 had much to do with familiarizing the American public 
 with the name of Greco. When the Metropolitan Mu- 
 
 [298]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 seum was considering the purchase of the Greco Nativity, 
 Daniel Chester French sent for Chase as an expert upon 
 Spanish art to decide whether or not the work was 
 genuine. Chase was also responsible for the purchase 
 of El Greco's Crucifixion for the Wilstach Collection in 
 Philadelphia. One day soon after this last picture had 
 been hung, Chase, who was standing before it in the 
 gallery, was accosted by a gentleman who was also study- 
 ing the canvas. "Can you tell me," this gentleman anx- 
 iously inquired, "if the artist had any authority for mak- 
 ing the figure of the infant Christ so emaciated?" Mr. 
 Chase responded with considerable dryness that he was 
 unable to furnish any data upon that point. "And 
 why," pursued the conscientious student of art, "should . 
 a picture so unpleasant be hung upon these walls? 
 Who is responsible for its presence here?" Chase turned 
 upon his questioner we can imagine that blue light of 
 wrath in his eye that came when his shrine was invaded 
 by the Philistine: 
 
 " I am proud and happy to state that I am the person 
 responsible for the purchase of that picture, and I would 
 have you understand, sir, that you are standing before 
 the work of a great master." With these words the 
 painter made a dramatic exit from the presence of the 
 bewildered critic of art. To Chase such an incident held 
 
 [299 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 no saving light of humor. It was an outrage that rankled 
 in his mind for long afterward. 
 
 Chase's collection of pictures at one time included 
 as many as six hundred valuable canvases, including 
 examples of Rubens, Van Dyck, Jordaens, Guyp, Cluet, 
 Corot, Vollon, Daubigny, Ribot, Manet, Roybet, Geri- 
 cault, Couture, Jules Dupre, Villegas, Isabey, Jacques, 
 Boudin, Bastien-Lepage, Georges Michel, La Touche, 
 Fromentin, Alfred Stevens, Carolus Duran, El Greco, 
 Ribera, Fortuny, Sorolla, Mancini, Boldini, De Nittis, 
 Raffaeli, Martin Rico, Leibl, Von Lenbach, Ziem, Hans 
 Makart, Brangwyn, Sargent, Whistler, La Farge, Blake- 
 lock, Duveneck, Frank Currier, William Hunt, Twacht- 
 man, George Innes, Blum, Wyatt Eaton, Gedney Bunce, 
 Irving Wiles and F. C. Frieseke. 
 
 His collection of rings is famous, also the interesting 
 and varied collection of crosses that he made for his 
 wife. In addition to these he collected at various times 
 clocks and watches, samovars and old locks. 
 
 Wherever he went in Europe or America Chase had a 
 studio. His Philadelphia studio was said to be quite as 
 handsome as the Fourth Avenue place. The one in Ma- 
 drid is described by the painters who saw it as extraor- 
 dinarily artistic. Even the little California studio was 
 charming. He refused to live without "his background. 
 
 [300]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 In the days of his early conflict with the academi- 
 cians Chase's apprehensions were sometimes unnecessarily 
 aroused about his own work. Christy tells an anecdote 
 of the Tenth Street Studio days when Chase had painted 
 a brilliant study of the nude. The next day, wanting to 
 see it again, Christy wandered into the adjoining studio 
 where the canvas had stood upon an easel and discovered 
 that Chase had painted it out. "Why, Mr. Chase," he 
 exclaimed, "why did you paint out that beautiful 
 thing?" Chase's eyebrow went up in a worried frown. 
 
 After a moment he said: "Well, to tell you the truth 
 
 (a "bonbon-box" artist) came in here yesterday and he 
 liked it so well I thought there must be something the 
 matter with it." 
 
 Christy tells another anecdote that shows Chase's 
 characteristic view-point amusingly. One day a very im- 
 pressive-looking artist came to the studio to call on 
 Chase a person having what is known as a great com- 
 mand of language. Young Christy was much impressed, 
 and decided that this magnificent being could be none 
 other than Sargent. After the visitor had left he went in 
 and questioned Chase. No, Chase replied, his guest was 
 not a great painter. Christy was astonished. But Chase 
 shook his head with a wise smile. "No, they never are 
 that sort. Talks too well" he added confidentially. 
 
 [301]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 Chase had to the utmost degree the quality of disin- 
 terested and impersonal judgment; he could value the 
 work and rejoice in the success of the man who had 
 wronged him as sincerely as if the painter had been his 
 loyal friend. He was himself a generous patron of the 
 arts, buying not only the pictures of arrived artists but 
 those of his own pupils before they had achieved recog- 
 nition, thus conferring it upon them. 
 
 Chase was Jonas Lie's first patron; he also bought the 
 first picture sold by Salvatore Guarino. He interested 
 himself in Jerome Meyer, who studied with him, and in 
 Everett Shinn, who was not one of his pupils. His assist- 
 ance to his pupil C. W. Hawthorne in his beginnings was 
 of the greatest value to him. He also encouraged and 
 helped his Philadelphia pupil, Leopold Seiffert. He had 
 much to do with starting Schrey vogel on the path to suc- 
 cess. During his presidency of the Society of American 
 Artists he called the attention of the jurors to the work of 
 this young painter, who had not previously met with rec- 
 ognition. The fact that Schreyvogel's pictures were not 
 only admitted but that one of them received the prize 
 at that exhibition made a turning-point in his career. 
 
 Mrs. Wadsworth, the mother of one of Chase's promis- 
 ing pupils who died young, tells of another characteristi- 
 cally generous act. o 
 
 [ 302 ]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 One day at Shinnecock he exhibited to his class a 
 number of canvases, the work of a young man who was 
 both poor and talented a not infrequent combination. 
 The young man was married, it seems, and had children, 
 and had decided because of his responsibilities that he 
 must give up painting and become a clerk. But this the 
 kindly Chase, having seen his work, instantly decided 
 he must not do. He made one of his characteristic ap- 
 peals for the poor young artist, insisting that his talent 
 justified some effort on their part to give him a start and 
 added: "Just think what a poor clerk he would make!" 
 
 Many of the pupils bought sketches at once, Chase, of 
 course, taking several himself, and the young man who 
 had come so close to giving up his career continued to 
 paint, and thanks to this help and encouragement, be- 
 came a successful artist. 
 
 Chase was interested in all talented young artists, 
 whether they were his pupils or not. Another gifted 
 painter, now successful, has never forgotten how when 
 he was stranded in a European city, living in the very 
 poorest quarter of the town, Chase took him out with 
 him and feted him, apparently unaware of his shabby 
 clothes. 
 
 Chase was more than generous in his exchanges with 
 other painters. Henry Poore tells of his own experience, 
 
 [303]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 which made a deep impression upon him. On the open- 
 ing day of Chase's exhibition at the National Arts Club 
 Poore ran across him. After greeting his fellow artist 
 Chase inquired, with a gesture that swept the room: 
 "Well, have you made your choice?" Mr. Poore, rather 
 overcome by this generosity for the exhibit was in all 
 respects remarkable selected a small sketch, but Chase 
 protested, "I had thought you might want this," indi- 
 cating a splendid fish still-life. What was more, he in- 
 sisted upon presenting it. 
 
