Documents associated with: mezzotint
Record 8 of 18
System Number: 00303
Date: [c. 31 December 1878][1]
Author: JW
Place: London
Recipient: George Bird[2]
Place: [London]
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler B79
Document Type: ALS
[butterfly signature]
THE WHITE HOUSE,[3]
CHELSEA EMBANKMENT.
So you are back! My dear Doctor you ought to have been here at the fight![4] - I said to your sister[5] that together you and I could whip the crowd I believed! -
Now go at once this very day to Chatto & Windus[6] - Piccadilly - you know Swinburnes[7] publishers, and ask for several copies of Whistler's pamphlet[8]. [p. 2] and you are not to give them away! but to make everybody else get them also at Chatto's - so that the run on the thing may keep up! - Miss Bird[9] must go herself too - The ladies you know are the ones to win the world with and especially they must eagerly cry out in full Piccadilly for Whistlers pamphlet!
You remember that I "shoved Seymour Haden[10] on ten years"! well I rather fancy this will let old Ruskin[11] down to the end of his Almanack with a run! -
Ever yours
J A McN. Whistler
All right about the Carlyles[12] - It is a pang to have to give up the pretty pink cheque to the Graves[13]! - You will have the prints directly
This document is protected by copyright.
Notes:
1. [c. 31 December 1878]
Dated from reference to Whistler, James McNeill, Whistler v. Ruskin: Art and Art Critics, London, 1878, which has the date of 24 December 1878 on the cover.
2. George Bird
Dr George Bird (1817-ca 1899), physician [more].
3. THE WHITE HOUSE,
The address heading is embossed on page.
4. the fight!
JW's libel suit against John Ruskin (1819-1900), critic, social reformer and artist [more], Whistler v. Ruskin, 25-26 November 1878.
5. sister
Alice L. Bird (b. ca 1833), sister of Dr George Bird [more].
6. Chatto & Windus
London publishers of Whistler, James McNeill, Whistler v. Ruskin: Art and Art Critics, London, 1878.
7. Swinburne's
Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837-1909), poet and critic [more].
8. Whistler's pamphlet
Whistler, James McNeill, Whistler v. Ruskin: Art and Art Critics, London, 1878.
9. Miss Bird
i.e. Alice L. Bird (see above).
10. Seymour Haden
Francis Seymour Haden (1818-1910), surgeon and etcher, JW's brother-in-law [more].
11. Ruskin
John Ruskin (1819-1900), critic, social reformer and artist [more].
12. Carlyles
A mezzotint of Arrangement in Grey and Black, No. 2: Portrait of Thomas Carlyle (YMSM 137), was engraved by Richard Josey during the summer of 1878. According to Pennell, Elizabeth Robins, and Joseph Pennell, The Life of James McNeill Whistler, 2 vols, London and Philadelphia, 1908, vol. I, p. 227, the first proofs were delivered on 2 December 1878.
13. Graves
Henry Graves (1806-1892), print dealer and founder of H. Graves and Co. [more]. The firm published the mezzotint of Arrangement in Grey and Black, No. 2: Portrait of Thomas Carlyle (YMSM 137).