 A pupil in one of Chase's European classes remembers 
 how Chase once offered to exchange with a European 
 painter who, although most appreciative of Chase and 
 his art, was yet so far removed from his class as an 
 artist that Chase's act could only seem to the outsider 
 a condescension. Chase selected a little sketch of this 
 painter's in which his kindness found something to ad- 
 mire and gave him in return a beautiful fish picture. 
 When the pupil protested, "Oh, Mr. Chase, you're not 
 going to give him that beautiful thing!" his character- 
 istic reply was, "Why not? When you make a gift give 
 your best." There spoke the innate aristocracy of art. 
 
 Concerning his own work and the value the future 
 might set upon it, Chase must have thought frequently, 
 although he seldom spoke of it. Sometimes he believed 
 
 [304]
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 that certain canvases of his would last, at other times he 
 only hoped they would. For so great was his reverence 
 for art and so high his ideal, that measuring his achieve- 
 ment beside it he felt a humility perhaps not realized or 
 understood by those who knew only the mask and habit 
 of the outer man. At such moments he would sometimes 
 say in utter sincerity and simplicity to one near and 
 in his confidence: "I am a greatly overrated man." 
 
 Birge Harrison quotes one of Chase's rare remarks on 
 the subject of posterity's view-point. When going about 
 the exhibition of the Ten American Painters with Mr. 
 Harrison and his wife, Chase had expended his generous 
 hyperbole upon the canvas of a brother artist. 
 
 "There is a masterpiece," he said, "a canvas that can 
 hold its own beside any of the old masters," and Mrs. 
 Harrison quickly added: "And those fish of yours could 
 go into the same museum, for they too are a master- 
 piece." Chase seemed not to hear, but when she repeated 
 her little tribute, he replied: "Yes, yes, I suppose that 
 some day I shall be known only as a painter of fish, a 
 painter of fish." 
 
 While it is not possible to predict what value the 
 future may set upon any of the art of to-day, it seems 
 safe to say that the Whistler portrait, Dorothy and Her 
 Sister, The Red Box, and Mother and Child, not to speak 
 
 [305 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 of a number of fine quiet Shinnecock landscapes, will 
 last as long as the most brilliant fish picture Chase ever 
 painted. 
 
 Chase's practical services to art were too various and 
 varied to be enumerated. He has served as juror on the 
 committees of most of the important exhibitions for the 
 last thirty-five years, forfeiting by that unselfish alle- 
 giance to the cause of art his own eligibility to medals 
 and prizes. In that position alone he did incalculable 
 service to art and artists. He also worked for many years 
 with Beckwith, Blashfield and other painters in attempt- 
 ing to get the Free Art Bill passed so that foreign works 
 of art might be brought into the country free of duty. 
 
 That his opinion was valued by his confreres is a fact 
 that is quite generally acknowledged by them. Anything 
 that Chase knew he wanted to pass on for the cause of 
 art. Walter Palmer has commented appreciatively upon 
 the inspiring quality of his criticism. 
 
 " I was very fond of Chase and always found him most 
 stimulating with his intense, never-failing interest in 
 painting. One could never do a creditable piece of work 
 without Chase praising it at his first opportunity, and 
 he was just as sure to tell one if he had done a poor 
 thing; but in either case it was a pleasure to have his 
 frank, friendly opinion. I remember his once greeting me 
 
 [ 306 ]
 
 DOROTHY AND HER SISTER. 
 
 Portrait of two of Chase's daughters.
 
 CHASE, THE ARTIST 
 
 after seeing something I had painted with the remark: 
 'Palmer, how did you do such a damned bad thing?' 
 
 Frank Benson said of Chase: "I always thought of 
 him, as we all did, as one who above most others was 
 an artist in every thought and act." 
 
 Sargent has added his tribute: "I should be glad to 
 have my very warm friendship for Chase and my great 
 admiration for his work put on record." 
 
 Those who came more closely in contact with him 
 Irving Wiles, Cecilia Beaux, Alden Weir, Carroll Beck- 
 with, and Frank Duveneck have spoken with the deep- 
 est feeling of Chase as man and artist, a feeling simply 
 and completely expressed by Cecilia Beaux when she 
 said: "He was always so rigkt, his judgment was so 
 dependable and his kindness and generosity never failed. 
 We miss him terribly; no one can take his place." 
 
 Aside from those artists already quoted, E. H. Blash- 
 field, Sir John Lavery, F. S. Church, Percy Moran, T. W. 
 Dewing, Charles Dana Gibson, Siddons Mowbray, Will 
 Low, Childe Hassam, Birge Harrison and a host of others 
 have paid their tribute to Chase's achievement, his gen- 
 erous attitude toward the work of other painters, and his 
 unselfish devotion to the cause of art. 
 
 Professional jealousy was not only non-existent in him, 
 it was not understandable to his nature. He wanted first 
 
 [307]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 and always that the purposes of art should be served. 
 To that end he devoted his life. All that was best, finest, 
 most generous, most unselfish in Chase's character was 
 centred in art, not just in his own personal expression 
 but art in the abstract, art the eternal illusive goddess. 
 As his old friend and confrere, Frank Duveneck, said of 
 him, he "did not care whose art it was, his own or some 
 other painter's, so long as it was good art." 
 
 [308]
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 CHASE once said: "I believe I am the father of more 
 art children than any other teacher." And indeed 
 it seemed in some such paternal light that he regarded 
 his pupils. The side that he turned toward them was 
 one of unceasing helpfulness and generosity. Anything 
 that he had to give he gave freely. The very way in 
 which he said "an old pupil of mine" seemed an expres- 
 sion of affection. Mrs. Chase used to say that a person 
 need only claim distant relationship to a pupil to insure 
 his instant attention. He invariably thought of them in 
 the affectionate diminutive. 
 
 The feminine students, whatever their height, weight, 
 or years, were all "little Miss So-and-So," the men all 
 "young This or That," whatever their age or condition. 
 
 Chase had classes in New York, Brooklyn, Philadel- 
 phia, Hartford and Chicago. He taught altogether 
 twenty-one years at the Art League, twelve years at the 
 New York School of Art, thirteen years in Philadelphia 
 and five in Brooklyn, in addition to the classes held in 
 his own studio. He had summer classes in California, 
 England, Italy, Belgium, Holland and Spain, and taught 
 for eleven summers at Shinnecock. Also while he was 
 
 [309 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 teaching in Philadelphia Chase had a free class for stu- 
 dents who could not afford to pay for instruction. The 
 city gave him the use of a public school for this purpose. 
 
 "Association with my pupils has kept me young in my 
 work," he often said. "Criticism of their work has kept 
 my own point of view clear." 
 
 There are comparatively few painters who do not 
 actually dislike teaching, and among those who do not 
 the majority are men whose gift is rather for verbal 
 criticism than for expression with the brush. With Chase 
 the case was entirely different. He loved to teach, but his 
 criticism was always a painter's criticism, suggestive 
 rather than explicit. 
 
 "Try to think of it as if it were something else," he 
 would say to the pupil using water-color in the conven- 
 tional tinted water-color manner. "Could you see as 
 much as that?" he asked another too faithful in detail. 
 And to the honest young student in the museum who 
 said she did not like the Manet Woman with the Parrot, 
 his kindly, amused reply, "No? Oh, but you will," was 
 always remembered as a starting-point. Concerning those 
 things that can come only with the growth of percep- 
 tion, he did not instruct but left them to time. 
 
 In this connection he often referred to a well-known 
 collector who used to consult him about his pictures. 
 
 [310]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 This man had begun collecting alone and unadvised 
 with no real knowledge about pictures and Chase con- 
 sidered him an excellent illustration of how the taste 
 might be educated by the contemplation of art. "He has 
 still in his collection," Chase used to tell us, "the first 
 picture he ever bought, a small thing" he would pause 
 there while an expression of pain contorted his eye- 
 brows "small but terrible. . . . That picture he has 
 kept on the walls of his gallery to show his starting- 
 point, for his collection is now one of the finest in this 
 country." 
 
 To the pupil with a tiresome literal manner who needed 
 a vigorous shaking up he spoke more incisively, but never 
 unkindly. Indeed, more than one unpromising pupil 
 who seemed in student days utterly lacking in the sense 
 of art has somehow under his inspiring influence become 
 a real painter. 
 
 With all sensitiveness he refrained from making any 
 criticism that might deflect or restrain the individual 
 tendency of a talented student. The way in which Chase 
 from his first years of teaching studied the needs of the 
 pupil with individuality was well illustrated in the case of 
 Livingston Platt who had a natural bent for decorative 
 art before the period when that was an available talent. 
 
 Chase noticed how this student in his life class at the 
 
 [311]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 League drew from unusual view-points and always did 
 something that got away a little from the actual pose 
 of the model. After watching Platt's work a while he 
 told him to paint still life, but the same tendency mani- 
 fested itself. Platt seemed to paint not what he saw but 
 something that the thing he saw suggested. Finally 
 Chase requested his unconventional pupil to paint a 
 single object, but when he came to criticise him he found 
 that he had been disobeyed. Platt, unable to resist the 
 temptation to make "an arrangement," had, contrary 
 to his master's instruction, combined other objects with 
 his solitary jar. 
 
 The next experiment Chase made with this non-con- 
 forming young disciple was to invite him to go with him 
 when he painted in the park. Chase noted that his 
 pupil's sketches were invariably done in a lighter key 
 than his own and were rather a harmonious disposition 
 of the facts before him than a regulation landscape such 
 as might have been expected from a student. 
 
 "You ought to be a decorator," Chase said then, "but 
 I don't know what you will find to decorate. You should 
 do something like theatrical scene-painting if such things 
 were sufficiently artistic to justify the painter in using 
 his talents that way." 
 
 That, however, was exactly what cajne to pass in time. 
 
 [312]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 Several years later when such openings first presented 
 themselves, Platt started to make decorative stage-set- 
 tings, first in Belgium, then in America. His sketches 
 and costumes for De Koven's "Canterbury Pilgrims," 
 given at the Metropolitan Opera House last winter, 
 were chosen in the prize competition. The fact is in- 
 teresting not only as an example of Chase's treatment 
 of the pupil's special gift but because it shows how he 
 foresaw even in that day of conventional stage-setting 
 what the artist might do for the theatre. 
 
 In another way Chase might have contributed to the- 
 atrical art had managerial enlightenment been greater. 
 He was once asked to design the costumes for a play 
 whose scene was laid in the sixties. He made some 
 exquisite drawings in color, enjoying the wide sweep of 
 the hoop-skirt with visions of Velasquez's use of that 
 effect flitting through his imagination. But when the 
 manager saw them he laughed the artist to scorn and 
 brought out his play with costumes made in the current 
 fashion. A few years later however, when the manager's 
 education had progressed, he quietly utilized Chase's idea 
 in the costuming of another play. 
 
 Chase's patience with the rebel student was unfailing. 
 When his knowledge or his standards were questioned it 
 was not resentment that he felt but toleration and un- 
 
 [313]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 derstanding. "Because, you see, I was a rebel once my- 
 self," he exclaimed. He had at one time a talented 
 young pupil who scorned his interest and assistance even 
 to the point of discourtesy to his master. "I would 
 have liked to help him, but he didn't seem to want my 
 help," was his only comment. The student afterward 
 went abroad to study and did good work which Chase 
 liked so well that he bought one of his canvases. When 
 the ambitious young artist heard of this purchase his 
 heart was touched through his vanity, it is to be 
 feared and after that he had nothing but admiring things 
 to say of Chase. 
 
 Chase's less original pupils imitated him, sometimes 
 later to find their own manner, but he never encouraged 
 such imitation. His patience in explanation even with 
 the apparently ungifted pupil was unfailing, for he real- 
 ized that sometimes the student who seemed to show 
 little progress at first, afterward developed most satis- 
 factorily. 
 
 He never ceased to warn against the sin of prettiness. 
 "I have often thought that those old Dutch painters 
 were fortunate in having such ugly subjects," he would 
 say in his talks to students (but that was before the 
 day of ladies with one eye and no mouth, executed as 
 with the ill-regulated brush of the ^five-year-old, and 
 
 [314]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 solemnly or insincerely signed by the mature painter!). 
 To find beauty in the thing that does not obviously sug- 
 gest it, to realize that nothing in art is more difficult and 
 dangerous than the painting of the frankly beautiful 
 thing such comments are sign-posts for the student, 
 and should go far to make the painter's attitude under- 
 standable to the layman. 
 
 Often in praising the sketch of a student in which the 
 impression had been freshly caught, he would say: "I 
 envy you the good time you had doing that." It was his 
 belief that the great canvases of the world were easily 
 done, since it is true of all art that a thing can be com- 
 pletely expressed only when all preliminary processes are 
 assimilated and have become second nature. The painter 
 of the Rossetti type possessed by the sentimental or 
 literary idea usually neglects the essential technical 
 foundation. The very mention of such a painter or such 
 a standpoint was sufficient to bring a cloud to Chase's 
 usually serene brow, but he did not believe in argument 
 on these subjects. He used to say: "I would cross the 
 street any day to avoid a man who differs with me on 
 the subject of art and insists upon discussing it." One's 
 convictions and choice once established, he believed that 
 nothing was gained by dispute. He invariably cautioned 
 his pupils against it, advising them to associate with 
 
 [315]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 those whose artistic convictions agreed with their own, 
 since the artist's mental state should always be as serene 
 as possible. 
 
 Chase used to be called by those artists and commen- 
 tators upon art who have literary leanings, a painter of 
 the outside merely. 
 
 Although remarks concerning the so-called "soul" of 
 the subject, that mysterious thing which is supposed by 
 picture-lovers with the emotional and literary view- 
 point to be impaled upon the canvas, somewhat dis- 
 turbed the painter, he was willing to discuss it in his 
 suggestive fashion with the pupil not yet free from senti- 
 mental yearnings. "Do not imagine that I would dis- 
 regard the thing that lies beneath the mask," he said, 
 "but be sure that when the outside is rightly seen, the 
 thing that lies under the surface will be found upon your 
 canvas." 
 
 It was amusing when Chase criticised to watch the 
 thing that took place in his mind as he talked. He would 
 begin very kindly and patiently, pointing out the defects, 
 passing on to an indication of the dangers of such de- 
 fects if uncorrected; then, if the fault chanced to be 
 one of his pet aversions overconscientiousness or, still 
 worse, prettiness he continued to warn, picturing the 
 terrible results that might ensue, until 'lie had gradually 
 
 [316]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 lashed himself into a state of indignation that was almost 
 fury over the vision his imagination had conjured up, 
 so that he sometimes left the easel of a favorite and 
 promising pupil crimson with potential wrath. 
 
 Chase's associates on juries were sometimes amused 
 by his conscientiousness in considering work that seemed 
 to the eyes of less unselfish painters unworthy of serious 
 attention. One fellow juryman aware of Chase's fatherly 
 attitude toward his pupils who discovered him bending 
 attentive glasses upon a rather unimportant sketch be- 
 fore it was cast aside, called out: "It's all right, Chase, 
 you don't know her." 
 
 Certain phrases of his whimsical, kindly, humorous, 
 impressionistic will always linger in the memory of his 
 students. In contemplating one of those peculiarly dreary 
 landscapes sometimes offered by students for criticism, 
 the thought that found words was: "How terrible if 
 nature should come to look to you like that." Once, 
 after he had given a long careful criticism upon a most 
 unpromising piece of work, a Central Park sketch exe- 
 cuted in raw and clashing colors, only to be met at the 
 end with renewed questions from the complacent ama- 
 teur showing that she had not understood a word he had 
 said, the painter's patience gave way. "What I mean, 
 madam, is that" he paused helplessly, then brought it 
 
 [O "I <* ~\ 
 *>!< j
 
 WILLIAM MERR1TT CHASE 
 
 out desperately "if it looks like that in the park, 7 
 don't want to go there !" 
 
 To another misguided pupil he said once: "You have 
 put enough work on that one daisy to have painted a 
 whole study." And to one who presented a hard, tight 
 little landscape: "You might crack a nut on that sky." 
 
 In considering a canvas false to some basic principle 
 of color, line or value Chase would often remark: "If it 
 looks like that to you, perhaps you'd do well to consult 
 an ocuh'st, sir [or madam]." 
 
 Upon one occasion, criticising a pupil working with 
 deliberate affectations, the young man after Chase's 
 protest "Why don't you paint things as you see them ? " 
 thought to forestall his master and with impertinent 
 insincerity suggested: "Perhaps there is something the 
 matter with my eyes, Mr. Chase." But he had reckoned 
 without his Chase. The master adjusted his glasses, 
 lifted one eyebrow, and gave the young man a brief 
 glance. "I think not, I think not! In your case, sir, the 
 trouble is a little higher up." 
 
 Yet his comments, even when they seemed but the 
 seizure of an irresistible opportunity, were never merely 
 amusing. The fundamental art principle was always there. 
 They could illumine a whole pathway for the student. 
 
 As positive advice he suggested, "Be^a picture worm"; 
 
 [318]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 and as negative but important hint, "Beware the bird's- 
 eye view !" Another comment that always seemed to me 
 a rule for the sincere student to carry all his days for 
 preservation of the right state of mind and nerves was: 
 "Combine a certain amount of indifference with your 
 ambition. Be carefully careless. If you don't succeed to- 
 day, there is always to-morrow." 
 
 "Do not try to paint the grandiose thing. Paint the 
 commonplace so that it will be distinguished" is a rule 
 that his own work well exemplifies and that the artist 
 can never afford to forget. Another, "Learn to paint so 
 well that you can conceal your own dexterity," is an 
 answer to those older academic painters who maintained 
 that Chase cared only for the externals of art. On that 
 same subject he said: "I fear some people confuse 
 technic with slashing brush strokes. Consider Holbein, 
 whose calm surfaces show him to be one of the world's 
 greatest masters of the technical side of art." 
 
 Another bit of advice helpful not only for student 
 days but through the painter's entire career is: "Don't 
 try to make comparisons between your own pictures. 
 Forget what you have done and think only of making 
 the best of what you are doing." 
 
 "Don't try to say the last word," "Don't paint in an 
 apologetic way," "When you begin to wonder what to 
 
 ['319]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 do, stop," are a few out of a long list of Chase's sug- 
 gestive maxims. 
 
 Another remark remembered by Reynolds Beal is very 
 characteristic of Chase's humor and his clear common 
 sense: "If the artist paints his picture squinting the pub- 
 lic will not see it as he saw it and he should put over 
 his canvas when he exhibits it, 'Please squint at this pic- 
 ture.' " Sargent, Chase told his pupils, opened his eyes 
 wider than usual when he looked at a picture in order 
 to cover with his vision as large a space as possible. 
 Mr. Beal tells another anecdote that shows how Chase 
 struggled to make his pupils understand the purpose 
 and destiny of the artist. "Try to paint the unusual 
 thing," the master said of course, referring to the 
 manner of painting, not the choice of subject to which 
 Mr. Beal replied: "Then people will say, 'Whoever saw 
 such a looking thing !' : 
 
 "Exactly," replied Chase; "it is the artist who points 
 out the unusual and educates the public." 
 
 Chase's instructions if seldom specific enough to sug- 
 gest the recipe were always definite enough to carry un- 
 derstanding to the pupil ready to receive what he had to 
 give. He would speak upon occasion of such purely tech- 
 nical points as how to start a canvas. "Note first your 
 highest lights and darkest dark." Another suggestion 
 
 [320]
 
 CHASE, THE TEACHER 
 
 designed to make the student remember the charm and 
 subtlety of delicate values and the light touch was: "The 
 successful picture ought to look as if it had been blown 
 on the canvas with one puff." 
 
 One of his few concrete suggestions dealt with the use 
 of white which he considered rather a dangerous pig- 
 ment for the student to handle, since white painted is in 
 reality anything but white, and at one time he did not 
 keep it on his own palette. Instead, he mixed a light gray 
 and had a paint-dealer put it up in tubes for him. The 
 next time he went to the shop he was surprised to find 
 it on sale under the name of "Chase gray." 
 
 What William Chase gave to his fellow artists and 
 pupils in his living, creating presence, his beautiful en- 
 thusiasm ever helping to keep alive the spirit of art, he 
 can give no more save as his deeds live in our memories. 
 But the stamp that his influence left upon his time is 
 ineffaceable. 
 
 Essential artist that he was, he was ever humble be- 
 fore the great spirit of art. In his mind there remained 
 always the distance between his ideal and his achieve- 
 ment, a deep feeling expressed once when, after showing 
 a number of his pictures to a guest, he pointed to a blank 
 canvas. "But that is my masterpiece," he said, "my un- 
 painted picture." 
 
 [321 ]
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 THE END 
 
 THE winter of 1915-16, as has been said, Chase 
 continued with his private class, but he did less 
 painting than usual. Although not aware that he had 
 any serious ailment, he was conscious of not feeling him- 
 self. He painted a small self-portrait the last year of his 
 life and several others, among them one of Mrs. Eldredge 
 Johnson and one of Mr. A. B. Gwathmey. Both are bril- 
 liant and characteristic examples of the real Chase. 
 
 In the spring he gave a talk to the students of the 
 Art League his last. In May he went to the meeting of 
 the Federation of Arts in Washington, the last public 
 function that he was to attend. In June the New York 
 University conferred the degree of Doctor of Laws upon 
 him. That same month he painted a portrait for the 
 Allied Bazaar. 
 
 Not wishing to leave his physician, he remained in 
 town through the summer, growing steadily weaker. 
 He continued to go to his studio, working as long as his 
 strength permitted. The portrait of Mr. Gwathmey, 
 referred to above, was his last work. 
 
 In September he went with Mrs. Chase to Atlantic 
 City. Before he left he dragged himself to his studio 
 and gathered together his paints. 
 
 [322]
 
 PORTRAIT OF A. B. GWATHMEY. 
 
 The last portrait painted by Chase.
 
 'You aren't going to try to paint while you are 
 there?" exclaimed a distressed pupil who was in the 
 studio, but Chase answered with his pathetic cheerful- 
 ness: "Of course I am! There's nothing like painting 
 . . . nothing like work." 
 
 On the way home he stopped at a Chinese shop to see 
 if the man had anything new and interesting. It was his 
 last walk in New York. 
 
 The first days of his stay in Atlantic City Chase was 
 able to walk a short distance. He bought a few rings at 
 a near-by shop and yearned for a very expensive piece of 
 brocade, which he was finally persuaded to do without. 
 He strongly desired a Japanese hanging of dark blue and 
 silver that he saw in a window. This Mrs. Chase had 
 sent to the hotel as a surprise for him. He took a great 
 fancy to this decoration, and when he went home had it 
 placed where he could see it from his bed. 
 
 From Atlantic City he wrote a short, pathetically 
 optimistic letter to his sisters-in-law to whom he had 
 been attached for so many years. 
 
 "MY DEAR GOOD SlSTERSI 
 
 "Just a line to say that I fully appreciate your con- 
 cern about me. I think we did well to come down. Toady 
 has of course written and told you of the perfect weather 
 we are having. With all that and the ideal nursing I am 
 
 [323 ]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 getting from Toady, I believe I am getting better. I hope 
 both of you are feeling well (I have come to envy anyone 
 who does). Time for medicine so I will say goodbye for 
 
 this time. With my blessing to you. 
 
 "WILL." 
 
 He was too weak to paint during those last weeks, but 
 he continually begged his wife to take out his paints, 
 as if through her he might give out the thing he wanted to 
 express. Perhaps, too, the unfailing instinct of the teacher 
 still survived in him. Too ill to read and not wanting to 
 be read to, he cared only to talk of pictures and art, 
 reviewing with his wife, as she has told in her foreword, 
 the art treasures of the European galleries playing a 
 sort of game of "remembering" each detail of a canvas, 
 even its placing upon the gallery wall, and what other 
 pictures were in that same room. 
 
 He did not realize that he could not live and spent 
 hours talking over his future plans with his wife. At last 
 as he only grew weaker, he was taken back to New York. 
 The last two days of his life he was unconscious. On 
 October 25th he died. 
 
 A few days before his death, while he was still able to 
 talk, his friend Irving Wiles came to see him, the only 
 person outside the family to see him after his return to 
 
 [324]
 
 THE END 
 
 New York. Although very weak and near the end, he 
 had sent to his studio for some pictures which he re- 
 quested to have hung upon the wall to show his painter 
 friend. An artist to his innermost soul, that last char- 
 acteristic act has a touching significance to those who 
 knew and loved him. 
 
 As his wife was leaving the room to tell Wiles to enter, 
 he called her back. He wanted the Japanese hanging, his 
 newest toy, arranged so that it would show all its beauties 
 to the other artist. Before he died he expressed the wish 
 that Wiles should finish his unfinished portrait com- 
 missions. 
 
 The debt of American art to William Merritt Chase 
 has yet to be computed in its entirety. It will gather in- 
 terest with the years, for whatever valuation the future 
 may put upon his work, his lifelong service to the art he 
 loved must last as long as there are records and histories 
 of art. 
 
 [325 ]
 
 LOCATION OF CHASE'S PICTURES 
 
 The following is a list of Chase's pictures owned by 
 museums and public galleries: 
 
 BOSTON Museum of Fine Arts: 
 
 Still Life Fish. 
 
 CHICAGO Art Institute: 
 
 Alice. 
 
 North River Shad. 
 
 CINCINNATI Museum Association: 
 The Mirror. 
 Still Life. 
 
 Woman with Basket. 
 Still Life. 
 Robert Blum. 
 
 DETROIT Museum of Art: 
 
 Yield of the Waters. 
 Self-Portrait. 
 
 FLORENCE, ITALY Uffizi Palace: 
 
 Self-Portrait. 
 
 INDIANAPOLIS John Herron Art Institute: 
 
 After the Shower. 
 
 Dorothy. 
 
 Still Life. 
 
 Fish Still Life. 
 NEW YORK CITY 
 
 Brooklyn Museum : 
 
 The Antiquary's Shop. 
 
 In the Studio. 
 
 Japanese Study; a Portrait. 
 
 Fish. 
 
 Lydia Field Emmett. 
 
 o 
 
 [326]
 
 LOCATION OF CHASE'S PICTURES 
 
 Metropolitan Museum of Art: 
 
 Lady in Black. 
 
 Carmencita. 
 
 Seventeenth Century Lady. 
 
 Still Life. 
 
 Shinnecock Hall. 
 Union League Club : 
 
 Ready for the Ride. 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts: 
 
 Lady with a White Shawl. 
 
 Still Life Fish. 
 Wilstach Gallery: 
 
 Still Life. 
 
 PITTSBURGH Carnegie Institute: 
 Mrs. Chase. 
 William N. Frew. 
 English Cod. 
 Tenth Street Studio. 
 
 POUGHKEEPSIE Taylor Art Building, Vassar College: 
 James Monroe Taylor. 
 
 PROVIDENCE Rhode Island School of Design: 
 The Lady in Pink. 
 In Venice. 
 
 Study of Girl's Head. 
 Dorothy. 
 Still Life. 
 
 RICHMOND, INDIANA Art Association: 
 Self-Portrait. 
 
 ST. Louis City Art Museum: 
 Still Life. 
 
 Courtyard of an Orphan Asylum. 
 Holland. 
 An Old Salt. 
 Contemplation. 
 
 [327]
 
 WILLIAM MERRITT CHASE 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C. 
 
 Corcoran Gallery of Art: 
 
 The Model (pastel). 
 An English Cod. 
 
 National Gallery of Art: 
 
 Shinnecock Hills. 
 
 YOUNGSTOWN, OHIO: 
 
 Master Roland. 
 
 The following portraits by Chase are owned by col- 
 leges and other public associations: 
 
 Doctor Andrews Brown University. 
 
 Doctor Reynolds Chicago University. 
 
 Doctor James Taylor Vassar College. 
 
 Doctor Angell University of Michigan. 
 
 Reverend Arthur Brooks Church of the Incarnation. 
 
 Captain Casey Seventh Regiment Armory. 
 
 John F. Kennedy Presbyterian Hospital. 
 
 Frederick S. Sturges Presbyterian Hospital. 
 
 Dean Grosvenor Synod Hall, Cathedral of St. John the Divine. 
 
 Robert Buchanan The White House. 
 
 Seth Low Borough Hall, Brooklyn, New York. 
 
 Clyde Fitch Amherst College. 
 
 Emil Paur Lotus Club. 
 
 Louis Windmiiller Reform Club. 
 
 Doctor De Forest Willard University of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Sir William Osier University of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Of Chase's copies from the old masters the following 
 are owned by public galleries and associations: 
 
 Cooper Union Buildings 
 
 Committee Women by Frans Hals : Museum^of Decorative Arts. 
 
 [328]
 
 LOCATION OF CHASE'S PICTURES 
 
 Game, Original in Schleisheim Gallery, by Ferdinand Bol: 
 
 Museum. 
 
 Painting of a War Scene by Karl von Piloty: Museum of Art. 
 Portrait by Van Dyck: Woman's Art School. 
 Menippus by Velasquez: Woman's Art School. 
 Figure from St. Joris Shooting Company by Frans Hals: 
 
 Woman's Art School. 
 
 Msop by Velasquez: Woman's Art School. 
 Portrait by Rubens: Woman's Art School. 
 
 The Nelson Collection of Copies of Old Masters, Indianapolis 
 The Standard Bearer, Frans Hals. Detail of La Compagnie 
 
 Maigre from the Rijks Museum, Amsterdam. 
 Las Meninas, Velasquez: Prado Museum, Madrid. 
 
 The Players' Club, New York 
 The Actor, Velasquez. 
 
 Owned by the Chase Estate 
 The Queen. 
 
 The Infanta, Velasquez. 
 The Man with the Red Knee. Detail from the group of men 
 
 in the Haarlem Rathhaus. 
 Detail from the Officers of St. Joris, Haarlem Rathhaus. 
 
 Other copies of old masters by Chase sold at the sale 
 of 1896 are: 
 
 Velasquez, Don Diego Ribera, Jose 
 
 Head of Philip IV. Portrait of a Man. 
 
 Portrait of Himself. 
 
 Philip IV. Van Rhyn, Rembrandt 
 The Spinners. Portrait of Himself. 
 
 Van Dyck, A. 
 
 Die Heilige Magdaline. Watteau, Antoine 
 
 Portrait of a Lad. The Seven Ages. 
 
 [329]
 
 LIST OF MEDALS RECEIVED 
 BY WILLIAM M. CHASE 
 
 Bronze medal, Munich, 1873. 
 
 Bronze medal, Munich, 1874. 
 
 Silver medal, Munich, 1874. 
 
 Bronze medal, Munich, 1875. 
 
 Bronze medal, Munich, 1876. 
 
 Medal, Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia, 1876. 
 
 Massachusetts silver medal, 1878. 
 
 Honorable mention, Paris Salon, 1881. 
 
 Gold medal, Munich, 1883. 
 
 Gold medal, Paris Salon, 1889. 
 
 Member, International Jury of Awards, Columbian Exposition, 
 
 Chicago, 1893. 
 
 First prize, Cleveland Art Association, 1894. 
 Gold medal of honor, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1894. 
 Shaw prize, Society American Artists, 1895. 
 Shaw fund prize at the Society of American Artists, 1895. 
 Gold medal, Paris Exposition, 1900. 
 
 Temple gold medal, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1901. 
 Gold medal, Pan-American Exposition, Buffalo, 1901. 
 Gold medal, Charleston Exposition, 1902. 
 First Corcoran prize, Society Washington Artists, 1904. 
 Gold medal, Louisiana Purchase Exposition, 1904. 
 Member, International Jury of Awards, St. Louis Exposition, 1904. 
 Gold medal, Buenos Aires, 1910. 
 Bronze medal presented by the Hispanic Society, New York City. 
 
 [330]
 
 LETTERS AND SKETCHES 
 
 BY 
 
 CHASE AND HIS FRIENDS
 
 F. S. Church. 
 
 Chase 
 
 Dielman. 
 
 Sarah Cowell Le Moyne. 
 
 Alice Gerson. 
 
 SILHOUETTES MADE BY CHASE. CHURCH, DIELMAN, AND SHIRLAW. 
 AT THE GERSONS' HOME ABOUT 1879. 
 
 [333]
 
 ou 
 
 otiww 0lu M^ 
 
 
 V 
 
 LETTER FROM F. S. CHURCH TO MISS C.ERSON, ABOUT 1879. 
 
 [334]
 
 / /"J 
 
 CL-.-"/'vJ ^>?-!/ C^-?"~ 'ZC.*^, 
 
 i S. ^ 1 
 
 
 -r-,.^ i**^ 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, 1881. 
 
 [335]
 
 ~ ; \ .v " \ ~ . / 
 
 i-^-i-1 *J/** '" * /- ^ 
 
 **-*-/*a -.""" ^*^is\ri^ ^^ i //y)* 5 ^^ / * A r** 
 
 X^ ^1^9-^8? ? 
 
 / / ^i-""- -."H u ?* * 
 
 / / r^* tv . . t*f # ^ ii > i 
 
 LETTER FROM CHASE TO ALICE GERSON, 1881.
 
 LETTKR FROM BLUM TO CHASE, SPAIN, 188. 
 
 [337]
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM IN VENICE, 1885. 
 
 [338]
 
 r 
 
 CARICATURES OF TWACHTMAX (left) AXD CHASE (right) IX A LETTER 
 FROM Hl.lM TO CHASE, 1885. 
 
 [339]
 
 /V^H/ ^rjc^ /Xt^//C 
 
 i ' hk^l- 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, VENICE, 1885. 
 
 [340]
 
 v',V -^M>*~ W^E, 
 
 LKTTER FROM TWACHTMAX TO CHASE FROM VENICE, 1885. 
 [341]
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE FROM VENICE, 1885.
 
 ~Q <- 
 
 X/ <**-- >>- C 
 
 ^ 
 ^ 
 
 Ot O-O-t_-v- ^^"^vVT 
 
 C^lC 
 
 ^ 
 
 y? oc^-^--^& <7i''. 
 
 c.: 
 
 LETfER FROM BLUM IN VENICE TO CHASE IN .NEW YORK. ABOUT 1889. 
 
 [343]
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, ABOUT ISHii. 
 
 (344]
 
 /' 
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, ABOUT 1889. 
 
 [345
 
 VENETIAN SKETCHES IN LETTER FROM HI-l'M TO CHASE, ABOUT 1889. 
 
 [346]
 
 w 
 
 *x. 
 
 h-I 
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM TO CHASE, 1890. 
 
 [347]
 
 LETTER FROM BLUM IX JAPAN TO CHASE, 1891. 
 
 [348
 
 INDEX 
 
 Abbey, Edwin, 19, 123, 215, 223, 285. 
 
 Academy of Arts and Letters, 219. 
 
 Academy of Design, 18, 20, 158. 
 
 Allston, Washington, 22. 
 
 Alma-Tadema, 215. 
 
 American art, 16-18, 23, 54, 79, 297. 
 
 American Painters in Pastel, 107-108. 
 
 Art Club, the, 57. 
 
 Art League, 55, 85, 100, 151, 231, 309. 
 
 Beard, 21. 
 
 Beaux, Cecilia, 307. 
 
 Beckwith, Carroll, 56, 93, 155, 234, 307. 
 
 Belgenland, decoration of, 93. 
 
 Benson, Frank, 307. 
 
 Bierstadt, 23. 
 
 Blum, Robert, 69, 93, 95, 104, 105, 106, 
 
 107, 108, 116, 145-146, 158-161, 192, 
 
 211, 269. 
 
 Boston Art Club exhibition, 150. 
 Brangwyn, 191, 238, 246. 
 Bret Harte, 19. 
 Bronson, Mrs., 45, 46, 50. 
 Bruges, 238. 
 
 Brush, George DeForest, 224. 
 Buffalo Bill, 270. 
 Bunce, Gedney, 95. 
 Burne-Jones, Chase's opinion of, 215. 
 
 California, 246-252. 
 
 Carmel-by-the-Sea, 247. 
 
 Carmencita in the Tenth Street Studio, 
 
 155-158. 
 
 Centennial Exhibit, 54. 
 Central Park sketches, 151, 280. 
 Chardin, 279. 
 Chase 
 
 Art and art opinions, 275-308. 
 
 Atlantic City, at, 322. 
 
 Birth, 1. 
 
 Boyhood, anecdotes of, 2-5. 
 
 Children, 159, 162, 166, 185, 214, 
 245, 265-267, 271-274. 
 
 Children, marriage of, 236, 237. 
 
 Classes, 165, 309. 
 
 Collections, 300. 
 
 Columbus competition, 38-40. 
 
 Copley, 297. 
 
 Death, 324. 
 
 Degree, N. Y. University, 322. 
 
 Etchings, 292. 
 
 Exhibition, his first, 22. 
 
 Fifth Avenue Studio, 171. 
 
 Florentine art, his opinion of, 223- 
 
 224. 
 
 Fourth Avenue Studio, 18, 229-231. 
 Free art bill, interest in, 306. 
 Hat, 144-145, 262-263. 
 Hoboken, in, 162. 
 Holland, in, 108-145, 204-213. 
 Imitative gift, his, 258. 
 Indiana, We in, 1-8, 10-14. 
 Indiana Art Association, 251-252. 
 Interiors, 278. 
 
 Italy, in, 223-227, 231-232, 233, 240. 
 London, in, 114, 190-192, 214-218, 
 
 238, 246. 
 
 Munich, in, 27-44, 193-202. 
 National Academy, 42. 
 New York, student days in, 15-26. 
 Paints, first use of, 11. 
 Parents, 1, 10, 24, 186. 
 Paris, in, 94-95, 104, 192. 
 Pastel, use of, 291. 
 Portraits of self, 224, 251, 252. 
 Rings, collection of, 261. 
 Sargent's portrait of, 172-173. 
 School, The, 171. 
 Shinnecock, at, 162. 
 Society American Artists, connection 
 
 with, 85, 150. 
 Spam, in, 95-100, 104-107, 168-170, 
 
 219-222. 
 
 Still-life studies, first, 22. 
 Studios, 13, 18, 40, 56, 171, 229, 300 
 Venice, in, 45-51, 234, 240-244. 
 Whistler, meeting with, 111. 
 Chase canvases mentioned 
 Alice, 165. 
 Antiquary's Shop, The, 47. 
 
 349
 
 INDEX 
 
 Apprentice Boy, The, 42. 
 
 Belgian Melon, A, 22, 239. 
 
 Boy with Cockatoo, 42. 
 
 Broken Jug, The, 42, 54. 
 
 Dorothy and Her Sister, 171, 305. 
 
 Dowager, The, 42. 
 
 English Cod, An, 216-218. 
 
 Fish Market, The, 47, 242. 
 
 Flame, The, 248, 282. 
 
 Grey Kimono, The, 171, 283. 
 
 Gwathmey, portrait, 288, 322. 
 
 Hide and Seek, 278. 
 
 Jester, The, 41, 54, 292. 
 
 Johnson, Robert Underwood, portrait, 
 240. 
 
 Just Onions, 239. 
 
 Lady in Black, The, 158. 
 
 Lady urith White Shawl, The, 165, 228, 
 233, 288. 
 
 Mother and Child, 154, 283, 305. 
 
 Old Cavalier, 42. 
 
 Paur, Emil, portrait, 171. 
 
 Ready for the Ride, 42, 54. 
 
 Red Box, The, 171, 282, 305. 
 
 Ring Toss, 279. 
 
 Smoker, The, 41. 
 
 Spanish Lady, A, 281. 
 
 Sunlight and Shadow, 108, 204. 
 
 Turkish Page, The, 40, 42. 
 
 Uffizi Gallery, self portrait for, 225. 
 
 Windmuller, Louis, portrait, 174, 288. 
 Chase, Mrs., 150, 153, 171, 184, 253-254. 
 Christy, Howard Chandler, 181, 301. 
 Church, F. S., 65-68, 70-72, 73. 
 Ciardi, Signorina, 241-242. 
 Cincinnati Exhibition, 232. 
 Cooper Union, 20, 328. 
 Currier, Frank, 29, 42, 292. 
 
 Daniel, 55, 78, 88-92. 
 
 De Hooghe, 279. 
 
 Del Monte, 247. 
 
 Dielman, Frederick, 26, 28, 36, 83. 
 
 Dietrich, 196. 
 
 Dietz, 196, 198. 
 
 Dodd, Samuel, 112. 
 
 Dog story, Madrid, 97. 
 
 Dogs, 87, 109. 
 
 Diisseldorf School, 16. 
 
 Duveneck, Frank, 26, 28, 29, 40, 45, 46, 
 51, 53, 307, 308. 
 
 Eaton, J. O., 14, 18, 19. 
 
 Eaton, Wyatt, 19. 
 
 Fairman, 22. 
 
 Fish still-life, 228, 248, 305. 
 
 Fish still-life, manner of painting, 283- 
 
 284. 
 
 Fortuny, influence of, 281. 
 Fortuny, Mme., 243-244. 
 French Plein Air School, 280. 
 Fuller, George, 16, 18, 24. 
 Futurists, Chase's opinion of, 179, 296. 
 
 Gerson family, The, 68-74, 84, 208-211, 
 
 265, 323. 
 
 Gibson, Charles Dana, 240, 270. 
 Gilder, Mr. and Mrs. R. W., 55. 
 Greco, El, 255-256, 298-299. 
 Guarino, Salvatore, 302. 
 
 von Habermann, 34. 
 Hals, Franz, 211, 213, 297. 
 Harper's Christmas, 82. 
 Harrison, Alexander, 193. 
 Harrison, Birge, 253, 305. 
 Hawthorne, C. W., 302. 
 Hayes, Benjamin, 13. 
 Holbein, Chase's opinion of, 319. 
 Homer, Winslow, 18, 21. 
 Horn, Oliver, 21, 83. 
 Hudson River School, The, 21, 79. 
 Hunt, William, 16. 
 
 Indianapolis, 6, 8, 10. 
 Inman, 297. 
 Inness, George, 20. 
 Israels, 212. 
 
 Japanese art, 279. 
 Jewett, Sarah, 19. 
 Jocko, 47-50. 
 
 Kaulbach, 27, 37. 
 Kelly, James, 19, 69. 
 King, 22. 
 
 [350 ] 
 
 La Touche, death of, 243. 
 
 *
 
 INDEX 
 
 La Touche, Chase's meeting with, 239. 
 
 Lavery, 191, 215. 
 
 Leibl, 27, 29, 203. 
 
 von Lenbach, 199. 
 
 Leutze, 16. 
 
 Lie, Jonas, 302. 
 
 Low, Will, 21. 
 
 Ludwig, King, 31. 
 
 Macy, W. S., 19, 47. 
 
 Manet, 94. 
 
 Marr, Carl, 198. 
 
 Martin, Homer, 21. 
 
 Mesdag, 206, 212. 
 
 Metropolitan Museum, 20, 55. 
 
 Meyer, Jerome, 302. 
 
 Millais, Sir John, 129. 
 
 Miller, N.A., Charles, 28, 56. 
 
 Miller, Zack, 270. 
 
 Mitchell, Bleecker, 67. 
 
 Models, the first, 59. 
 
 Moore, George, Chase's opinion of, 254. 
 
 Morse, Samuel, 20, 22, 297. 
 
 Mowbray, Siddons, 108. 
 
 Mulvaney, John, 25. 
 
 Munich 
 
 Columbus competition, 38. 
 
 Max Emmanuel Cafe, 32. 
 
 New Pinakotek, 196. 
 
 Old Pinakotek, 33, 196. 
 
 Royal Academy, 27, 28, 38. 
 
 Schack gallery, 199. 
 
 Student days, 27-44, 51. 
 Munich revisited, 194-201. 
 Munich School, 17, 42, 276. 
 Murillo, Chase's opinion of, 296. 
 
 National Arts Club Exhibition, 232, 304. 
 National Gallery, 216. 
 New York School of Art, connection with, 
 171, 224. 
 
 Palmer, Walter, 57, 87, 306. 
 
 Pan-American Exposition, 246, 252. 
 
 Parrish, Maxfield, 260. 
 
 Peale, 22. 
 
 Pennland, decoration of, 103, 108. 
 
 Pennsylvania Academy, 171, 231. 
 
 Philadelphia Free Class, 310. 
 
 Piloty, Karl von, 27, 37, 39-40, 293. 
 Platt, Livingston, 152, 311-313. 
 Polling, 51-53. 
 Poore, Henry, 303. 
 Prospect Park sketches, 151. 
 
 Quartley, Arthur, 76, 83, 103. 
 
 Raphael, Chase's opinion of, 292. 
 Reinhart, C. S., 28, 83. 
 Rembrandt, Chase's opinion of, 292. 
 Rittenberg, Henry, 35, 196, 197, 198, 201, 
 
 202. 
 Rolshoven, Julius, 224. 
 
 St. Louis, 24, 25. 
 
 Sargent, John, 24, 155-156, 157, 158, 215, 
 
 238, 307. 
 
 Sargent's portrait of Chase, 172, 173. 
 Sarony, Napoleon, 81, 86-87. 
 Schoolship Portsmouth, 9, 10. 
 Schreyvogel, 302. 
 Seiffert, Leopold, 302. 
 Shannon, J. J., 215. 
 Sherwood, Rosina Emmett, 22, 85. 
 Shinn, Everett, 302. 
 Shinnecock, 162, 165, 175-188, 273. 
 Shinnecock art village, 177, 188. 
 Shinnecock criticisms, 177-183. 
 Shinnecock Indians, 186-187. 
 Shinnecock landscapes, 175. 
 Shinnecock tableaux, 184. 
 Shirlaw, Walter, 26, 29, 30, 51, 194. 
 Smith, Hopkinson, 21, 56, 77, 81. 
 Society of American Artists, 55, 85, 150. 
 Sorolla, 220. 
 Spanish art, 96, 280. 
 Stevens, Alfred, 95, 135, 211, 276. 
 Stewart, Gilbert, 297. 
 StUck, 200. 
 
 Studio buildings in New York, 19-20. 
 Studio life, beginning of, 60. 
 Studio life in New York, 19. 
 Studio, The, 57. 
 Sully, 22, 297. 
 
 Tate Gallery, 215. 
 
 Ten American Painters, 174, 305. 
 
 [351]
 
 INDEX 
 
 Tenth Street Studio, The, 20, 56, 86, 153, 
 
 166-167. 
 
 Tintoretto, 242, 293. 
 Twachtman, John H., 26, 42, 45, 80, 147- 
 
 148, 174. 
 Twain, Mark, 44. 
 
 von Uhde, Fritz, 201. 
 
 Ullman, Eugene Paul, 196, 201, 202, 204. 
 
 Van Dyck, Anthony, 43. 
 
 Van Dyke, John, 212. 
 
 Velasquez, 93, 96. 
 
 Velasquez, anecdote of, 169. 
 
 Velasquez, Chase's admiration for, 100, 
 
 297. 
 
 Velasquez copies, 168, 169, 328, 329. 
 Velasquez, influence of, 281. 
 Vermeer, 279, 297. 
 Vinton, Frederick, 103, 104, 232. 
 Vollon, 258, 297. 
 
 Wagner, Richard and Cosima, 31. 
 
 Weir, Alden, 94, 307. 
 
 West, Benjamin, 22, 27. 
 
 Wheeler, Dora, 85. 
 
 Wheeler, Mrs. Candace, 82, 103. 
 
 Whistler, 9, 18. 
 
 Whistler, Chase's association with, 111- 
 
 149, 207. 
 
 Whistler, Chase portraits, the, 139-142. 
 Whistler, Chase's portrait of, 289, 305. 
 Wiggin, Kate Douglas, 154. 
 Wiles, Gladys, 234. 
 Wiles, Irving, 58, 219, 233, 307, 324, 
 
 325. 
 
 WUhelm, Kaiser, 202, 228. 
 Wilhelmj, 260. 
 Williamsburg, Indiana, 1. 
 Wyant, A. H., 23. 
 
 Zandvoort, 108, 204. 
 Zuloaga, 255-256. 
 
 [352]
 
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